Britain’s invasion of Iraq in 1941

Compiled By: Syed Ali Shahbaz
On May 2, 1941 AD, Britain again invaded Iraq to oust the nationalist government of Prime Minister Rashid Aali al-Gilani who had staged a coup to end colonial influence by removing from power Abdullah bin Ali, the regent of the 6-year old king, Faisal II, whose grandfather Faisal I of Hijaz was installed as king in 1921 by London against the wishes of the Iraqi people, after crushing the popular uprising of 1920 led by Ayatollah Shaikh Kashef al-Gheta and Ayatollah Mirza Mohammad Taqi Shirazi.
London feared that Gilani might take control of the oil industry from Britain, in view of his links to Germany and the Axis powers. The war ended on May 29 when Gilani fled to Iran and an armistice was signed on May 31. Gilani, a Sunni Muslim and descendant of Baghdad’s prominent Iranian Sufi, Sheikh Abdul-Qader Gilani, could not stay long in Iran and fled to Germany when the British dethroned their agent Reza Khan Pahlavi for his pro-German views and exiled him to the island of Mauritius, replacing him with his 21 year old son Mohammad Reza.
After the German defeat in World War 2, Gilani sought asylum in Saudi Arabia before returning to Iraq in 1958 on the overthrow of the British-installed monarchy by General Abdul-Karim Qassim. He was implicated in a plot to seize power, was sentenced to death, but pardoned and exiled. He died in Beirut, Lebanon in 1965.