WI: No Invasion of Iraq in 2003?

This question has been asked countless times, but I'm legitimately curious as to how you people feel the political climate of the U.S would have evolved had it avoided invading Iraq in 2003. Do you feel ISIS would still exist? Would our economy still have been weakened in 2008? Would Hussein still be in power? If not, would he have been removed during the Arab Spring or died at some point, leaving one of his sons in power?
 
Hussein wouldn't still be in power. He was hated by everyone and his position was way too weak to win a civil war. He goes probably during Arab Spring. What happens next is up for grabs. Radical Sunni Islam will probably move in on some level like it does every time a place with Sunnis becomes a failed state but I doubt it would be as bad as today.

Yes, the economy would still have been in bad shape in 2008. The core reasons for that had nothing to do with Iraq.

Neoconservatism would probably still be a major ideological influence and Trumpian cynical, isolationist, pro-Russia conservatism wouldn't have become a thing.

One interesting idea is if Iran moves in and takes out Saddam to install a friendly Shiite regime, creating a contiguous Shia axis. Now that would be fun.
 
This thread reminds me what a tar baby the Middle East can be. The US had been getting its fingers stuck in it for two decades, Absent the Kuwaiti invasion I'm thinking the process will be slower but the end result much the same.
 

DevlPalce

Banned
I think it might effect the 2004 presidental election. IIRC, the war was still giving Bush the 'rally-around-me' popularity all wars usually do. Without this, and without a solution the public deems alright to 9/11, Kerry could even win. Even moreso, Howard Dean could win, since war experince doesn't seem so important.

If a democrat takes the white house in 2004, and no war to boost the economy up minorly, Lehman probably collapses earlier. The war intially helped economic growth, stalling the 2008 recession, but it just delayed it. Republican s might be the one to have supermajority's right after 2008, not democrats.

Trump would probably not be president. Unless he would run in 2008, when he was a democrat IIRC, no years would be good for him.
 
Saddam had no competitors.Arab spring would have brought his downfall.Then the same thing which is happening now in Libya ,albeit the billions of dollars spent by US,would have happened in Iraq(power struggle,sunni-shia conflictetc).We should remember that a war is a booming business.The Iraq war provided a stimulus to the complex military-industrial complex.Without it, only Afghanistan would not have sustained/rationalised such huge spending(you can bomb a country to stone age, not below that).
 
Any significant changes you can picture arising out of the absence of the Iraq War?
No Obama is a big one. The fact he voted against Iraq was a big reason why he beat Hilary from what I hear. In this scenario, she'd probably take the nomination in 2008. Similarly, in the UK the more centrist strain in Labour would be stronger over OTL due to how the war did not discredit Blair.

You feel ISIS would till exist if Hussein remained until 2011?
I am no expert on the subject, but it seems to me Isis arose out of events that were inseparable from the Iraq War. If there were no invasion, sheer butterflies would mean its extremely unlikely we'd see a group like OTL, even if there were still something comparable to it, its not going to be exactly the same.
 
Hussein wouldn't still be in power.

He'd be gone from old age, but his regime might've survived. A son may have succeed him but probably would've been assassinated and replaced by somebody else.

He was hated by everyone and his position was way too weak to win a civil war. He goes probably during Arab Spring.

Saddam always had many enemies but remained in power, even after the catastrophe of '91, sanctions etc. As for a civil war, Saddam amazingly, was able to crush the shia uprising of '91 right after his army had ben demolished! (Ghadafy might've done the same had NATO stayed out.) The sunnis appear to have been the toughest group in Iraq. Had the Baath survived in power, ISIS almost certainly would've been stillborn (many of its members were former baathists, driven out of power). But it's noteworthy that ISIS was really on a roll in '14; had it not been for US/Iranian intervention, the sunnis might've regained control of Iraq.


One interesting idea is if Iran moves in and takes out Saddam to install a friendly Shiite regime, creating a contiguous Shia axis. Now that would be fun.

I think it would've been too costly--a quagmire for Tehran. Progress against ISIS would've been much slower and costlier without US airstrikes.
 

They had just enough left to put it down then, but only just. Assad was in a vastly stronger position in Syria and still came very close to losing, only having his position saved by massive foreign intervention. That's my point of comparison; Saddam wasn't long for power. Eventually the revolts would have started up again and the Iraqi military was just too badly damaged by that point to put it down.

I don't think it would have been a quagmire. The Iranians as is came very close to winning the Iran-Iraq War (they almost took Basrah in 1987), and by the 2000s Saddam was immeasurably weaker for having lost nearly his whole air force, the better part of his army, and had a brittle hold on the overall country. Iran conversely had grown in military strength through development of its domestic arms industry and the purchase of a lot of good equipment after the USSR broke apart. They could have cleaned up with him.
 
They had just enough left to put it down then, but only just.

Well, it says something they put it down when they were at their weakest, and there weren't any further revolts AFAIK for the next 12 years despite all the hardships.

Assad was in a vastly stronger position in Syria and still came very close to losing, only having his position saved by massive foreign intervention. That's my point of comparison; Saddam wasn't long for power. Eventually the revolts would have started up again and the Iraqi military was just too badly damaged by that point to put it down.

I don't think Assad jr had anywhere near the political acumen or toughness of Saddam. Jr owed his position to birth and in fact wasn't originally intended to be a head of state. In contrast Saddam had to fight his way to the top from the bottom, or almost; he was much more experienced and tougher from the point of view of handling internal opposition. And again, it says a lot about Saddam's staying power that he faced no serious challenge to his rule for 12 years after the catastrophe of '91, despite the terrible rut Iraq was in.

I don't think it would have been a quagmire. The Iranians as is came very close to winning the Iran-Iraq War (they almost took Basrah in 1987), and by the 2000s Saddam was immeasurably weaker for having lost nearly his whole air force, the better part of his army, and had a brittle hold on the overall country. Iran conversely had grown in military strength through development of its domestic arms industry and the purchase of a lot of good equipment after the USSR broke apart. They could have cleaned up with him.

By 2003 or earlier Iran might've won a conventional war. But after the slaughter they endured in the '80s, it's understandable they didn't try their luck in a manner you suggest. Also, winning a conventional war isn't the same as holding down a hostile occupied population; even the US had difficulties after '03.
 
One of the things that I wonder about is would the US arm the Kurds in Iraq so that they could fight Saddam for independence. This covert action would weaken Saddam. However the Turks have concerns about an independent Kurd homeland. Would the Turks push back against arming the Kurds?
 
Better middle east. No ISIS, or at least not the ISIS we know. Conservatism in America much stronger. No Donald Trump, though some of the issues that brought him to the forefront still active.

What a fucking disaster it all was.
 
I mean, Saddam was his late 60s when 03 came around and his death. I feel like his sons would tear apart Iraq after his dies, and that would be a big mess to deal with.
 
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I mean, Saddam was his late 60s when 03 came around and his death. I feel like his sons would tear apart Iraq after his dies, and that would be a big mess to deal with.
His two older sons were quite something. The eldest was likely deranged, and if not for the attempted assassination that crippled him, might have taken charge and really taken the country into a mess. The younger one was a lot more stable, but was apparently even more ruthless than his dad...
 
His two older sons were quite something. The eldest was likely deranged, and if not for the attempted assassination that crippled him, might have taken charge and really taken the country into a mess. The younger one was a lot more stable, but was apparently even more ruthless than his dad...

Not a good mix of people to rule over Iraq. I wonder, if Iraq suffers a implosion after Saddam's death, would the US send in a focre to keep the peace? Or Iran? Or Turkey? Or Syria?
 
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