Salah Jadid

Salah Jadid صلاح جديد
Assistant Regional Secretary of the Syrian Regional Branch
In office August 1, 1965 – November 13, 1970
Regional Secretary	Amin al-Hafiz Nureddin al-Atassi
Preceded by	Muhammad az-Zubi
Succeeded by	Jaber Bajbouj
Chief of Staff of the Syrian Army
In office November 11, 1963 – 1966
Preceded by	Ziad al-Hariri
Succeeded by	Ahmad Suwaydani
Member of the Regional Command of the Syrian Regional Branch
In office March 1966 – November 13, 1970
In office February 1, 1964 – December 19, 1965
Personal details
Born	1926 Dweir Baabda, Latakia, Syria
Died	19 August 1993 (aged 67) Damascus, Syria
Nationality	Syrian
Political party	Syrian Regional Branch of the (first) Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party (1947–1966) and then Syrian-dominated Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party
Religion	Alawite
Military service
Years of service	1946–1970
Rank	Major General

Salah Jadid (1926 – 19 August 1993, Arabic: صلاح جديد) was a Syrian general and political figure in the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party in Syria, and the country's de facto leader from 1966 until 1970.

Jadid was born in 1926 in the village of Dweir Baabda, near the coastal city of Jableh, which in turn was close to Lattakia, to an Alawite family. However, there is another report stating his birth year as 1924. He studied at the Homs Military Academy, and entered the Syrian Army in 1946. Jadid was originally a member of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), but later became a member of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, led by Michel Aflaq and Salah al-Din al-Bitar, in the 1950s through an associate of Akram al-Hawrani. Even so, Jadid remained close to the SSNP; his brother, Ghassan, was one of its most prominent members in Syria. He changed allegiance again in the 1950s, when he became a member of the Arab Nationalist Movement, a party supporting Gamal Abdel Nasser's ideological beliefs. Jadid supported Syria's ascension into the United Arab Republic (UAR), a union republic consisting of Egypt and Syria.

During the UAR-era, Jadid was stationed in Cairo, Egypt. Jadid established the Military Committee alongside other Ba'athists in 1959. The chief aim of the Military Committee was to protect the UAR's existence. In the beginning there was only four members of the Military Committee, the others were Hafez al-Assad, Abd al-Karim al-Jundi and Muhammad Umran. The Military Committee also tried to save the Syrian Ba'ath movement from annihilation. Committee members were among those who blamed Aflaq for the Ba'ath Party's failing during the UAR years. The party's Third National Congress in 1959 supported Aflaq's decision to dissolve the party, but a 1960 National Congress, in which Jadid was a delegate representing the then-unknown Military Committee, reversed the decision and called for the Ba'ath Party's reestablishment. The Congress also decided to improve relations with Nasser by democratising the UAR from within. A faction within the party, led by al-Hawrani, called for Syria's secession. The Military Committee did not succeed in its aims, and in September 1961 the UAR was dissolved. Nazim al-Qudsi, who led the first post-UAR government, persecuted Jadid and the others for their Nasserite loyalties, and all of them were forced to retire from the Syrian Army.

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