Ahmad al-Suwaydani^[a] (Arabic: أحمد سويداني; 1932–1994) was the Syrian Army's chief of staff in February 1966– February 1968. Before that he had been the chief of military intelligence in 1963–1965 and the head of the bureau of military personnel in 1965–1966.^[1] He was dismissed and imprisoned for suspicions of plotting a coup in 1968. In 1994 he was released and died shortly after.

Ahmad was born in 1932 in Nawa.^[2] He belonged to the Bani Suwaydan, a Sunni Muslim clan of the Hauran. In the 17th century, before the town of al-Suwayda had become a predominantly Druze center, the headmen of the town often hailed from the Bani Suwaydan. Ahmad's father was a peasant, relatively better off than most of the peasants of Nawa and part of the village's notable class.^[3]

Ahmad graduated from the Homs Military Academy and joined the Ba'ath Party.^[4] In 1963–1965, he served as the chief of the military intelligence directorate.^[1] During this time he helped finance and provide arms to the Palestinian armed movement Fatah, cooperating particularly with Yasser Arafat and Salah Khalaf (Abu Iyad).^[5]

In 1965 he also became head of the bureau of military personnel.^[1] He became closely with President Amin al-Hafiz and Chief of Staff Salah Jadid,^[6] Ahmad participated in the 1966 Syrian coup d'etat which installed Nureddin al-Atassi as president with Jadid effectively as the country's strongman. Ahmad was then promoted to the rank of major-general and appointed by Jadid as chief of staff. He held this post during Syria's defeat by Israel in the Six Day War of 1967.^[5] Ahmad blamed Defense Minister Hafez al-Assad for the loss of the Golan Heights to Israeli forces, and a quarrel erupted within the Syrian high command. Ahmad penned a report denouncing Assad, but the latter countered with allegations that Ahmed was fomenting a coup in collaboration with some 100 officers from the Hauran.^[7] As a result of Assad's and Jadid's suspicions, Jadid dismissed Ahmad in February 1968.^[5]

During a flight Ahmad was taking from Baghdad to Cairo in July 1969, his plane was forced to take an emergency landing by the Syrian authorities in Damascus, whereupon he was arrested. Afterward, all his loyalists from the Hauran were dismissed from the officer corps.^[8][5] He remained imprisoned through the presidency of Hafez al-Assad until his release in February 1994. Soon after his release, in the same year, he died in his hometown.^[5]

Ahmed Suwaydani was portrayed by Alexander Siddig in the Netflix TV series The Spy.^[9]

• Batatu, Hanna (1999). Syria's Peasantry, the Descendants of Its Lesser Rural Notables, and Their Politics. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0691002541.
• Khatib, Lina (2011). Islamic Revivalism in Syria: The Rise and Fall of Ba'thist Secularism. Abingdon and New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-78203-6.
• Moubayed, Sami M. (2006). Steel & Silk: Men and Women who Shaped Syria 1900-2000. Cune Press. ISBN 9781885942401.