Why did america intervene in the gulf war of 1991 and not the iran-iraq war before then?
Kuwait was an ally, Iraq and Iran weren’t. Oh yeah, and the Gulf War was a UN intervention, not an American one. We just supplied most of the firepower. And no, the USA did not sell Iraq any significant amount of weaponry or munitions used in the war. Iraq got their stuff mainly from Russia, with some purchases from several European countries.
The west made tons of cash bankrolling the iran – iraq war. iraq was better armed and iran had more men so it evened out. But Iran always had someone the west considered more dangerous, so used iraq to keep him down. Also remember Iran was getting cash from Russia and arms, so the cold war kind of spilled over in the nineties. However like so many despots before him, Saddam once backed up with better arms decided that he would flex his muscles, by gasing hundreds and invading others. He expanded his border into where he said he always owned, Kuwait. Like China did with Tibet. However a different US administration that wasn’t so much bothered with Russian problems, a Kuwaity call to the UN (always helps) and worries over oil made it a very different argument. Nothing to do with actual prices as the opec cartel price fixes them so all oil is sold at the same price. In the 80’s Iraq and kuwait were selling oil together and Iraq was also a nice earner for arms, then suddenly one is a rogue
Actually, the United States has been intervening in the Middle East for decades in the Iran-Iraq conflict. We supported the shah of Iran for many, many years. When he went into exile (in the United States), we armed Iraq when the Iran-Iraq war started. When Iran started losing, we armed Iran (see Iran-Contra hearings). (That would be when you thought they were just fighting each other.) When Iraq invaded Kuwait, we fought against Iraq. In 2003, we were back to fighting against Iraq. Now, we are once again propping up Iraq in a possible conflict with Iran. If we got any more involved in the conflict, we would be fighting on both sides at the same time.
I’m not gonna argue about whether oil was motivation for either Gulf War in 1991 or the current one, but the U.S. did intervene in the Iran-Iraq war. We supplied Iraq with financial aid, intelligence, and weapons. We isolated Iran, and attacked some of their interest in the Persian Gulf (oil platforms, warships, etc.).
We did – and half a million Iranians were killed, with the help that we gave to our former allie, Saddam Hussein.. See the picture of Donald Rumsfeld, shaking hands with Saddam Hussein here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._suppor… And regarding the 1991 Gulf War, consider this: “On July 25 (1990,) Saddam Hussein summoned U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie to a meeting that would later gain great publicity and vociferously complained that Kuwait was engaging in acts of war against Iraq by not assisting with Iraq’s war debt or agreeing to limit its production of oil. If Iraq attacked Kuwait, Saddam vehemently argued that it would be because Kuwait was already making war on Iraq. To Saddam’s overt threat, Glaspie mildly responded: “We have no opinion on your Arab-Arab conflicts.” It has been widely argued that Glaspie’s response persuaded Saddam that the United States would not militarily
