Tag: Iraq stamp

Tanks can be devastating weapons so small countries should keep close track of them. These British gifted Churchill tanks were out of date and unreliable. When they were ordered to Jordan they instead headed for the Palace. The Royal Guard stood down and then the Royal Family was gunned down. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

There were two visions of pan Arab unity in the 1950s. Nasser’s socialist vision backed by the USSR. There was also a rival Hashemite vision backed by Britain. Here we see WWII surplus Churchill heavy tanks ready to make the Hashemite case. In Syria and Egypt similar vintage but superior Soviet T34 was backing up their side. Intimately the people decide such things and the Hashemites couldn’t even trust their tank crews.

Todays stamp is issue A34, an eight Fils stamp issued by the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq on January 6th, 1958. This was a four stamp issue in various denominations celebrating Iraqi Army Day. According to the Scott Catalog, the stamp is worth 85 cents used.

King Faisal III came on to the Iraqi throne in 1938 at the age of three after the mysterious death of his father in a car crash in Switzerland. There was then a Regency with an Uncle and a lot of mysterious foreign advisors. In 1941, there was a coup where disgruntaled officers attempted to align with Germany. A British, Arab Legion invasion followed that restored the child King. My British father’s military service included this campaign. In 1953, Faisal reached his majority but the cast of characters didn’t change much. Oil revenue was beginning to flow but the rewards were not making it to the average Iraqi. The Hashemites were counting on oil revenue to grease the wheels of their planned coming together of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and Kuwait.

At this same period, Nasser in Egypt was offering an alternative socialist pan Arab vision that seemed to offer a more modern choice to the middle class. His United Arab Republic signed up Syria and North Yemen and there was much intrigue going on in Lebanon. In order to bolster Jordan’s position in this, two armored Brigades of the Iraqi Army were ordered to Jordan in 1958. To do so, they had to pass through Baghdad. Their Nasser sympathetic commanders saw the opportunity. Churchill tanks drove to the radio station, the defense ministry and the Palace. The Royal Guard stood down. The Royal Family was marched outside the Palace and shot. One Princess survived being shot and escaped.

The two chief coup plotters both had turns leading Iraq. One was then executed and the other had his plane sabotaged by domestic rivals. Neither followed up on their alleged belief in Nasser’s vision of an United Arab Republic. The oil rich cannot sign on to the level of subsity from rich to poor that union demands.

The Churchill tank was  hopelessly obsolete even before the end of World War II. It was a heavy tank with armor protection on a par with the contemporary German Tiger tank. Where the Tiger had an 88mm gun, the Churchill tank started with only a 40mm gun. The tank was later uprated with a 57mm gun and later some were retrofitted with 75mm turrets taken from American Sherman tanks. The Iraqi ones appear to have the 57mm gun. The tanks would not have been much good against Syrian/Soviet T34s but Syria also possessed old German Panzer IVs passed on from the French. so the old tanks might have had a reunion  in the desert, Iraq had more modern new build British Centurions on order, but the Churchills proved very capable in a coup.

Well my drink is empty and I am left wondering about middle eastern Royals spending so much on sophisticated weapons when they can’t trust those who will operate it. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting

A young adventurer wants an Empire for himself not just to expand the empire of his father. To get it he double and triple deals with Ottomans, British, and Jews. Awarded an empire in Iraq, where he was a stranger, could the adventurer become a statesman? So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

Todays stamp show the period after Iraq became a self governing Kingdom. However notice that the state service overprint is in English. Notice that the King to whom loyalty was due was not Iraqi, but rather one of Lawrence of Arabia cronies, the one played by Alec Guinness in the movie. Not shown is Gertrude Bell, a British women who pulled his strings only to die mysteriously. Or Chaim Weizmann, the Zionist leader with whom he made deals. Who was this man working for. Iraq was too rough a place to leave open questions like this.

Todays stamp was issue A12 a 2 Fills, new currency that year, stamp issued by the Kingdom of Iraq on May 9th, 1932. It was part of a 17 stamp issue displaying King Faisal I. There are earlier versions of this stamp with the earlier Indian currency. The overprint means the stamp was meant for government service. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used.

King Faisal was the son of the Sharif of Mecca who was later the King of Hejaz after leading a rebellion against the Ottomans. The Sharif is to be the protector of the Islamic holy cities but Medina was looted after being taken from the Ottomans. The British then recruited an Arab Legion including Faisal to rid the middle east of the Ottomans. The British were conflicted because at the same time they were trying to stake out a Jewish homeland in then Palestine. Very complex and the deals made would forever haunt the Arabs participating. Arabs like Faisal foresaw a large Arab Empire of the whole Fertile Crescent with the sons of the Shariff of Mecca ruling. Oil would fund it, the British would protect it and the new Jews in Palestine would get some autonomy in return for payments and accepting Arab sovereignty. Probably not the best of a bad list of alternatives but what they were going with.

Faisal himself was iffy on these goals and early in 1918 offered to change sides if the Turks would name him ruler of Syria. They refused but soon lost the war. Faisal declared himself King of Syria but the French weren’t going to have that and threw him out militarily a month later. In consolation, the British then gave Faisal Iraq. A quick, violent uprising had convinced them that direct rule in Iraq was a bad idea. The had adventuress and archeologist Gertrude Bell move to Baghdad to keep Faisal on the path of right.

Faisal found the Iraqi people less than worthy of him. The Shiites hated him. Most of his fellow Sunnis were backward. The Kurds to the north were both backward and of a different ethnicity, so their hatred was also racial. The dealings that the King made to get where he was meant that no one could ever trust him. Gertrude Bell died mysteriously in a death labeled an overdose. After that the King spent more time in Switzerland. That may have seemed a safer idea and of course allowed the leader to be closer to his money where he could enjoy it. It was in Bern in 1933 where his deals caught up to him in the form of fatal arsenic poisoning. His death was labeled a heart attack. This doomed the Kingdom as for the next 25 years there was a series of child Kings that did not live into maturity when they might have built a coherent country.

Well my drink is empty and every time I write a stamp from Iraq the image of what a sad place it is comes through. Perhaps people will eventually learn to leave them alone to their misery, Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

In the 50s, every Arab seemed to be a pan-Arabist. The Hashemites offered a traditional Kingdom structure. Nasser showed how to tell off the west and live to tell about it. In Iraq and Syria, a pan-Arabist, socialist and secular Ba’ath movement offered an alternative. Pan of course means come together though and how does that happen when everyone keeps getting assassinated. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

Here we have the new emblem of the new Republic of Iraq. It is trying to be hopeful and is somewhat in the United Nations style. Prime Minister Qasim came into office promising Pan Arabism, oil nationalization, and socialist reforms. This stamp tries to build that spirit. The King and his ministers were dead and many were happy about it. However some more ministers would soon also be dead and the same people will be happy about that as well.

Todays stamp is issue A58, a 1 Fils stamp issued by the Republic of Iraq in 1959. It was part of a 16 stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used. The official overprint adds nothing to the value.

In 1958, the young King Faisal II achieved a measure of pan Arabism by entering a federation with Jordan. They were also putting pressure on Kuwait to join. Arab youth had been given hope by the collapse of colonialism and the Hashemites were just not what they had in mind. A troop movement was cover for an unopposed military coup that saw the Royal Family assassinated in the palace’s courtyard. The unloved Prime Minister tried to escape dressed as a women but with men’s shoes. He was discovered, and killed and buried. Then he was dug up, burned, hung, and then run over by a Baghdad city bus until there was nothing left. Not taking a hint, a former Coronel name Qasim declared himself Prime Minister.

Qasim’s agenda in power turned out to be more socialist the pan-Arabist. The federation with Jordan was over, oil was nationalized, women were given rights, and polygamy and early marriage was banned. Land reform was started and much low income housing was built in the cities. He was not willing to turn over sovereignty to Nasser’s Egypt and join a United Arab Republic. It is after all difficult to join an oil rich country with a poor one. It is just a formula for rich to poor wealth transfer that you can’t expect the rich one to look forward to.

Citing lack of progress in pan Arabist goals, there was another coup in 1963. This one was fought tooth and nail until Qasim offered to give in in exchange for safe passage out of the country. This was reneged upon and there was a televised show trial culminating in Qasim’s being shot. The next guy also reneged on his previous pan-Arabist goals and just to spice things up, his plane was tampered with and he died in a plane crash. He had managed to take away the new rights of women. After all this the Ba’ath party movement took power that it would hold till 2003. that does not mean the intrique ended but from now on it was within the party. Pan-Arabist ambitions would now be persused by force of arms.

Qasim is slightly better remembered in Iraq than some of the other pan-Arabist heroes. There is a new statue to him as of 2007 and when his remains were discovered in 2006 they were not desecrated.

Well my drink is empty and Iraq is just to rough a place to toast anyone. Maybe losers get the leaders they deserve. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

When an empire fades there is a vacuum. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

The stamp today displays an exotic picture of an ancient Sunni Mosque. The other stamps of the issue show other religious sites from the various religions in Iraq. The stamp displays the problem facing the British as it did the Ottomans before them and the Americans much later. The country is just not a cohesive place  that lends itself to becoming a successful country.

The stamp today is issue A1, a one half anna stamp that was the first issue of a separate Iraq. There are earlier Baghdad overprints from the Ottoman era. It was part of a thirteen stamp issue of various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used. The 10 Rupee stamp featuring the Golden Shia Mosque at Kadhimain is worth $67 mint.

Iraq broke off from the retreating Ottoman Empire after World War I. When it became clear that there was going to be a British mandate to run Iraq, there was a rebellion. The head Shia Ayatollah issued a jihad forbidding Iraqis from working for the British and to press Iraqi demands peacefully at first. The rebellion was widespread and not just Shia. The British were able to put down the rebellion at high cost through the use of aerial bombing. The cost was such that Britain decided that they did not want to administer Iraq after all. At T. E. Lawrence’s suggestion, a Hashemite leader he had worked with in World War I was brought in and named King. He had previously served briefly as King of Syria until the French Colonial forces had removed and exiled him. He was originally from Mecca and could trace his ancestry to the Prophet Mohammed.

This choice was also complicated. King Faisal I was virtually unknown in Iraq and a Sunni. The Sunnis were a minority in Iraq and since the Ottoman administration was also Sunni, the majority Shia felt disadvantaged. Though Arab, the Shia also looked more to Iran for leadership and support. Faisal tried to overcome this by trying to appeal to a more pan Arab spirit. His brother was after all the ruler of neighboring Transjordan and covetous of Syria, Lebanon, Arabia, and Palestine. The choice of  Faisal let the British step back from the mandate while still keeping it’s interest in the British owned Iraqi oil company.

The Hashemite’s rule was not successful personally for them. The three Hashemite rulers of Iraq were all murdered. Faisal I was murdered by arsenic poisoning in 1933. His young son King Ghazi died in a mysterious car wreck in 1939. He had been a disappointment to the British as he was openly pro axis and said so on his radio show. There was also a sexual scandal with a black servant boy dying of a gunshot wound in the Royal chamber. The King claimed the boy died after forgetting to remove his gun before laying down for siesta. In 1958, a still only 23 year old King Faisal II ordered the army to deploy to Jordan to support his ally King Hussein of Jordan. Instead they marched to the palace and lead a coup. The King’s whole family was shot after surrendering to the coup plotters. The King survived the shooting but the King died later in hospital. The crown price and prime minister’s dead bodies were dragged through the streets and then hung from a lamp post.

That was the end of the Hashemites in Iraq but the tradition continued with republic. The coup plotter served five years as prime minister before another coup where he was shot and then hung from a lamp post. Remember also Sadam Hussein being hung after being forced from office and found hiding in a sewer pipe. At least he was given a trial. Progress?

Well my drink is empty and so I will open the conversation in the below comment section. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.