What if the Gulf War never happened?

What if Saddam Hussein foresaw the strong international reaction to his planned invasion of Kuwait and in a effort to keep himself in power, does not go through with it, thereby negating the Gulf War?
 
HW Bush's poll numbers fall faster than OTL. Even without the spike in Oil prices that were caused by the Iraqi invyof Kuwait, the '90-'91 recession will still be there and the broken tax pledge will get more attention than OTL. Thus, his re election chances are even slimmer and he loses to a Democrat who is not Bill Clinton (a lot of heavyweight Dems sat the '92 race out due to the success of the Gulf War, this won't be the case in TTL).
 
We also still have Vietnam syndrome well into the 1990s. That was our first major military undertaking since then. (Reagan, in spite of his warmonger cowboy reputation, preferred funding proxy wars to direct involvement.)

OBL isn't butthurt about the Saudis hiring us instead of him for protection. But he might cook up another excuse, so butterflying away 9/11 is a possibility, not a definite.
 
The new kind of media coverage of the Gulf War was a huge big factor in the rise of CNN in the 90s and 24 hour news networks generally. With no Gulf War these developments are more gradual.
 

samcster94

Banned
HW Bush's poll numbers fall faster than OTL. Even without the spike in Oil prices that were caused by the Iraqi invyof Kuwait, the '90-'91 recession will still be there and the broken tax pledge will get more attention than OTL. Thus, his re election chances are even slimmer and he loses to a Democrat who is not Bill Clinton (a lot of heavyweight Dems sat the '92 race out due to the success of the Gulf War, this won't be the case in TTL).
Where does Perot fall here?
 
The new kind of media coverage of the Gulf War was a huge big factor in the rise of CNN in the 90s and 24 hour news networks generally. With no Gulf War these developments are more gradual.

The OJ trial and Monicagate and Columbine were all big money ratings for cable news nets as well.

We also still have Vietnam syndrome well into the 1990s. That was our first major military undertaking since then. (Reagan, in spite of his warmonger cowboy reputation, preferred funding proxy wars to direct involvement.)

OBL isn't butthurt about the Saudis hiring us instead of him for protection. But he might cook up another excuse, so butterflying away 9/11 is a possibility, not a definite.

Yes, but we likely retain bigger land forces by several hundred thousand. The Gulf War produced an incredible level of arrogance at the Pentagon in the 90s and on about what they could do with high tech and bombs, but they forgot technology can win battles, but boots hold what you gained.
 
I'd think Iraq will do better-Saddam won't have to put down Shia and Kurdish revolts.

A settling of accounts between the US and Iraq is inevitable-war or some sort of regime change will happen by 2010.
 
A settling of accounts between the US and Iraq is inevitable-war or some sort of regime change will happen by 2010.

what account ?? ... the POD is in 1990 before the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait

In case you have forgotten (or never know) at that time the USA was pretty much supporting Irag.

Caveat: This was more a case of "my enemies enemy" than real trust.
in the 1970 the USA did not like the fact that Iraq bought weapons from the Soviets and helped Palestinians.
By the 1980s the USA had providing support to Iraq in its war against Iran
and stopped protesting its support for the Palestinians
 
We also still have Vietnam syndrome well into the 1990s. That was our first major military undertaking since then. (Reagan, in spite of his warmonger cowboy reputation, preferred funding proxy wars to direct involvement.)
.

As someone who had a military career in that era the Viet Nam War hangover was near gone. It mostly existed in the minds of people who had heartburn with the centrist politics of the voters in those days, and aging news pundits.

The Gulf War did quiet some military thinkers who claimed the US would never fight another 'conventional' war again. Right up to Desert Shield they were advising reconfiguring the entire US military for "Fourth Generation" warfare.
 
what account ?? ... the POD is in 1990 before the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait

In case you have forgotten (or never know) at that time the USA was pretty much supporting Irag.

Caveat: This was more a case of "my enemies enemy" than real trust.
in the 1970 the USA did not like the fact that Iraq bought weapons from the Soviets and helped Palestinians.
By the 1980s the USA had providing support to Iraq in its war against Iran
and stopped protesting its support for the Palestinians
didn't US support for Iraq evaporate after the Iran/Iraq War? IIRC, most of our support was intelligence, and we stopped giving it when the war was over...
 
didn't US support for Iraq evaporate after the Iran/Iraq War? IIRC, most of our support was intelligence, and we stopped giving it when the war was over...

No to all your assumptions

During the Iran-Iraq war the US supplied Iraq with many tangible assets including "non military aircraft".

the US removed Iraq from its self appointed list of sponsors of terrorism and resumed full diplomatic relations in the midst of the war.

The US then instituted Operation Staunch - an attempt to interdict third party sales of arms to Iran, but with no corresponding efforts aimed at Iraq.

And its military actions were very partial towards Iraq. Compare the almost non existent US reaction to the Iraqi strike on the USS Stark in May 1987 with its enthusiastic attacks on Iran following damage to a US Merchantman in October 87.

Not forgetting the murder of flight 655 in July 88 from a warship clearly in Iranian waters - a fact initially denied outright by the USN and US government.

Once the ceasefire was brokered the US state department ignored Iran and began offering aid in repairing the ravages of the war only to Iraq.
 
No to all your assumptions

During the Iran-Iraq war the US supplied Iraq with many tangible assets including "non military aircraft".

the US removed Iraq from its self appointed list of sponsors of terrorism and resumed full diplomatic relations in the midst of the war.

The US then instituted Operation Staunch - an attempt to interdict third party sales of arms to Iran, but with no corresponding efforts aimed at Iraq.

And its military actions were very partial towards Iraq. Compare the almost non existent US reaction to the Iraqi strike on the USS Stark in May 1987 with its enthusiastic attacks on Iran following damage to a US Merchantman in October 87.

Not forgetting the murder of flight 655 in July 88 from a warship clearly in Iranian waters - a fact initially denied outright by the USN and US government.

Once the ceasefire was brokered the US state department ignored Iran and began offering aid in repairing the ravages of the war only to Iraq.
yes, during the war, the US backed Iraq, but that wasn't really my question... didn't the help pretty much disappear after the war? During the war, the US regarded the idea of Iran conquering it's way around the Gulf with horror, so it's hardly surprising they backed Iraq. But this thread is about what happened after that, and doing away with Desert Storm...
 
No invasion of Kuwait? Saddam has nuclear weapons by the end of 1991 and by the end of the following year, much of the middle east would have been nuked. By him and the Isrealis.
 

Art

Monthly Donor
What is your evidence that Iraq would have achieved nuclear weapons capability without a Persian Gulf War? Pakistan has nukes, and despite being a failing/failed country, has not used them in combat.
 
No invasion of Kuwait? Saddam has nuclear weapons by the end of 1991 and by the end of the following year, much of the middle east would have been nuked. By him and the Isrealis.

I can't decide if this is a serious post or not. Where is Iraq getting the fissile material from? Even IF 1991 Iraq acquired the ability to produce nuclear weapons that were small enough to put on something that could get to Israel, why in the world would they use the 1-5 weapons they could reasonably have produced (again, not plausible) by the end of 1992 when they know Israel has a massive advantage in nuclear capabilities? It's not even mutually assured destruction...it would just be state suicide.
 
Here's the hard part for me. Yes, the Gulf War was part of the chain of events (specifically, U.S. soldiers in Saudi) which led to Sept. 11th. But I don't want to blame the victim. And yes, sometimes even large countries, rich persons, crummy bosses, etc, can be the victim.

There was certainly terrorism beforehand. Remember the bombing of a Pan Am flight over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988. Two Libyans were convicted, but some outside chance it was actually a plot which originated in Iran.

If there is not something as major as September 11th, some reasonable chance that we in the United States will continue to pursue terrorism as a criminal matter. And whereas it can often be appropriate to wage war against a criminal organization, we won't fall into the trap of trying to wage war against a method.
 
We also still have Vietnam syndrome well into the 1990s. That was our first major military undertaking since then. (Reagan, in spite of his warmonger cowboy reputation, preferred funding proxy wars to direct involvement.)

OBL isn't butthurt about the Saudis hiring us instead of him for protection. But he might cook up another excuse, so butterflying away 9/11 is a possibility, not a definite.

He was extremely anti-western long before 9/11; even in the 1980s in Afghanistan he was notorious for taking out hits on foreign journalists. He would have come up with something else.
 




Hell, U.S. support dried up *during* the war. We gave him just enough to keep him on his feet and prevent him from getting toppled and tapered it off when dangerous moments passed. Nobody ever forgot he was an anti-Israel Arab socialist dictator who bought a ton of arms from the Soviets.

I think that might have been the right decision. Saddam was a loathsome guy but it's hard to see how Iran cleaning up, conquering Iraq, and creating a contiguous Shiite axis would have created a better or more peaceful world.
 
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