October 30, 1944: Ahmed Chalabi Is Born into Elite Iraqi Family

Ahmed Chalabi. [Source: Tim Sloan / Agence France-Presse]On October 30, 1944, Ahmed Chalabi is born into a wealthy, oligarchic Shiite family with close ties to Iraq’s Hashemite monarchy. [American Prospect, 11/18/2002; CounterPunch, 5/20/2004; New Yorker, 6/7/2004] Chalabi’s mother runs political salons catering to Iraq’s elite and his father loans money to members of the ruling family who reward him with top posts in the government, which he uses to advance his business interests. His grandfather was also close to the monarchy, holding nine cabinet positions in government during his lifetime. [American Prospect, 11/18/2002; New Yorker, 6/7/2004] But it was Chalabi’s great grandfather who, as the tax farmer of Kadimiah, a town near Baghdad, established the family’s grand fortunes. According to Iraqi historian Hanna Batatu, Ahmed’s great grandfather was “a very harsh man, [who] kept a bodyguard of armed slaves and had a special prison at his disposal” where, according to a friend of Chalabi’s, he imprisoned serfs who failed to pay their taxes or produce wheat. “When he died the people of Kadimiah heaved a sigh of relief,” Batatu writes. [Batatu, 2004; New Yorker, 6/7/2004] In 1958, Chalabi’s family will flee Iraq when the Iraqi Communist Party overthrows the monarchy. Decades later, Imad Khadduri, a schoolmate of Chalabi’s, will say: “Ahmed wanted to avenge his father’s ouster and the deprivation of his lands.… Now he’s trying to fit in his father’s shoes.” [Unger, 2007, pp. 123]