AH Challenge: Cordial Saddam-US Relations

IOTL, Saddam Hussein had a relatively good relationship with the USA in the 1980s. The US helped him in the Iran-Iraq War, for example, in an effort to destabilize Post-Revolution Iran. So, with a POD no earlier than the inauguration of Ronald Reagan to his second term as President of the United States, have this relationship remain relatively good. Bonus points if Iran becomes the Gulf-War Analogue enemy. Double bonus points if Iraq is part of a Coalition against Iran.
 
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Saddam attacked Kuwait because his nation was broke as a result of the (very high) costs of the Iran-Iraq war. Keep him from attacking Kuwait, and you remove most of the problems he had.
 
I can't really think of any with a PoD that early. Perhaps if April Glaspie never got named Ambassador, and the new Ambassador told Iraq that we would back them in most things- just not in invading Kuwait...
 
Gorbachev fails to get the nod, and the increasing desperate hardliner regime carries out a "lightning" (ha!) invasion of Iran in early 1990 in an effort to change the balance of power, having managed to convince themselves that the US isn't going to start WWIII for the sake of the Mullahs. As the front-line state in against the new Red Offensive, Iraq becomes the new Best Buddy of the US, a front-line state that becomes even more important during the Soviet Civil War of the mid-90s and the messy, drawn-out collapse of the Iranian puppet regime. The US even allows Iraq to test a nuclear weapon of their own in 1994...

Bruce
 
I thought that whole Iran-Contra thing, and the hostages in Beruit (so much for Reagan being a hardliner) had to do with the rift. Saddam felt double-crossed when American arms dealers started selling to Iran. Simple thing to do would be to eliminate this whole situtation. How? I don't know, send in some Jarheads (I mean that in a good way) to free the hostages.
 

Cook

Banned
I can't really think of any with a PoD that early. Perhaps if April Glaspie never got named Ambassador, and the new Ambassador told Iraq that we would back them in most things- just not in invading Kuwait...


Pretty much the same thought.

Have April Glaspie, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq in 1990, state that while America did not have an opinion in the Iraq – Kuwait dispute, it expected the dispute to be resolved peacefully and would not tolerate the use of force.
 
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