Conflicts in Iraq

Victory Parade for Operation Desert Storm

Military personnel carry a huge American flag through New York City during a ticker tape victory parade for
Operation Desert Storm. Image: © Joseph Sohm; ChromoSohm Inc./CORBIS June 1991
 Middle East Quick Quiz
How much do you know about the
middle east? 5 quiz questions
1) Who created most of the borders
and countries of the Middle East?
a. France and England
b. Jordan and Syria
c. Saudi Arabia
d. The United Nations
e. The United States

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 Middle East Quick Quiz
How much do you know about the
middle east? 5 quiz questions
2) What language is spoken in most
of the Middle East?
• Which country in the Middle East is
considered most holy to Muslims?

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 Middle East Quick Quiz
How much do you know about the
middle east? 5 quiz questions
4) What is the most populous Islamic
country in the world?
a. Egypt
b. Indonesia
c. Iran
d. Saudi Arabia

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 Middle East Quick Quiz
How much do you know about the
middle east? 5 quiz questions
5) Which of following is Iraq?

C D
A B

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 Middle East Quick Quiz
How much do you know about the
middle east? 5 quiz questions
Answers!!
1. A
2. Arabic
3. Saudi Arabia
4. B (196 million people)
5. C

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 Iraq Basics
Where?

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 Iraq Basics
Who? Ethnic Groups
A. Arabs
•2/3 of Iraq Kurds

B. Kurds
•1/4 of Iraq & present in
Turkey, Syria, and Iran
•Own language &
customs and traditions

•Brutally suppressed in
Iraq – demands for self
determination

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 Iraq Basics: Religion

A. Shiite
•3/5 of the population
•Closest ally = Iran

B. Sunni
•2/5th of population
•90% of world’s Muslims
•Saddam Hussein & the
Baath Party = Sunni

C. History of violence going

back to the 7th century = sites
of martyrdom = in Iraq!
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 Iraqi History
A. British Mandate
•Post WWII British control &
•British established the Iraqi
monarchy – King Faysal had never
been to Iraq! (but he had been to
Oxford University)

C. Military Coups
1958 – first coup – Iraqi Royal
family murdered
1963 – next military coup
establishes the Sunni dominated
Baath Party as ruling party King Faisal I of Iraq
Original caption: Death of King Faisal. Faisal, King of Iraq, whose
sudden death is just announced.
Image: © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS
Date Photographed: ca. 1930

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 The Baath Party and the rise of Saddam
Hussein
1963 – 1979 Internal struggle for
power within the Baath Party
(Saddam Hussein slowly rises
through the ranks of the military)

1972 The Arab Socialist Baath

Party = signed a treaty of friendship
with the Soviet Union

1972 Iraq nationalizes the Iraq

Petroleum Company

1979 President resigns and is

replaced by Saddam Hussein, his
deputy

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 Iran-Iraq War (1980 – 1988)
A. Iraq’s Goals:
•Remove Iran’s leaders, gain oil-land, & unite the
Iraqi people and the Baaths behind Saddam
B. How?
•Long brutal war, including use of chemical
weapons on both sides – and military support for
both sides from both the US and USSR
•UN creates a peace deal
C. Results
•Iraq left with big war debt
•1 million dead on both sides
•Iran’s Shia government support for anti Saddam forces within
12 Iraq
 Persian Gulf War (UN action against Iraq)
Why?
1.Iraq’s claimed the land
of Kuwait
2. Claimed Kuwait was
stealing oil from Iraq
(“slant drilling”)
3. $ owed to
countries Kuwait

4.Hussein thought no
one would stop him

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 Persian Gulf War (UN action not just US)
What happened??
US invades w/full UN backing
•US bombs Iraqi military &
civilian infrastructure
•We make no attempt to hold
Iraqi towns or capture
Saddam Hussein

Destroyed Vehicles Along Kuwaiti Highway

Destroyed cars and trucks line Kuwait's "Highway
of Death" during the Persian Gulf War. The name
was given to the stretch of road leading north out
of Kuwait City which, while clogged with
retreating Iraqi forces, was furiously bombed by
coalition forces, killing most on it.
Image: © Peter Turnley/CORBIS
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 Persian Gulf War Pictures
Kuwait Oil Well Fires
from Space
View from the space
shuttle Atlantis of
black smoke billowing
from burning oil wells
in Kuwait, which were
set ablaze by retreating
Iraqi troops at the end
of the

Persian Gulf War.

Image: Digital image ©
1996 CORBIS;
Original image
courtesy of
NASA/CORBIS
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 Persian Gulf War Pictures

George Bush and Saddam

Hussein on CNN Television
Broadcast
The faces of the US President
George Bush and the leader of
Iraq Saddam Hussein on a
CNN television broadcast
during the Gulf War, 1990.

Image: © Zen
Icknow/CORBIS
Photographer: Zen
Icknow
Date Photographed:
January 1990

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 Persian Gulf War (the 1st one!)
Results?
UN Peace Terms:

•Iraq accepts border with Kuwait,

surrenders all WMDs, destroys all
WMD production capability –
agrees to regular inspections
•Iraq can sell oil in exchange for
food & medicine
•Above Iraq = a no fly zone
•Kurds given semi-autonomous
zone in the North of Iraq
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 1991 – 2002 Between the Wars

Saddam Hussein had been defeated and forced to

comply with the conditions of the peace.
Dangers for his rule:
-Internal Party overthrow?
-Sanctions = drop in economic activity and rapid
increase in poverty rates?
-Attempted Shia uprising in Southern Iraq
-Regular strategic bombing by US air force
-IAEA making regular inspections
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 1991-2002 Between the Wars
How did Saddam keep his hold on Iraq?

-Used Chemical weapons against the Shiites in the South

-Refused to allow IAEA inspectors into Iraq from 1998 on.

(US launch a bombing campaign to destroy Iraq’s WMD
program)

-Propaganda campaign in defiance of the international

community

-Launched a military campaign against the Kurds in the

North

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 Second Iraq War
Bush Doctrine: Doctrine of pre-meditative war –
claims that after 9/11 there is no option
Why?:Bush argues Iraq
is a threat because of
WMDs
How? First US pushes
for tighter inspections,
then invades claiming
Hussein was not
cooperating

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 March 2003 – Ultimatum and Response

US and UK – after failing to get UN support

for an invasion – give Saddam Hussein an
ultimatum – 48 hours to fully co operate with
inspectors or they will invade.

20 March – US and UK forces launch an air

attack on Baghdad
9 April – Baghdad falls to American forces
President Bush declares “ Mission Accomplished

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 What Challenges did the Americans face in
helping to re-build Iraq?
•Ethnic divisions

•Political divisions

•Religious divisions

•Infrastructure Collapse

•Government Legitimacy

•Local Attitudes to the Invasion?

•Economic restructuring

•Foreign relations – particularly with neighbors

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