Why the fuck did he invade Kuwait? All he had to do was not like

>>1647793

Put simply, he thought his position as counterbalance to the Iranians would mean that the U.S. wasn't really serious about their threats of attacking him if he invaded Kuwait.

So why not grab a tiny, oil-rich province?

>>1647793

I've wondered this too.

I think the answer is that he simply vastly under-estimated the USA's power projection. I mean, put yourself in his shoes. The USA is on the other side of the world, and you have the world's fifth largest military at your disposal. So it might be easy to think: "hey America has a huge powerful army but they'll never be able to actually get over here in time."

You also have to consider that desert storm was perhaps the first "modern" air war in the sense that this was the first time that "smart" weapons were used in large numbers. This makes bombing vastly more effective than way was ever possible in the past. However, nobody had really seen this before, so nobody really knew what to expect.

>>1647793
>gone soverign

true king

t gadafi

>>1647823
>fifth largest army in the world
I had to google this
>it's true
God damn

>>1647823

Why didn't he provide a proper pretext then?

Wishy-washy US diplomats making him think we weren't serious about dropping him like a turd at a summer faire.

File: Saudi,Iraq,Bin Laden.jpg (73KB, 480x753px) Image search: [Google]

73KB, 480x753px

>>1647843
Fun fact: One of the reasons the Saudis allowed U.S. bases on their soil is because they feared Iraq.

>>1647793

The invasion or Kuwait was preceded by Iraq's attempts to have at least some part of its massive war debts erased. Iraq incurred insane amount of debt, especially among fellow Arab. Saddam thought that everyone owed him for containing the Iranians, especially the Arabs who were terrified by Iran. To his dismay, he found that other Arabs have to intention to help him. They were patting his back when he fought Iran, now they were getting to buttfuck the Iraqi economy. Apparently the last straw was when some high-placed Kuwaiti (forgot now who) told Iraqi ambassador that Iraqi women would whore themselves to other Arabs to help pay the debt.

Saddam figured out that annexing Kuwait would solve many of his problems. First of all, it would remove one of his primary lenders out of existence. Secondly, it would bolster Iraqi economy by giving them some more juicy oil and gas fields. Finally, it will show other Arabs who's the top dog and that Iraq is not to be fucked with.

Saddam failed to notify that the world had changed. Cold war was over and he was no longer a necessary ally to contain Iran or the Soviets. US was moving towards becoming the World Police and claimed it will now protect freedom worldwide.

>>1647823
I did a report on military medicine for my history of medicine course and judging by the articles of the time, people in the US were terrified of the potential casualty figures. Sadam had very modern technology and gas weapons. Lots of newspapers at the time had interviews with officials who were unsure we would be able to fulfill the medical needs.

People forget, but the gulf war was one of the last times the US had a relatively conventional war against a standing army and we absolutely smashed them. Hell, even the second time around, we broke the Iraq army in 28 days. The sectarian violence makes people forget that, but we made it to Baghdad in about 3 weeks.

>>1647910
We told Saddam that if he used chemical weaponry, we'd nuke him back to the Stone Age. He wasn't willing to risk escalation.

>>1647906
It's funny. All media I've ever consumed about Iraq suggests it was just some small shitty third world country with a half-assed modest-sized AK-weilding army
This is a revelation to me

>>1647918

Forgetting the SCUD attacks on Israel?

>>1647793

>go to war against Iran
>Kuwait and saudi Arabia decide to give you plenty of oil shekels because they dont like Iran either
>after the war, they start jewing on Saddam
>asking him to pay all this money back, and trying to sieze iraqi oil fields
>Saddam takes his big ass army he just built and steam rolls them both
>they have to run like bitches to the US and beg them for help

Saudi Arabia should be fucking nuked. They are literally everything stormfags hate about Israel, but only 100 times worse.

File: Image33.jpg (150KB, 643x900px) Image search: [Google]

150KB, 643x900px

>>1647919
What most people forget is that Saddams army was mainly Shia conscripts(RG were Sunni tough). They had no motivation to fight for Saddam really(especially after 1991).

>>1647925

Saddam's idea was that by attacking Israel, it would bring Israel into the war. This would piss off America's arab allies who would be revolted by the idea of being in a war on the same side of Israel. However, the US government successfully talked Israel down.

>>1647940
>Sunni
>Shia

Not back then, yet. Pre-1991 Iraq was largely secular and Saddam attempted to build a nation around Arab nationalism. Only after the war did Saddam for various reason went into sectarianism.

>>1647918
>>1647910
>>1647919

Another thing you need to understand is that before this, America's last war was Vietnam. Plenty of observers expected that this was going to turn into another long quagmire like Vietnam. (And really it did, but not until much later when Bush II screwed everything up)

>>1647941

Oh, you're right, actually, I just double-checked my sources, and while there were extensive fears that the missiles would have gas warheads, none of them seemed to have actually included them.

>>1647954
Yep, because Mosul and Basra would have been mushroom clouds within hours if he had.

>>1647919

>It's funny. All media I've ever consumed about Iraq suggests it was just some small shitty third world country with a half-assed modest-sized AK-weilding army

>This is a revelation to me

This is why it sucks that high-speed internet is a fairly recent phenomenon. At the time, news outlets were trying to outdo each other is predicting casualty numbers for US forces.

>>1647951
Yes, Iraq under Saddam was secular and the sectarianism was not as big as today, but I was more referring to Iraq during the U.S. invasion. Iraq fell quick for various reasons, but this one seem to be often ignored.

File: 7289793278927892.jpg (24KB, 500x369px) Image search: [Google]

24KB, 500x369px

Kuwait was drinking Iraq's milkshake.

They were sucking out Iraq's oil and thought they could get away with it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOEYT0wZFNg

>>1647953

Last wars were Grenada and Panama and they turned out great.