The Gulf war – A catalyst for suffering

Quinten Mooij, 5V.

02/02/2023

Source: salud-america.org, “Kuwait City, Kuwait – April 1, 1991: Damaged tank on road with burning oil fire from Persian Gulf War.“
What is the Gulf War?
The Gulf war is a military operation which started in August of 1990 and lasted a single year
up until February 1991. The war was initiated by the United States of America as a response
to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, a small country south of Iraq. Iraq had justified the invasion by
accusing Kuwait of deliberately keeping oil prices down to threaten Iraq’s economy.
Kuwait’s oil export, at the time, was above its quota set by OPEC, an organization that set
rules and guidelines regarding the export of petroleum by countries.

How did the world react to the Gulf war?

The military operation was, as soon as it started, condemned by most of the western world.
The United Nations Security Council immediately established sanctions against Iraq which
included a full trade embargo (excluding items deemed as human necessities), which
ultimately led to hyperinflation and malnutrition among the Iraqi people. However, even
though these sanctions were probably toughest to the Iraqi people, next to the war itself, it
may not have been the worst decision which was made in that period. The president of the
United States at the time, George H. W. Bush also deployed troops and sent equipment into
Saudi Arabia and urged other countries to do the same. This may have been the biggest
mistake yet- the direct employment of western troops and equipment into the region may
have led to even more instability in the region in the coming years.

Why the employment of troops led to even more instability in the region.
Even though the employment of western troops and years of waging war against the Iraqi’s
eventually led to the retreat of the Iraqi troops and the reestablishment of Kuwait as a
sovereign entity in the Middle East, most of the damage was already done. The United States
now held a firm grip in the Middle-East and controlled most of it through military power
alone. It is even questionable if the Middle Eastern people even wanted them there. However,
that is not the point. The point is that the equipment they had moved over from all across the
globe was now in the Middle East. Due to the sensitive nature of the situation in Iraq
weapons were freely moving across the region to support the western fight against tyranny.
Slack controls over military stockpiles and the corruption of the successive Iraqi government
led to the weapons falling into a potential larger threat- ISIS.

The Syrian Civil War

The Gulf war which had started as an ambitious takeover by Saddam Hussein and his
government has bled over to modern times. The sheer inability to control the flow of
weaponry and ammunition has led to even greater threats. I don’t believe that I have to repeat
how bad ISIS is- or the atrocities that they have committed since they have already been
repeated ad nauseam. You might assume that because of the size of the Gulf War that it has
caused more casualties than ISIS have done in their small stint, however, this isn’t the case.
During the Gulf War there have been an estimated 100.000 to 200.000 casualties. The Syrian
civil war, primarily fought with weaponry which was lost due to complete incompetence by
the very bodies who are responsible for protecting us, has been estimated to have taken the
lives of around 580.000 people.
And whether every single death can be attributed to this incompetence by the western bodies
can be discussed, however, I do believe the people who are responsible for these failures
should be held accountable. Which probably will never happen- considering these same
bodies still hold most of the power in the western world.

The Syrian civil war isn’t the only war which was directly influenced by the Gulf War. Take
former Yugoslavia, and the Yugoslav wars, which were also initiated by the United States
because of Yugoslavia’s pressure on the Albanians in Kosovo. During the invasion of
Kuwait, Yugoslavia exported weapons and other armory to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war,
which ultimately would’ve also ended up being used in the invasion of Kuwait. Yugoslavia
also sent engineers to Iraq to construct bunkers which would ultimately end up being used in
the Gulf War. And since the Yugoslav wars started around 1991- around the same time the
Gulf War ended the chances are big that the weaponry used in Yugoslavia also originated
from the Gulf War.

These mentioned wars, conflicts, and deaths- all directly influenced by the United States and
their illusory role as police on the global scale has led to major damage across the globe.
From human lives being lost, people starving, people being forced to depart from their
homes, a corrupt replacement government, it is clear that the United States utterly failed in
their role as the global enforcer. And I believe that they should be held accountable for all the
lives lost and potential ruined. These people were affected by a sick power struggle from a
country which ultimately had no right to interfere in their struggles. I do realize that even
though the U.S. in my eyes unlawfully invaded these countries as a power-play, that if they
didn’t do that, the results may have been far worse. But I do believe that if you are going to
play the enforcer on a global level, you should be able to be held responsible for your actions
but most importantly your shortcomings.
Sources

Mongabay. (n.d.). Yugoslavia-Arms Sales. Retrieved from

https://web.archive.org/web/20130807063557/http://www.mongabay.com/history/
yugoslavia/yugoslavia-arms_sales.html

Ingrao, C. W., & Emmert, T. A. (2013). Confronting the Yugoslav controversies a scholars'
initiative. United States Institute of Peace Press.

How islamic state got its weapons. Amnesty International UK. (n.d.). Retrieved February 2,
2023, from https://www.amnesty.org.uk/how-isis-islamic-state-isil-got-its-weapons-
iraq-syria

Hiro, D. (1991). The Longest War: The iran-iraq military conflict. Routledge.

Zunes, S. (2011, May 25). The US War on Yugoslavia: Ten years later. HuffPost. Retrieved
February 2, 2023, from https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-us-war-on-
yugoslavia_b_211172

Iraq. Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Serbia). (n.d.). Retrieved February 2, 2023, from
https://www.mfa.gov.rs/en/foreign-policy/bilateral-cooperation/iraq