Saud ibn Abd al-Aziz
Saud ibn Abd al-Aziz Al Saud ( Arabic سعود بن عبد العزيز آل سعود, DMG Saʿūd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Āl Saʿūd ; * January 15, 1902 in Kuwait City ; † February 23, 1969 in Athens , Greece ) came from the Saud dynasty and was the second king of Saudi Arabia from 1953 to 1964 .
Ascent
Saud was born in Kuwait on January 15, 1902, the second eldest son of King Abd al-Aziz ibn Abd ar-Rahman Al Saud , the day Saud's father conquered Riyadh .
His mother was Princess Wahdba Bint Mohammed Bin Al-Uraymir Al-Hazzam of the Bani Khalid tribe. Saud's biological brothers were named Prince Turki I, Prince Fahd I and Prince Abdul Salam. All had died at an early age. After the death of his older brother Prince Turki in 1919, he was his father's eldest surviving son.
Saud took part in his father's numerous audiences and thus learned direct contact between the ruler and his subjects.
During his youth, Saud also had to live with the country's Bedouins. This is what his father required of each of his sons so that they would understand the simple way of life of the Bedouins, their culture, history and mentality and live accordingly. In addition, the king's sons had to get up two hours before dawn, go barefoot and ride a horse and a camel without a saddle.
On May 10, 1933, King Abdul Aziz appointed Prince Saud as Crown Prince in Mecca. For the tradition-conscious people this was a mistake, because it broke old Bedouin traditions. The emirs and sheikhs of the desert tribes had never been allowed to choose their successors alone: the most experienced and elders of the men always had a say. In addition, the Bedouin custom required that the selection be made shortly before the ruler's death. But Abdul Aziz had chosen his successor 20 years before his death in order to prevent the collapse of his newly created empire through family feuds. However, he was aware at the time that he was violating tradition, because he made it a point to appoint a second Crown Prince so that the most experienced and elders had a choice - this second Crown Prince was Prince Faisal .
In October 1953, King Abdul Aziz formally established a Council of Ministers, the chairman of which he appointed the Crown Prince. At the same time, Saud was appointed commander in chief of the armed forces by his father. The king took this step due to increasing pressure from his sons, especially from Crown Prince Saud and Prince Faisal, who demanded a modern system of government for the kingdom.
King Abdul Aziz died on November 9, 1953. In the provisions of his estate, he had stipulated that his sons should respect the different maternal ties, never turn against one another and at the same time respect Islam and Wahhabi teachings. The kingdom was to be brought into modern times without destroying traditional values.
Saud was appointed king on the anniversary of his father's death and named Prince Faisal as the new crown prince that same day. King Saud's reign was characterized by the creation of numerous ministerial posts, often delegated to close family members, with their expertise being of secondary importance. On March 7, 1954, Saud appointed a new Council of Ministers. He acted as its chairman and also as prime minister. He appointed his brother Faisal, who also served as foreign minister, as deputy prime minister.
Saud's extravagance , which was reflected in his palaces, soon got the state budget in trouble, despite the millions in revenue from the oil business. He gave away countless gold watches to the Bedouins in order to secure their loyalty. After handing over key administrative posts to his own sons, his brothers feared that the Saudi Succession Act would be called into question and deprived of their rights to the throne.
After taking over the government, he continued his father's policy. The close relations with the USA and Great Britain continued.
In August 1954, Saud and Faisal made a mutual agreement to share some of the power of government. Saud then named Faisal Prime Minister. The post of Deputy Prime Minister initially remained vacant. Saud retained the chairmanship of the Council of Ministers at the same time. At the same time, Saud dismissed Finance Minister Sheikh Abdullah as-Sulaiman from his office and appointed Mohammed bin Surur as-Sabban as the new Finance Minister.
On March 22, 1958, Prince Mohammed and Prince Talal called on King Saud to abdicate, while other princes demanded the full transfer of executive power to Crown Prince Faisal. Prince Abdullah was able to negotiate a compromise between his nephews, King Saud, and Crown Prince Faisal. Faisal refused to accept the royal dignity. He was now given full executive governance in the domestic, external and financial sectors as prime minister. Saud retained the royal dignity, but acted only as head of state and commander in chief of the armed forces . Furthermore, all security matters were left to him.
On March 23, 1958, Faisal, as Prime Minister with full executive powers, immediately began reducing the kingdom's $ 480 million debt accumulated by Saud's lifestyle. In May Faisal appointed a new Council of Ministers.
Since 1962, Saudi Arabia also supported the royalists in the Yemeni civil war against the Egyptian- backed Republicans.
Power struggle and exile
Tensions about King Saud and his brother Faisal, who were characterized by opposing lifestyles, intensified within the royal family. While the king was fond of games, alcohol and women, his brother was considered a strict Wahhabit . The first crisis arose in 1962 when King Saud underwent medical treatment in the United States and on that occasion Faisal formed a cabinet from which the king's sons were excluded. Upon his return, King Saud condemned these decisions and threatened to use the royal guard against his brother, who in turn could count on loyalty in the National Guard and appointed his younger half-brother Prince Abdullah as commander of the National Guard in 1963.
In the spring of 1964 in Riyadh, the royal guard and the national guard faced each other - one devoted to the king, the other to the crown prince. The conflict became explosive when Faisal ruled at the end of March 1964 that the royal guard would henceforth be subordinate to the Defense Minister Prince Sultan, a younger half-brother of Faisal, who was one of Faisal's loyalists. The officers realized that in the event of a conflict they were no longer allowed to obey the king and submitted to Faisal.
In this critical situation, one of Saud's and Faisal's uncle, Prince Abdullah bin Abd ar-Rahman Al Saud, spoke to the most important ulema of the kingdom and got them to adopt a joint fatwa , which provided for the king's disempowerment.
At first Saud did not care about the opinion of the clergy and did not think of abdicating. Half a year later, however, after much pressure from the family and when he saw that his property would be confiscated, he abdicated.
King Saud's reign officially ended on November 2, 1964. The following day he went into exile. He first moved to Geneva , frequented Paris and the Côte d'Azur and continued to lead a luxurious lifestyle. Despite his earlier arguments with the Egyptian head of state, he made a rapprochement with Nasser and resided in a magnificent palace in the Egyptian city of Heliopolis and in a large estate in the Greek capital Athens, where he died of heart failure on December 23, 1969. His body was transferred on board a Saudi Arabian Airlines Boeing to the al-Haram mosque in Mecca , whereupon he was quietly buried in Riyadh.
To this day, his name is hardly mentioned in Saudi Arabia, only the King Saud University he founded in Riyadh in 1957 bears his name.
family
King Saud has 52 sons and 50 daughters from officially twelve wives connected to him. The names of the wives are largely unknown. This number only includes the descendants of women officially associated with him. The number of sons from relationships with female slaves was also about 50. He is said to have had over 100 marriages, these were for a short time; H. the marriage was divorced after just a few weeks or months, only marriages with women who had given him sons traditionally lasted longer.
Well-known wives of King Saud were
- Princess Umm Chalid, daughter of Assad Ibrahim Mirhi from Syria, she is the mother of Saud's eldest sons
- Princess Nijaa bint Dhadan bin Chalid al-Hithlain, from the Ajman tribe. Saud divorced her again, after which she married Prince Mohammed al-Sharqan bin Saud al-Arafa bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud, she was the daughter of Sheikh Dhaidan bin Chalid al-Hithlain
- A daughter of Sheikh Nuri asch-Schaʿlan, she was the sister of Princess Nuf bint asch-Schaʿlan, Sheikh Nuri at that time the sheikh of the powerful Ruwala tribe
- One or more women from the Ash Sheikh family
- One or more women from the al-Sudairi family
- One or more women from the Bani Chalid tribe, his mother's tribe
- One or more women from the ar-Raschid family
King Saud's eldest son, Prince Sultan, died of flu as a child. His second eldest son, Prince Fahd, was born in 1928 or 1929 and was therefore one of the oldest grandsons of state founder King Abd al-Aziz. He died on August 21, 2006 at the age of 77.
26 sons of King Saud try to participate more in the politics of their country. They were seen as advisors to their uncle King Fahd , are active in the economy and some of them hold command posts in the National Guard and the other armed forces of the kingdom. But important government offices were also given to them. Unlike his older half-brothers King Faisal and King Khalid, King Fahd had reconciled with his nephews, although he was also one of the members of his family who asked King Saud to abdicate.
Furthermore, King Saud's sons supported their uncle King Abdullah in his politics and in his accession to the throne, because Abdullah brought some of King Saud's sons into the National Guard as commanders and gave them more political offices.
The daughters of King Saud are increasingly active in women's politics and in charity organizations in their country. So is u. a. Princess Fahdah is a chair of the Al-Faisaliyah Charitable Society.
See also
literature
- Saud ibn Abdul Asis al Faisal al Saud , in: Internationales Biographisches Archiv 17/1969 of April 14, 1969, in the Munzinger Archive ( beginning of article freely available)
Web links
- King Ibn Saud visited the city 50 years ago
- 50 years ago: King Saud holds court in Freiburg Both articles in the Badische Zeitung from July 2009
Individual evidence
- ↑ Died: SAUD IBN ABD EL AL SAUD ASIS, 67. In: Der Spiegel. 10/1969, p. 176.
Abd al-Aziz ibn Saud (1932–1953) | Saud ibn Abd al-Aziz (1953–1964) | Faisal ibn Abd al-Aziz (1964–1975) | Chalid ibn Abd al-Aziz (1975-1982) | Fahd ibn Abd al-Aziz (1982-2005) | Abdullah ibn Abd al-Aziz (2005-2015) | Salman ibn Abd al-Aziz (since 2015)
Saud ibn Abd al-Aziz (1933–1953) | Faisal ibn Abd al-Aziz (1953–1964) | Chalid ibn Abd al-Aziz (1964–1975) | Fahd ibn Abd al-Aziz (1975–1982) | Abdullah ibn Abd al-Aziz (1982-2005) | Sultan ibn Abd al-Aziz (2005-2011) | Naif ibn Abd al-Aziz (2011–2012) | Salman ibn Abd al-Aziz (2012-2015) | Muqrin ibn Abd al-Aziz (2015) | Mohammed ibn Naif (2015-2017) | Mohammed bin Salman (since 2017)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Saud ibn Abd al-Aziz |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Saud ibn Abd al-Aziz Al Saud |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Saudi Arabian King (1953–1964) |
| DATE OF BIRTH | January 15, 1902 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Kuwait City |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 23, 1969 |
| Place of death | Athens |