Uday Hussein

Uday Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti (Arabic: عدي صدام حسين التكريتي ‎; c. 1964 - 22 July 2003) was the eldest child of Saddam Hussein by his first wife, Sajida Talfah, and the brother of Qusay Hussein. Uday was seen for several years as the likely successor to his father, but lost the place as heir apparent to Qusay due to injuries he sustained in an assassination attempt.

Following the United States-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, he was killed alongside his brother Qusay and nephew Mustapha by an American task force after a prolonged gunfight in Mosul.

Uday opened accounts with Yahoo! and MSN Messenger, which created controversy as this allegedly violated U.S. trade sanctions against Iraq. Uday also amassed a large video collection, found in his palace in 2003, much of which featured himself in both public and private situations. In Uday's palace, a zoo with wild animals, hundreds of luxury cars, guns made from many brands of gold, hundreds of luxury drinks and hundreds of cigars with the name on it were found. At the Presidential Palace, in Uday's dwellings, anti-depressants, an e-mail output that "a virgin girl agrees to come to him," and another order asking for the girls to be examined for diseases were found. One of Uday's private prisons was later disclosed, and it was stated that there were everyone who bothered Uday inside, the insiders were businessmen clashing with Uday, athletes who could not win, drivers who did not yield him the right of way, and some were thrown into the same cell with German shepherd dogs and left to die. Erotic pictures of women downloaded from the internet and pictures of American president Bush's twin daughters Jenna and Barbara were found on the walls in the gym of Uday. In another house owned by Uday, "pornographic pictures, heroin bags, expensive liqueurs, vintage cars and HIV testing" was found. He was feeding lions and the other wild animals in his palace and often fed them with his own hands.

A report released on 20 March 2003, one day after the American led invasion of Iraq, by ABC News detailed several allegations against Uday:

Saddam Hussein's closest aides, Abid Hamid Mahmud, had been captured, and told his interrogators that he and Saddam's two sons had sought refuge in Syria but were turned back. According to the smuggler who made them cross the border, they came again after less than 48 hours. They said to the smuggler: "A Syrian citizen will be waiting for a call from them and my mission is limited to bring them to the borders, not inside Syria." Smuggler said, "They sought refuge with some of their acquaintances near the Rabia border center, and they already reached the outskirts of the city of Aleppo, and there, after replacing the broken tires of their car, the Syrian authorities, who ordered their return to Iraq, stopped them. Abd Hammoud was not staying with them, but he visited them for four days and on the fourth day they left the house. Accompanying Abd Hammoud towards Mosul, and there Uday and Qusai took refuge in the house of Nawaf Al-Zaidan, joined by Mustafa Qusai, who was staying with his grandfather, Maher Abdul-Rashid. On July 16, 2003, he met with Qusay again, asked if he had an intention to get out of Iraq, Qusai replied, 'This is no longer possible. I will stay in Iraq awaiting the instructions of the father.' Seven days later, Uday, Qusay, and Mustafa, and their companions, were killed." Abdel Halim Khaddam, the former vice president of Syria, revealed that his country handed over half brother of Saddam Hussein, to the American forces. They also deported the sons of the ousted president to Iraq and refused to receive the former foreign minister, Tariq Aziz.

On 22 July 2003, JSOC Task Force 20, aided by troops of the United States Army 101st Airborne Division, surrounded Uday, Qusay, and Qusay's 14-year-old son Mustapha during a raid on a home in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul. Uday had been the Ace of Hearts on the most-wanted Iraqi playing cards (Qusay was the Ace of Clubs). Acting on a tip from an unidentified Iraqi, soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division provided security while the Task Force 20 operators tried to capture the inhabitants of the house. As many as 200 American troops, later aided by OH-58 Kiowa helicopters and an A-10 "Warthog", surrounded and fired upon the house, thus killing Uday, Qusay, and Qusay's son. After approximately four hours of battle, soldiers entered the house and found four bodies, including the Hussein brothers' bodyguard.

Uday was reported to have converted to Shia Islam in 2001, but he denied these reports.

The Shia Shaaban Movement assumed responsibility for the assassination. Salman Sharif, one of the 3 assassins, learned that Uday regularly visits one of the luxurious streets of Mansour every Thursday at 7 in the evening to pick up a girl. They watched the street for 3 months and made preparations. They realized that Uday was sometimes unprotected and tried to find out who was the real shopkeeper and who was the secret police on the street. On the day of the assassination, they saw a luxury car that could only belong to Uday without bodyguards. They shot Uday exactly 50 times, but 17 hits. Some Shaaban members who knew about this assassination were arrested for another incident in Jordan and handed over to the Iraqi police. In August 1998, Saddam's men arrested Abu Sajad and learned the details of other members of the team. Sharif's seven brothers and father were imprisoned, and his mother was then told to collect their bodies from the Baghdad morgue. The father and three brothers of assassin Abu Sadeq were executed. Other assassin Abu Sajad and his father shared the same fate. Security guards destroyed the homes of all families with bulldozers and confiscated all their property. In December 2002, Iraqi intelligence officers tracked down and killed Abu Sadeq, who was in Iran. Uday was injured for the rest of his life and - according to popular belief - became impotent. Sharif interpreted this as "divine justice" by referring to Uday's brutal reputation for women.

Adeeb al-Ani, who was the secretary of Uday, said, "Uday wanted a different woman every night and made them kidnapped, usually very young girls, but also women from wealthy Baghdad families. They would all be paid as if they were prostitutes." Uday's assistant, Adib Shabaan, said, "In 1998, Uday saw an ex-governor's 14-year-old daughter at a party, made her kidnapped, sent her home after three days, and when the girl's father received a rape report and talked about what happened, Uday told the man, 'Your daughters will be my girlfriend, or I will erase you from the earth,' and ordered the man to bring his daughter and his other 12-year-old daughter to his next party." According to a former employee, "five nights a week, two dozen girls, all brought to him by his friends, were taken to the luxurious Baghdad Boat Club on the Tigris coast to meet Uday; those who were chosen after drinks, music and dance would spent the night with Uday". "He never slept with a girl more than three times," said an ex-butler. If a friend used the same brand of clothes, perfumes or shoes as Uday, Uday would threaten his friend not to use the same thing again. A family friend said that the day when Uday discovered the Internet was "a black day for the Iraqis", and he had employees whose job was to investigate new methods of torture and new car models on the Internet. In the Boat Club's kitchen, there was a monkey named Louisa, and if one of Uday's friends fell asleep at parties because of alcohol, he would put them in the same cage with the drunk monkey.

Raed Ahmed, one of the Iraqi athletes who escaped, said, "During the training, he would watch all the athletes closely, put pressure on the coaches to push the athletes even more ... If he was not happy with the results, he would have coaches and athletes put in his private prison in the Olympic Committee building. The punishment was Uday's private prison where they tortured people. Some athletes, including the best ones, started quitting the sport when Uday took over the Committee. I always managed not to be punished. I paid attention not to promise anything. There is a strong possibility of always being beaten. But when I won, Uday would be very happy." Amo Baba, who coached teams who won 18 tournaments and participated three times in the Olympic Games, said the punishment that Uday imposed on the players had destroyed their athletic abilities. Amo Baba noted that half of the Iraqi athletes had left the country, and many of them pretended to be sick before the games against strong competitors. The famous coach, who was arrested several times but loved by Saddam, said that Uday had destroyed the national team, adding that they played worse after the arrest. Uncle Baba said he told his friends that if he died suddenly, they would know the reason. However, some people claim that these stories are exaggerated. Maad Ibrahim Hamid, assistant coach of the national football team, said that Uday was giving the players financial rewards for victory and threatening them with imprisonment in the event of defeat. Hamid said that the athletes were not subjected to torture, but some were arrested for immoral behaviors, including adultery and addiction to alcohol, as well as for playing poorly. Ahmed Radhi, one of the most famous football players in Iraq, said that after he was not willing to join the newly founded Al-Rasheed club, he was kidnapped at midnight by Uday's men, beaten and accused of harassment and then he accepted Uday's offer because of death threats. Another Iraqi international soccer player, Saad Qais, said that Uday was angry with him because he was expelled from the 1997 Iraqi team's game against Turkmenistan, the "discipline" operation was carried out by jailers known as "teachers" in a closed section of the famous Radwaniyah detention facility for athletes and journalists. He said, "Uday established the Rashid team and forced the best Iraqi players to play in it, and forced me to leave my beloved team, and he honored us with gifts after every win, and in return, he punished us after every loss."

Singer, Qasım Sultan, was called to the Hunting Club in 1997 after singing at private parties in America and returning to Baghdad. Uday ordered him to sing until the sun rises. At 8 am, Uday began shouting at Sultan, and scolded Qasim for returning to Baghdad without telling him and told his guards to beat him. When Sultan went to another midnight concert by Uday, Uday's bodyguards beat him for not arriving earlier. Before Sultan came on the stage, he was called by Uday to drink his "mysterious cocktail", a bottle of mixtures of beer, gin and other hard liquors. Sultan was hospitalized twice because of the amount of alcohol he was forced to drink at these parties. He also claimed that in 1997, after the assassination; in the garden of Uday's palace, he was forced to sing while lions there. He described the parties as "a place where armed cowboys can kill you at any time." After Al-Shabab was founded in 1993, Iraqi singers of the 70s and 80s, such as Fadel Awad, Saadoun Jaber, Riyadh Ahmed were banned by Uday, on the grounds that they were the singers of the previous generation. Uday said to them, "You are forbidden from singing and I do not want to hear that any of you sings at a party." The ban was issued, their songs were not shown on TV, they did not perform any concert, and did not record a song for TV. However, Singer Ali Al-Issawi said, "Uday was a fan of singing and a connoisseur and he listened to all the singers and enjoyed our songs. Uday did not punish anyone at that time, but he only held accountable the abusive artists. He used to meet with me two to three times during the same day and did not harm me or my group at all."

Uday sustained permanent injuries during an assassination attempt in December 1996. Struck by between 7 and 13 bullets while driving in Mansour (Bagdad), Uday was initially believed to be paralyzed. Evacuated to Ibn Sina Hospital, he eventually recovered but with a noticeable limp. Despite repeated operations, two bullets remained lodged in his spine and could not be removed due to their location near the spinal cord. In the wake of Uday's subsequent disabilities, Saddam gave Qusay increasing responsibility and authority, designating him as his heir apparent in 2000. However, Abbas al-Janabi claims that Uday's exclusion in the family has ended after shooting his step-uncle Watban after this assassination. An American hypnotist, Larry Garret, claimed that he hypnotized Uday Huseyin to treat. He said, "He was an educated man, with a background in engineering. He was versed in the Koran. He had visited the U.S. with his cousin when he was 17. He expressed some political views, but he didn't involve me in them. I must say I was developing a fondness for him. He never spoke to me as a leader or the son of a leader. He never condescended. It was just two men sitting around at night."

After being handicapped by the assassination attempt on him in 1996, he maintained distance from Qusay who was rising in ranks and thought to be Saddam's next legitimate successor. Along with many other crimes, he along with Qusay in 1996, was said to be involved in the killings of their brothers-in-law, Hussein Kamel al-Majid and Saddam Kamel al-Majid, who themselves were powerful members of the elite regime. The two men, who had defected to Jordan along with their wives and children, were murdered after their return to Iraq.

The U.S. Administration released graphic pictures of the Hussein brothers' bodies. Afterwards, their bodies were reconstructed by morticians to assure the public that they were deceased. For example, Uday's beard was trimmed and an 8-inch metal bar in his leg from the 1996 assassination attempt was removed. When criticized, the U.S. military's response was to point out that these men were no ordinary combatants, and to express hope that confirmation of the deaths would bring closure to the Iraqi people. Uday was buried in a cemetery near Tikrit alongside Qusay and Mustapha Hussein.

In 1995, in a fight between his maternal uncle Louay and paternal step-uncle Watban, Uday shot his step-uncle intentionally or unknowingly with the other guests of the party with his Jack Hammer gun. Then he took him to the hospital. Uday later disappeared. When his brother-in-laws, Hussein Kamel and Saddam Kamel, escaped to Jordan the next day, Uday's attack on his uncle remained in the background. Saddam ordered Uday to ask his uncle to shoot him in the same way from where he was shot, but Watban refused to shoot Uday. One of the injured at the party said that the reason for the attack was that Uday's step-uncle had fun with Uday's speech disorder and his maternal uncle told this to Uday. Since birth, Uday's upper jaw has extended forward an abnormally large stretch. For this it was difficult for him to speak clearly. At the ceremony, his uncle imitated him with a subtle tradition and made his speech defect a material of mockery and humor, which sparked an atmosphere of extreme fun at the party. Shortly after the incident, Saddam got angry when he saw the difficulty of walking of his half-brother in the hospital and ordered to be burned the garage of Uday's luxury cars. Uday was angry with his brother Kusay for not preventing Saddam and had a nervous breakdown. Kusay said he prevented him from burning another garage. Uday set up a barricade in front of his luxury cars in another nearby garage and waited for his father or his men to come with heavy firearms. According to his close friend Jaber, Uday would have killed him if his father had come to the second garage.

According to the interrogation book of Saddam Hussein by John Nixon, Uday provoked the escape of Hussein Kamel and Saddam Kamel in 1995. Drunk Uday went to Kamel's house where a party was being held and punched Saddam Kamel. When he was defeated by Kamel, he took out his gun and fired. But bullet wounded Watban who got in the way. Soon shortly after the grooms escaped to Jordan, Saddam burned the garage of Uday's luxury cars, saying, "While Iraqis are suffering from the embargo, this situation may send a false message." After Uday took over Iraq's oil sales, used to be largely pocketed by the entourage of Hussein Kamel when he oversaw the oil business along with his responsibilities in defense and industry, also Uday zeroed in on other areas that were the province of Kamel, including army equipment supplies, reconstruction and food imports, then Iraqi official said, "Kamel decided to defect because he became frightened that Uday was now getting strong enough to really take care of him."

Uday was responsible for nearly 20 American prisoners of war captured during the 1991 Gulf War, including ex-Navy Commander Jeff Zaun, forced to appear on Iraqi state television and forced to condemn their country after being tortured. In 2000, a group of French university students claimed that they were invited by Uday to the party in Baghdad, but as soon as they entered the room, they were forced to have sex with each other at gunpoint while it was recorded by camera. In 1999, an anti-embargo group of French volunteers went to Iraq and a girl was forced to stay with Uday after the party, but they were able to leave the party when one of the girls said "we did not come here to be prostitutes". Miss Germany, Alexandra Vodjanikova, met with Uday and said "he was charming, downright warm, very friendly and always said to her 'you are beautiful, you are sexy'". Zainab Salbi, daughter of Saddam Hussein's private pilot said, "The days when Uday came to the university, the girls were hiding in the toilet in fear to escape from his hungry eyes, but it is a known fact that nobody can escape from the lust of Uday and Uday is known for his eerie quietness than for wild craziness." One of his long-time employe, Khaled Jassem, said: "You shouldn't compete with Uday on two subjects: business and girls. Often, he would make his decisions under the influence of the drink a cocktail based on whiskey, gin and champagne. I have never seen someone so cruel. My life was a nightmare. I was always afraid. I have suffered foot whipping as punishment four times. When he could not attend the caning, he sent his executioners to administer it. But not wanting to deprive himself of the pleasure of hearing the victim's pain, he listened the victim shouting over the telephone."

As punishment for the murder, Saddam briefly imprisoned his son and sentenced him to death; however, Uday probably served only three months in a prison in a private area. In response to personal intervention from King Hussein of Jordan, Saddam released Uday, banishing him to Switzerland as the assistant to the Iraqi ambassador there. He was expelled by the Swiss government in 1990 after he was repeatedly arrested for fighting. According to Jalopnik website, Uday's vast car collections were burned by his father, Saddam, after the Kamel Hana Gegeo incident.

According to a former employee, Uday had a party of 5 nights a week and fasted for the remaining 2 days. A chief of the Baghdad Hunting Club claimed that after a wedding party in the late 1990s, the bride suddenly disappeared, Uday's bodyguards locked all the doors, and the groom committed suicide. Again, according to the allegations of Uday's servant, he witnessed a forced custody of a crying bride at home in October 2002 and later said that the girl was killed and her body was destroyed after being raped. When the city was about to fall into US-led forces, it was alleged that Uday ordered Fedayeen Saddam to burn his cars instead of letting others take their cars. Former business manager Adib Shabaan said that Uday burned hips of many women whom he had sex with a horseshoe and created a U-shaped scar. Ala Bashir, the doctor of the Saddam family, claimed that he was treating women who were in the same condition and who had been burned with a lighted cigarette by Uday.

Ismail Hussain, who worked as a singer at Uday's parties in early 1990's, said, "Uday did not need a reason to party. He would have food and drink tables while many people in Iraq were starving. He'd get drunk and dance -- he was a good dancer too. Later, he'd bring out the machine guns and start shooting them off. He'd point the guns right over my head, and the bullets would spray all over the place. I would sing right through the flying bullets. I couldn't hear the music anymore. I'd just keep going, because I couldn't stop. It ended when Uday was ready for it to end.. At the parties, there would be about five or six men and 40 or 50 women. He was moody. People were expendable." He said, "I would be performing, and Uday would climb up on the stage with a machine gun and start shooting it at the ceiling. Uday would insist that everyone get drunk with him. He would interrupt my performance, get up on stage with a big glass of cognac for himself and one for me. He would insist that I drink all of it with him. When he gets really drunk, out come the guns. His friends are all terrified of him, because he can have them imprisoned or killed. I saw him once get angry with one of his friends. He kicked the man in the ass so hard that his boot flew off. The man ran over and retrieved the boot and then tried to put it back on Uday's foot, with Uday cursing him all the while."

Dhafer Muhammad Jaber Siddiq, one of Uday's closest aides, said about Uday: "He used to criticize his father's policies on many occasions, directly or indirectly, especially when discussing with Hussein Kamel... Uday was a young man like many young men trying to get close to beautiful women. He would send his phone number to every young woman he liked. There were a lot of women who were trying to get to know Uday, some of them changed their minds, and some of them strengthened their relationship with him...He was a person with many contradictions. For example, after the killing of his uncle, Minister of Defense Adnan Khairallah in 1989, he started to pray regularly and never cut it, and he fasted every Monday and Thursday, but he used to drink alcohol continuously. He was generous at times to the extreme, but at other times, he became unimaginably stingy. He had his independent empire. He used to say it himself, he used to say that he possesses the foundations of a state. He has press, television, sports, military and trade." Uday made a lawyer shot after he raised the case of a 17-year-old girl who was kidnapped and was rumored at the compound of Uday's Iraqi Olympic Committee. According to the lawyer's testimony, "Uday was looking at the papers I carried for him and then said: I will break both of your legs so that you cannot come back again, but I see your left leg injured during the war with Iran, so I will break your right leg." One of Uday's men then shot the right leg of the lawyer, and he had been thrown near a hospital. As for the girl, she was finally sent to her home after being raped repeatedly and asked her family not to travel. However, she managed to escape to Poland where some of her relatives lived there. But after a few years, some of the killers working for Uday were able to track down the girl and they killed her along with her father, the lawyer said. Some of the waiters working in high-end clubs said that they were shrinking with terror whenever Uday arrived, drunk and armed, looking for women to kidnap them. A lawyer said that Uday had ordered the head of a beautiful TV presenter to be shaved so that he could keep her long strands and then kept her naked in the Olympic Committee building for a month because she opposed his request.

Personal accounts state, Uday grew up idolizing his father, Saddam Hussein, although their relationship later became strained due to his father's many mistresses. Uday maintained a close cordial relationship with his mother, Sajida Talfah. The otherwise apathetic Uday, at his uncle's Adnan Khairallah's funeral in 1989, showed a rare moment of tenderness. Neglect and lack of bonding with Saddam in childhood, over-exposure to the regime's brutalities, and Sajida's over-nurturing molded his character.

Although his status as Saddam's elder son made him Saddam's prospective successor, Uday fell out of favour with his father. In October 1988, at a party in honour of Suzanne Mubarak, wife of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Uday murdered his father's personal valet and food taster, Kamel Hana Gegeo, possibly at the request of his mother. Before an assemblage of horrified guests, an intoxicated Uday bludgeoned Gegeo and repeatedly stabbed him with an electric carving knife. Gegeo had recently introduced Saddam to a younger woman, Samira Shahbandar, who later became Saddam's second wife. Uday considered his father's relationship with Shahbandar an insult to his mother. Samira's oldest son fled to Jordan because of the harassment by Uday after the marriage. He also may have feared losing succession to Gegeo, whose loyalty to Saddam Hussein was unquestioned.

Latif Yahia, who claims to be Uday's body double, said, "The word that defines him is sadistic. I think Saddam Hussein was more human than Uday. The Olympic Committee was not a sports center, it was Uday's world." In November 1987, Latif said, "I saw many rapes. He raped and killed women, and then killed her parents if they complained. I witnessed many murders. Uday had raped one of the Baghdad Beauty Queens and her father complained to Saddam. He ordered me to kill him. I refused and instead cut my wrists." He said that "The Devil's Double", based on his memories, is only 20% of the truth.  

In 1984, Saddam appointed Uday chairman of the Iraqi Olympic Committee and the Iraq Football Association. In the former role, he tortured athletes who failed to win. Furthermore, he founded his own sports club called Al-Rasheed and signed all the best players from the country to play for the club as they went on to dominate Iraqi football until their dissolving in 1990. He also became the editor of the Babel newspaper, the general secretary of the Iraqi Union of Students and the head of the Fedayeen Saddam. He was also the Head of the Iraq Journalists Union. His newspaper, Babel, was known for carrying Western reports on Iraq's conflict with the United States and was said to be the most influential newspaper in the country. Uday Hussein also had a television channel, Youth TV (Al-Shabab), which aired reports by other Arab channels not usually heard on Iraq's state-run media. Iraq's most popular radio station was Voice of Youth, owned by Uday, the only radio that played Western music. Uday seemed proud of his reputation and called himself Abu Sarhan, an Arabic term for "wolf".

Uday Hussein was born around 1964 in Tikrit to Saddam Hussein and Sajida Talfah while his father was in prison. Multiple sources give different birthdays; although official sources give a 18 June birth, The Independent gave a birth date of 9 March 1964, while others give a 1965 birth. One source gave it as early as 1963. As a child, his father would take him and his brother Qusay to watch executions of enemies.