Qusay Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti (Arabic: قصي صدام حسين‎) (or Qusai) (17 May 1966 – 22 July 2003) was the second son of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. He was appointed as his father's heir apparent in 2000.

Qusay's older brother Uday Hussein was viewed as Saddam's heir until he sustained serious injuries in a 1996 assassination attempt. Unlike Uday, who was known for extravagance and erratic, violent behavior, Qusay Hussein kept a low profile. He was married to the daughter of a top ranking military official and had three sons; One of the sons, Mustapha Hussein (born 3 January 1989 in Tikrit), was killed alongside his father in the shootout with U.S. troops. The other two: Yahya Hussein (born 1991) and Yaqub Hussein are presumed alive, but their whereabouts are unknown.

Unlike other members of his family and the government, little information is known about Qusay, politically or personally. It is believed that until the 2003 Invasion of Iraq Qusay was the supervisor of the Iraqi Republican Guard and the head of internal security forces (possibly the Special Security Organization (SSO)), and had authority over other Iraqi military units.

Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti (Arabic: صدام حسين عبد المجيد التكريتي Ṣaddām Ḥusayn ʿAbd al-Maǧīd al-Tikrītī; 28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003. A leading member of the revolutionary Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, and later, the Baghdad-based Ba'ath Party and its regional organisation Ba'ath Party – Iraq Region, which espoused ba'athism, a mix of Arab nationalism and Arab socialism, Saddam played a key role in the 1968 coup, later referred to as the 17 July Revolution, that brought the party to long-term power of Iraq.

As vice president under the ailing General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, and at a time when many groups were considered capable of overthrowing the government, Saddam created security forces through which he tightly controlled conflict between the government and the armed forces. In the early 1970s, Saddam nationalized oil and other industries. The state-owned banks were put under his control, leaving the system eventually insolvent mostly due to the Iran–Iraq War, the Gulf War, and UN sanctions. Through the 1970s, Saddam cemented his authority over the apparatuses of government as oil money helped Iraq's economy to grow at a rapid pace. Positions of power in the country were filled with Sunnis, a minority that made up only a fifth of the population.

Uday Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti (18 June 1964 – 22 July 2003), (Arabic: عُدي صدّام حُسين‎) was the eldest son of Saddam Hussein from his first wife, Sajida Talfah, and the brother of Qusay Hussein. Uday was for several years seen as the heir apparent of his father; however, Uday lost his place in the line of succession due to injuries sustained in an assassination attempt, his erratic behavior and his troubled relationship with his father and brother. Following the United States-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, he was killed along with his brother by a secretive combined Special Operations Task Force (Task Force 20) during a brief gunfight in Mosul.

Uday produced the newspaper Babel and a local Iraqi TV channel called "Al-shabab TV". He was briefly married to the daughter of Izzat Ibrahim ad-Douri, who was Vice President and Deputy Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, but he later divorced her.

Uday Saddam was born in Baghdad to Saddam Hussein and Sajida Talfah while his father was in prison.