Mark Phillips: The American Question

12/22/02: Gulf Wars One, Two, and Three.

Although we often label the coming invasion of Iraq "Gulf War Two", it's actually Gulf War Three.

The First Gulf War began in September, 1980, when Iraq, with U.S. encouragement, invaded Iran. Expecting rapid victory, the Iraqi campaign instead bogged-down in the face of Iranian resistance. Iranian counterattacks began in January, 1981, forcing Iraq to withdraw to the original border. What began as a World War Two-style blitzkrieg devolved into a World War One-style war of attrition; both sides lost tens of thousands.

From 1982 through 1987, Iranian massed infantry attacks ground Iraq slowly back, while Iranian air units attacked Iraqi shipping and port facilities in the Gulf. The Iraqi port city of Basra was threatened.

This is the context in which the modern Iraqi army was built with concerted international support. The Soviet Union supplied Iraq with tanks, attack helicopters, jet fighters, and combat engineering equipment. France loaned Iraq squadrons of Super Entendard attack fighters, and eventually sold them dozens of Mirage fighters. Saudi Arabia allowed Iraq to use its airbases; Kuwait opened its ports to shipments of arms destined for Iraq.

Most significantly, the United States assisted Iraqi efforts to develop and deploy the chemical weapons which proved decisive in halting Iranian massed infantry assaults. Donald Rumsfeld traveled to Baghdad in December, 1983, initiating high-level U.S.-Iraqi contacts. According to the Washington Post, U.S. intervention on the Iraqi side "included large-scale intelligence sharing, supply of cluster bombs through a Chilean front company, and facilitating Iraq's acquisition of chemical and biological precursors."¹ "The administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush authorized the sale to Iraq of numerous items that had both military and civilian applications, including poisonous chemicals and deadly biological viruses, such as anthrax and bubonic plague."² "U.S. intelligence and logistical support played a crucial role in shoring up Iraqi defenses against the 'human wave' attacks by suicidal Iranian troops."³

Finally, the U.S. Navy intervened militarily on the side of Iraq. The Navy's aggressive patrols tended "to start fights, not to end them. We behave at times as if our objective was to goad Iran into a war with us."⁴ In April, 1988 the U.S. turned a mining attack on a U.S. ship into "the biggest U.S. Navy sea battle since World War II."⁵ After the U.S. cruiser Vincennes shot down an Iranian civilian airliner, killing all 290 aboard, the commander of another U.S. Navy vessel in the area noted that while "the conduct of Iranian military forces in the month preceding the incident was pointedly non-threatening," the actions of the Vincennes "appeared to be consistently aggressive," leading some sailors to nickname it "Robo Cruiser".⁶

This concerted international intervention tipped the balance against Iran, which accepted a disadvantageous truce in July 1988.

Thus the 1991 campaign we know of as "The Gulf War" was in fact our second adventure there, this time on the side of Iraq against Iran. The coming invasion of Iraq itself will be Gulf War Three.

How many more will there be?

ENDNOTES

¹ Michael Dobbs, "U.S. Had Key Role in Iraq Buildup: Trade in Chemical Arms Allowed Despite Their Use on Iranians, Kurds", Washington Post, December 30, 2002. (Back to article.)

² Dobbs, op. cit. (Back to article.)

³ Dobbs, op. cit. (Back to article.)

⁴ Quoted in Stephen R. Shalom, "The United States and the Iran-Iraq War", Z Magazine, Feb. 1990. (Back to article.)

⁵ Shalom, op. cit. (Back to article.)

⁶ Shalom, op. cit. (Back to article.)

Back to 2002 menu
Back to Mark's Blogspace main page

More Information

1. "All roads lead to Tehran", Phillips
2. "Complexity", Phillips
3. "weblogs: a history and perspective", blood
4. "You've got blog", Mead
5. EatonWeb Portal
6. BlogHop
7. Blogger
8. Blogroots
9. The Pepys Project