Before the invasion of Iraq, tensions had been simmering between Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and the tiny (but wealthy) nation of Kuwait. The State of Kuwait had loaned Iraq $80 billion dollars, finding its fight against the Islamic Republic of Iran. Despite their strong relations during the war, Saddam decided to place 30,000 troops on the border of Kuwait after the war. Saddam believed that Kuwait was conspiring against his country after the Emir began meeting with Saddam's rivals in Syria, Egypt, and Iran.
Later, he began to accuse Kuwait of exceeding its OPEC quotas for oil production and drilling across the border, into Iraq's oil fields. And so, Saddam, confident that America would not intervene in another Middle Eastern War invaded his tiny neighbor on August 1990. This came as a bit of a shock to the international community as the crisis seemed to have resolved itself a month ago. On July 25th, Kuwait agreed to
a peaceful settlement that would've scaled down its oil production and allowed Iraq to become a major arbiter of oil prices within OPEC.
So the question is, what caused Iraq to diverge from the path of peace? Why did Saddam decide to move against Kuwait when things seemed to move in Iraq's favor? FBI agent George Piro later interviewed the deposed dictator during 2005 and
asked the same questions himself. He later found that what really pushed Saddam over the edge occurred during a meeting between himself and the Emir of Kuwait.
Washington Post said:
"What really triggered it for him, according to Saddam, was he had sent his foreign minister to Kuwait to meet with the Emir al-Sabah . . . to try to resolve some of these issues. And the emir told the foreign minister of Iraq that he would not stop doing what he was doing until he turned every Iraqi woman into a $10 prostitute. And that really sealed it for him, to invade Kuwait," Piro said in the interview, according to CBS.
After the Emir made this brash insult, Saddam would take the comment personally, ordering his troops to march across the border. And as they say, the rest is history. Thousands of soldiers would die in a swift invasion that crippled Saddam's forces and Iraq had become an international pariah. But suppose the Emir decides to hold his tongue, Saddam remains content with the agreement, and alls well that ends well. What's next for the Middle East? Does Baghdad's star continue to rise? Does instability still come to the region? And how does the rest of the world go on without a war caused by this single remark on Iraqi women?