Jafar al-Askari

Jafar al-Askari

Jafar (also: Jafar ) Pascha al-Askari (completely Muḥammad Ǧaʿfar Pascha bin Muṣṭafā bin ʿAbd ar-Raḥman al-ʿAskarī , Arabic جعفر العسكري Jaʿfar al-ʿAskarī , DMG Ǧaʿfar al-ʿAskarī ; born September 15, 1885 in Baghdad ; died October 30, 1936 ibid), was an Ottoman officer and Iraqi statesman .

Life

Jafar was born the son of an Ottoman officer and grew up in Mosul . The Nisba al-Askari is derived from the name of the place Askar (near Kirkuk ), where his paternal ancestor Abdullah Madani, who came from Medina , settled in the 16th century. From 1897 to 1901 he attended the military school in Baghdad and from 1901 to 1904 the military academy in Constantinople . As a lieutenant , he was assigned to the 6th Army in Baghdad following his training and took part in the war for Qasim in 1905 . From 1910 to 1912 Jafar stayed in Germany for military training. Apart from a few months inIn Berlin he spent this time in Karlsruhe with the Badischer Leibregiment 109 ( 28th Division , XIV. Army Corps ). When the First Balkan War broke out in October 1912 , Jafar was ordered back and assigned to the 11th Regiment (II Corps) as the commander of a company. Wounded on October 22, 1912, he was assigned to the General Staff of the X Corps after his recovery . Chief of staff at that time was Lieutenant Colonel Enver Bey . After the end of the Balkan wars, he became an instructor at the military academy in Aleppo and passed the exam at the staff academy. The first months of the First World War Jafar was assigned to the headquarters of Admiral Guido von Usedom , who was assigned to strengthen the fortifications of the Dardanelles . At the beginning of 1915 he was sent to Kyrenaica together with Nuri Bey to persuade the Senussi Order to invade British-occupied Egypt and to organize it. The invasion began on November 23, 1915. Jafar was captured by the British on February 26, 1916 at the Battle of Aqaqir . During his imprisonment in Cairo , he was persuaded by his friend and brother-in-law Nuri as-Said to join the revolt of the Emir of Mecca , Hussein bin Ali , against the Ottoman Empire and from March 1917 took over the post of the disgraced Aziz Ali al -Misri as Commander-in-Chief of the Arab Army .

After the end of the war he was briefly inspector general of the Syrian army and from 1919 to 1920 military governor of the province of Aleppo. He then became military advisor to Faisal, who was proclaimed King of Syria in March 1920 . Faisal was driven out by the French in July 1920, but the British promised him the royal dignity over Iraq and at the end of October 1920 appointed a provisional government for the period up to the coronation in August 1921 , in which Jafar became Minister of Defense and with the establishment of the Iraqi Army was commissioned. From November 1922 to September 1923 he was a diplomatic agent in London. Jafar was first appointed Prime Minister in November 1923. His cabinet was tasked with forming a constituent assembly and ratifying the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty of 1924. Jafar resigned on August 3, 1924, and resumed his post as diplomatic agent in London. At the end of 1926 he was again entrusted by Faisal I with the compilation of a cabinet. His attempt to introduce compulsory military service failed due to the opposition of the British government, whereupon he resigned as Prime Minister on January 28, 1928 and was again diplomatic agent in London. From 1930 until his death, he alternated various offices and ministerial posts at short intervals. Jafar was assassinated during the 1936 military coup on behalf of General Bakr Sidqī .

memoirs

Jafar could not finish his memoirs; they break off in 1919. They were published in Arabic in 1988 and in English translation in 2003.

• مذكرات جعفر العسكري[Mudhakkirāt Jaʻfar al-ʻAskarī]. Dār al-Lām, London 1988, ISBN 1-870326-11-3 .
• A Soldier's Story: From Ottoman Rule to Independent Iraq: The Memoirs of Jafar Pasha Al-Askari. Translated by Mustafa Tariq Al-Askari, edited by William Facey and Najdat Fathi Safwat. Arabian Publishing, London 2003, ISBN 0-9544792-0-3 .

literature

• Najdat Fathi Safwat: Introduction. In: The Memoirs of Jafar Pasha Al-Askari. Pp. 1-11.
• Najdat Fathi Safwat: A Brief Biography of Jafar Al-Askari from the End of his Memoirs until his Death. In: The Memoirs of Jafar Pasha Al-Askari, pp. 179-199.