Author Topic: How the first Gulf War came about )(  (Read 228 times)

Matrix Heart

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How the first Gulf War came about )(
« on: January 31, 2005, 06:52:10 AM »
The Gulf War of early 1991 didn't change much. Our old buddy, the despotic Emir of Kuwait, is back on his throne. Our former buddy, Saddam Hussein, while knocked down a peg or two, is still in power and as brutal as ever. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are dead, hundreds of US veterans are suffering from a mysterious disease, and the Persian Gulf has been ravaged by the largest oil spill in history. The question naturally arises, could any of this have been avoided?

The whole dispute started because Kuwait was slant-drilling. Using equipment bought from National Security Council chief Brent Scowcroft's old company, Kuwait was pumping out some $14-billion worth of oil from underneath Iraqi territory. Even the territory they were drilling from had originally been Iraq's. Slant-drilling is enough to get you shot in Texas, and it's certainly enough to start a war in the Mideast.

Even so, this dispute could have been negotiated. But it's hard to avoid a war when what you're actually doing is trying to provoke a war.
The most famous example of that is the meeting between Saddam and the US Ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie, five days before Iraq invaded Kuwait. As CIA satellite photos showed an Iraqi invasion force massing on the Kuwaiti border, Glaspie told Hussein that "the US takes no position" on Iraq's dispute with Kuwait.

A few days later, during last-minute negotiations, Kuwait's foreign minister said: "We are not going to respond to [Iraq]....If they don't like it, let them occupy our territory....We are going to bring in the Americans." The US reportedly encouraged Kuwait's attitude.
Pitting the two countries against each other was nothing new. Back in 1989, CIA Director William Webster advised Kuwait's security chief to "take advantage of the deteriorating economic situation in Iraq to put pressure on Iraq.'' At the same time, a CIA-linked think tank was advising Saddam to put pressure on the Kuwaitis.

A month earlier, the Bush administration issued a secret directive that called for greater economic cooperation with Iraq. This ultimately resulted in billions of dollars of illegal arms sales to Saddam.

The Gulf War further destabilized the region and made Kuwait more dependent on us. US oil companies can now exert more control over oil prices (and thus boost their profits). The US military got an excuse to build more bases in the region (which Saudi Arabia, for one, didn't want) and the war also helped justify the "need" to continue exorbitant levels of military spending. Finally, it sent a message to Third World leaders about what they could expect if they dared to step out of line.
 

Juronimo

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Re: How the first Gulf War came about )(
« Reply #1 on: February 04, 2005, 03:30:55 PM »
I agree, it was nothing short of cold manipulation and puppeteering for the sake of profit. I've read something similar to this in the past.
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notorious^q8I

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Re: How the first Gulf War came about )(
« Reply #2 on: June 03, 2006, 05:46:26 PM »
it wasnt about no drilling equipment man
saddam juss came out of his war with irana nd the situation in iraq was fukked up
especially financially.... so he went and asked kuwait for money, and they refused to donate them, they agreed to loan him though
he went crazy and started accusing kuwait of stealing oil, although it was the other way around, but blv it or not geologically the land in kuwait in much lower than iraq and saudi and iran, therefore its draining oil for all the countries around it naturally.... so they tried negotioiating a deal out in saudi.. didnt work
and obviously there was this infamous american statement telling saddam that the us would interfere any middle eastren conflicts, which was like a green light to invade kuwait...

CLASSIC.... west is BACK
 

J Bananas

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Re: How the first Gulf War came about )(
« Reply #3 on: June 03, 2006, 08:30:52 PM »
glad to see you revived this enthralling story from 05'