US continues supporting Sadaam into the 1990s

Its pretty well known that the US sided with Sadaam's Baath regime in the 1980s in their war against Iran, but of course that ended with the end of the Cold War and then Sadaam's invasion of Kuwait. Could there be a situation instead where the US continues to support Sadaam as an ally after the Iran-Iraq war?
 
but of course that ended with the end of the Cold War and then Sadaam's invasion of Kuwait

Technically not. Iran was hated by the U.S. and supporting Iraq hurts Iran. The support only ended because Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, thinking he could pull a Hitler on the U.S. Didn't work that well.
 
To be fair to Saddam (him still being evil and all) he invaded because he thought the US would not have any problem with invading Kuwait, and I do recall coming across something where he was essentially told by some US diplomat lady that if he were to ever go to war with Kuwait, the US would not take action. It's also not as if Kuwait was a democratic bed of roses (it, like Iraq, was a human rights abusing dictatorship).
 
That was why the US ambassador in question saw her career ended when it turned out she had consistently refused to give the truth to Saddam as to how the US would act if he did not leave Kuwait.
 
Which in turn is the POD that might be required. Saddam in fact doesn't get what he thinks is a Green Light, but instead is told, in diplomatic terms, just what would happen to him if he 'reclaimed' Iraq's '19th province'.
 
That would be impossible, Iraq was near flat out broke by the end of it, and both were exhausted by the loss of soldiers (Think: future of country).

Actually part of the reason Iran accepted the UN ceasefire that eventually made peace in the war was because of the fact that Iraq was rapidly rebuilding its army with Western assistance. That and the growing threat of American intervention.

Though in retrospect, a serious Iraqi victory of the sort that would result in Iraq gaining Khuzestan is not something that would have sat well with the US, renegotiating the Shatt-al-Arab dispute is one thing, 80% of Iran's oil-producing territory is quite another.

The funny thing is Saddam was in a great position to secure his power by working with the United States, he just had no real grasp of regional politics and the consequences his actions would have.
 
The funny thing is Saddam was in a great position to secure his power by working with the United States, he just had no real grasp of regional politics and the consequences his actions would have.

Saddam truly does always seem to come off like a bumbling man child who will indeed commit genocide, murder, and war, kill his enemies and torture his people, but it all boils down to little more than an evolved hissy fit from some brat who doesn't understand much more than hurting people solves all problems. He didn't have any of the prowess or intelligence of Hitler or Stalin, whom he admired.
 
I'm not quite clear on why the only way to avoid an invasion of Kuwait is to have an Iraqi victory against Iran (that seems like it would increase the odds, not decrease them), but still, this idea produces some extremely interesting butterflies. For one, if Kuwait isn't invaded, then the US won't put it's troops on Saudi Arabian soil, which was a major casus belli for al Qaeda. One could go so far as to butterfly away a successful attack on the World Trade Center this way. With no protracted wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we'd instead see a highly proactive American presence in other parts of the world. Relations with China and Russia might be frostier due to bumping heads with them more aggressively, and one or two human rights hellholes might see American troops intervening in a progression from Clinton's OTL foreign policy (Clinton himself might get butterflied here, but probably not, and Yugoslavian civil war certainly won't). Offhand, I'd say either Sudan or Somalia are decent candidates to receive American peacekeepers at some point in the 00's. Those will likely get messy, but not nearly so much so as Iraq/Afghanistan OTL.

All in all, this divergence would probably lead to a more stable planet as of 2012, but we'd also likely see a butterflying or deferral of the Arab Spring, so take that as you will. Oh, and this wouldn't stop the Sub-prime bust, so no dice there, either.
 
Last edited:
Iraq was an ally of convenience only, because he was fighting Iran, and having Iran take over any of the Arab Gulf states was a ghastly prospect for the west. Once the war was over, the only way the USA would stay an ally of Saddam is if he really turned over a new leaf and sought us out as an ally. He'd have to become a LOT less authoritarian, make nice with all the neighboring Arab states, and work more closely (and friendly) with the other OPEC states (other than Iran, of course). It's hard to see Saddam doing that.
Alternatively, rather than having Iraq win the war as some of you have suggested, have Iran come out of it better. Say that the mullahs get a clue early on and actually work to keep the professionalism of the old Shah's army in place, with working equipment (maybe some new stuff from Russia) and officers from the old army, and get rid of the stupid 'human wave' attacks. So, if Iran keeps a solid army in the field and either can't make headway against Iraq's defense lines, or is still forced to make a sullen peace, the USA has a reason to keep supporting Iraq. But it's hard to imagine Khomeini and the other whackadoo mullahs doing that either...
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
A POD I've played around with is Iraq taking the oil fields in the far north of Kuwait and the islands that block Iraqi access to the Gulf, but nothing more than that. In such a scenario, I can see the UN passing a resolution condemning the move but not giving the resolution any real teeth. I certainly don't see the US going to war in such a scenario.
 

Cook

Banned
Could there be a situation instead where the US continues to support Saddam as an ally after the Iran-Iraq war?
Iraq was never an ally. There is a difference between being neutral and giving tact diplomatic support, and being an ally. America’s concern was that Iran threatened to over-run the Gulf States; once that threat ceased (which it did with the end of the Iran-Iraq War), there was no further reason to be sympathetic to Saddam’s ambitions. Doubtless if Saddam had chosen to settle down and be a stay-at-home tyrant his relationship with the west would have remained good with US and European companies outbidding each other to rebuild Iraq following the end of the war.
he was essentially told by some US diplomat lady that if he were to ever go to war with Kuwait, the US would not take action.
Her name was April Glaspie, and what she actually said was that America had no interest in Iraq’s border dispute with Kuwait, but hoped that it would be resolved swiftly. At the time the Iraqis had been objecting to Kuwaiti slant drilling on the Rumeila oil field that straddles their common border; that Kuwait was tapping Iraqi oil. It was seen as simply a dispute over oil revenues and Iraq’s repayments for the massive loans Kuwait had provided during the Iran-Iraq War that, at worst, would see the Iraqis occupy Kuwait’s northern oil field. Glaspie’s mistake was in underestimating the danger the situation posed, not that she told Saddam that he could invade Kuwait, and to be fair the US State Department, Defence Department and C.I.A. were all caught short, as were the Kuwaitis themselves.
the reason Iran accepted the UN ceasefire...
Because the Ayatollah died. Saddam had already evacuated the Iranian territory, Khomeini had remained the only obstacle to ending a war that was going nowhere anyway.
A POD I've played around with is Iraq taking the oil fields in the far north of Kuwait and the islands that block Iraqi access to the Gulf, but nothing more than that. In such a scenario, I can see the UN passing a resolution condemning the move but not giving the resolution any real teeth. I certainly don't see the US going to war in such a scenario.
That sounds likely. The Americans would probably want to increase their military presence in the Gulf, but there would not be any request from Saud because they would not consider Saddam an existential threat.
 
I'm not quite clear on why the only way to avoid an invasion of Kuwait is to have an Iraqi victory against Iran (that seems like it would increase the odds, not decrease them)

OTL, Saddam survived the Iran-Iraq war, but Iraq owed enormous debts to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, which had financed Iraq in the war for obvious reasons.

With the war ended, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia started to press for repayment of the loans.

Saddam then had a clever idea. If he took over Kuwait, that would eliminate half of Iraq's war debt, plus he would gain Kuwait's oil revenue and possibly Kuwait's money pot (which was and is enormous).

If Iraq won the war, they would be in much better financial condition, with a lot more oil revenue; and depending on how the victory happened, smaller debts. Saddam would have less incentive to roll the dice again.
 

Cook

Banned
If Iraq won the war, they would be in much better financial condition, with a lot more oil revenue; and depending on how the victory happened, smaller debts. Saddam would have less incentive to roll the dice again.
Gamblers seldom step away from the table when they have had a win; If Saddam had won the Iran-Iraq War, he’d have felt himself to be in a much stronger position, which of course he would have been, and better positioned to fulfill his long term ambition of uniting the peninsula under him and his previous gamble would have been vindicated, making another role of the dice more likely.

It is worth noting that when Saddam had Babylon rebuilt, bulldozing much of the archeological site and building over it, where the old bricks were stamped with King Nebuchadnezzar’s name, the new bricks were stamped with Saddam’s name.
 
Its pretty well known that the US sided with Sadaam's Baath regime in the 1980s in their war against Iran, but of course that ended with the end of the Cold War and then Sadaam's invasion of Kuwait. Could there be a situation instead where the US continues to support Sadaam as an ally after the Iran-Iraq war?
What if IRAN wins convincingly, Sadam has to cling to America's skirts to survive, the US wants a trustworthy ally in the region.

(Trustworthy. Ya, sure. Still the us has leaned on weaker sticks in the past.)
 
Top