Kurdish military leader who for 50 years strove to create an independent nation for the millions of Kurds (Kurd) living on the borders of Iran, Iraq, and the Soviet Union.

The son of a landlord, Barzānī succeeded his elder brother, Sheikh Ahmed, who led the Kurdish national struggle from World War I until the late 1930s. In 1946 Barzānī emerged as commander of the army of the short-lived Kurdish Mahabad Republic, which had been established with Soviet aid in northwestern Iran. After the Soviet forces withdrew in 1947, the republic was overrun by Iran's army, and Barzānī took refuge in Soviet Azerbaijan, where he remained until he was allowed to return to Iraq after that country's 1958 revolution. Barzānī rejected the Iraqi government's subsequent offer of autonomy for the Kurdish area in northern Iraq, and in 1960 he escaped to the mountains and started a guerrilla war against the Iraqi forces. After 10 years of intermittent fighting, a cease-fire agreement was reached followed by a general amnesty for the insurgent Kurds, and in 1974 a law defining the Kurdish autonomous region was promulgated by Iraq. Barzānī found this compromise unacceptable and ordered his Pesh Merga (“Forward to Death”) Kurdish forces to resume fighting, this time with considerable support from Iran. When Iranian support ended in 1975, the Kurdish guerrillas were overrun by the Iraqi forces. Barzānī took up residence in Tehrān but then requested asylum in the United States, where he died. His remains were returned to his birthplace for burial.