Saddam Hussein killed in Operation Desert Fox (Dec. 1998)

What if Saddam and his two sons had been killed when they were struck by surprise inspecting one of the bases, or whatever, during U.S. bomibng in December of 1998?

There would be lots of outrage in the Middle East; including possible a civil war in Iraq. Ont he one hand, Bill Clinton would probably get some credit for ridding the world f the man who gassedthe Kirds and such, but on the other, there could be mass mayhem in the streets. That, ironically, the U.S. might send peacekeepers in to help solve. Or, would they? It may not seem like it, but the example of Somalia could be used to show that troops should be sent.

How would this effect Gore in 2000?
 

stalkere

Banned
Well, this is one mass of butterflies

I was a Staff Officer when DESERT FOX was happening.This sort of scenario was much discussed.
I think you might want to check the first 10 chapters of Clancy's "Executive Orders"
In his view, Iran orchestrates the assassination of Saddam, and the nation is quickly united in a Unified Islamic Republic.
When I originally read the book, that seemed plausible,but, knowing a bit more about the culture now, doubt that the Sunni Arabs would stand for a unification with Iran...I have little doubt that Iran would have grabbed the Shia Areas.
A possible outcome is the creation of three states - basically, the Kurdish Autonomous Region (NORTHERN WATCH) becomes a sovereign nation, the Shia SOUTHERN WATCH region becomes part of Iran (again) and the Sunni area holds out with Saudi assistance, and probably keeps the Iraq name.
There's a lot of questions - how long will Kurdistan exist before Turkey or Iran take it over?
It's not true that Muqtada Al Sadr is the nephew of the former Iranian Prime Minister, but there is some sort of familial relationship with high level members of the Iranian Ruling Council. Part of the reason the US forces made the "Thunder Run" to Baghdad was to get there before Sadr's Armored Column could get there from Iran. There was an ARCLIGHT strike on a Republican Guard unit that coincidentally closed a mountain pass that the Mahdi Armored Brigade needed - odd that the mission was delayed until the unit was in the pass, and not while it was out on the plain...there was some heated words between the Iranians and the US, since the ARCLIGHT mission supposedly damaged some of the leading elements of the Mahdi Brigade - one of those, "Well thanks for killing those RG bastards, but we would have kicked their butts anyway, and now it's going to take us a week to clear the road and get our tanks through."
CENTCOM - "Sorry 'bout that"
I doubt that we would have sent peace keepers into the post-Saddam quagmire. I can't say that anybody in the US or Saudi would have been happy with Iran acquiring the Shia area, but would there have been a war?
I especially wouldn't have wanted to be a Sunni Arab in the shrunken Iraq - especially if Iran took over Kurdistan as well as the South.
Not all the Shia - who are ethnically Persian but racially Arab - want to be Iranian again. The possible option is that the Shia areas might have become a client state of Iran, with some degree of autonomy, and the Kurdish areas might have been a highly US supervised area to keep the Turks and Iranians out.
Not sure if this would have had much effect on the 2000 elections, nor the 911 attacks.
I still happen to be a big fan of Al Gore - any body that REQUESTS to go to a war zone, when they can legally stay safe in Europe, has got a good set of stones. My personal opinion is that a Gore Presidency would have been a HELL of a lot better in the post 911 world - but that is a different discussion...:cool:
 
Wait...al-Sadr had an armored brigade?

Where'd this come from?

If Iran intervened in the post-Saddam chaos (assuming such chaos breaks out), I would imagine they'd have some kind of armor in the area, but I was under the impression Sadr's militia consisted of young men with small arms and it did not even come around until after Saddam fell.
 
Now, how that would effect the 2000 election, i dunno. Knowing how Clinton tended to act, if things didn't go immediately the way they're "supposed to", he'd probably pull the occupational forces out of there, leaving Iraq a clusterfuck of his own creation, which would probably lead to Iran taking it over. Not to mention more hostility, in that region, towards the US for pretty much letting it all go to hell in a hand-basket.

Since he was THERE during this time period, this probably wouldn't reflect well on ol' Gore either. He'd have to try his damned hardest to, somehow, completely distance himself from Bill Clinton during the election campaign. But he'd probably lose, without the need of 2-3 recounts, since the whole situation, still fresh in peoples' minds, would just give the opposition TOO MUCH ammunition to use against him.

So Bush or McCain win in the 2000 election, and there's no Iraq Invasion after 9/11.

But what about Afghanistan?? With a more powerful Iran in the region, (specially getting ahold of all that Iraq oil) would the US wanna even TRY to do anything with Afghanistan at that point?? :confused:
 

stalkere

Banned
Wait...al-Sadr had an armored brigade?

Where'd this come from?

If Iran intervened in the post-Saddam chaos (assuming such chaos breaks out), I would imagine they'd have some kind of armor in the area, but I was under the impression Sadr's militia consisted of young men with small arms and it did not even come around until after Saddam fell.

Yep.
Didn't get a lot of coverage in the US press, but there was some. I'll try to confine my comments to what I recall seeing in the press, but it sure took a WHOLE lot of attention in the CAOC.

Not sure what happened to it after the war - but the Shia are pretty smart - I doubt that they figured that a brigade of armor was going to do much to oppose the Coalition, and give the Abrams guys some more kill rings.

The Mahdi army irregulars can do their sniping and disappear back into the populace.

But...why do you think we did the "Thunder Run" to Baghdad? I mean, me personally? - I was all for letting the RG and Mahdi Brigade fight it out, then we plaster the survivors with J-SOW, but, hey, I was just a dumb-ass Major. They told me to shut up and color, so that's what I did.
 
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