Salaad Gabeyre Kadiye

Salaad Gabeyre Kadiye (1933 – 3 July 1972) was a senior officer in the Somali National Army (SNA) and one of the leaders of the military coup of 21 October 1969. Historical sources indicate that he, Siyad Barre, and other officers jointly established the Supreme Revolutionary Council (SRC), the military body to which power was transferred.

Kadiye was formally given the honorific title "Father of the Revolution". Two years later, in May 1971, he and Vice-President Mohamed Ainanshe Guled were arrested on charges of plotting a coup against Barre. On 3 July 1972, he, Ainanshe, and Colonel Abdulqaadir Dheel were executed in Mogadishu.

Background and military training

According to the English Wikipedia, Kadiye is recorded as having been born in 1933 in Haradhere, then part of Italian Somalia. He entered the military in the 1950s and received advanced training at the Frunze Military Academy in Moscow, a Soviet institution that trained the highest-ranking officers of the Warsaw Pact and allied countries. He held the rank of Lieutenant Colonel when the coup occurred, although some later sources refer to him as "General".

The 1969 coup and the Supreme Revolutionary Council

On 15 October 1969, President Abdirashid Ali Shermarke was killed by one of his guards in Laascaanood. The following day, 21 October 1969, the national military assumed power without significant armed resistance. Historical sources record that the initial leadership of the SRC was shared by Barre, Kadiye, Ainanshe, and police commander Jaamac Qorshel. The SRC changed the country's name to the Somali Democratic Republic, banned political parties, dissolved Parliament and the Supreme Court, and suspended the constitution. Subsequently, Barre became chairman of the council.

Kadiye was given the position of Minister of Defence in the revolutionary government. According to records of Somali ministerial positions, the next Defence Minister was Mohamed Ali Samatar, who held the office from 1970 onward. This indicates that Kadiye was removed from the centre of decision-making within two years.

The 1971 arrest and 1972 execution

In May 1971, Radio Mogadishu announced the discovery of a plot to overthrow the regime, and the Vice-Chairman of the SRC, Ainanshe, and Kadiye were arrested. Abdulqaadir Dheel, who had earlier left the military after a disagreement with Barre, was subsequently arrested and added to the charges. A national security court established by the SRC sentenced all three to death, and the execution was carried out publicly on 3 July 1972.

The alleged KGB connection

In works by historian Christopher Andrew based on the Mitrokhin Archive (documents smuggled from KGB files by archivist Vasili Mitrokhin), it is claimed that Kadiye was a KGB informant or agent codenamed "OPERATOR". This allegation has not been corroborated from other verified sources; it rests solely on a single archived collection that has not been fully opened to scholars.