Early Life and Career
Abd al-Karim Qasim's father was a Sunni Muslim of Arabic and Kurdish descent who died shortly after his son's birth during World War I as a soldier for the Ottoman Empire. Qasim's mother was a Shiite and the daughter of a Feyli Kurd farmer from Baghdad.
When Qasim was six years of age his family moved to Suwayra, a small town near the Tigris, then to Baghdad in 1926. Qasim was an excellent student; he entered secondary school on a government scholarship. After graduation in 1931, he taught at Shamiyya Elementary School from Oct 22 of that year until Sept 3 1932, when he was accepted into Military College. In 1934, he graduated as a second lieutenant. Qasim then attended al-Arkan (Iraqi Staff) College and graduated with honor (grade A) in December 1941. In 1951, he completed a senior officers’ course in Britain.
Militarily, he participated in the suppression of the tribal disturbances in the Middle Euphrates region in 1935, during the Anglo-Iraqi War in May 1941 and in the Kurdistan War in 1945. Qassim also served during the Iraqi military involvement in the Arab-Israeli War from May 1948 to June 1949. Toward the latter part of the mission, he commanded a battalion of the First Brigade, which was situated in the Kafr Qasem area south of Qilqilya. In 1956-57, he served with his brigade at Mafraq in Jordan in the wake of the Suez Crisis. By 1957 Qasim had assumed leadership of several opposition groups that had formed in the army.
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