Was A Military Struggle Fought Principally In Kuwait And Iraq During J

Was a military struggle fought principally in Kuwait and Iraq during January and February 1991. The crisis began in August 1990, when Iraq, led by President Saddam Hussein, invaded and annexed Kuwait. Between August and November the United Nations Security Council passed a series of resolutions that culminated in the demand that Iraq withdraw unconditionally from Kuwait by January 15, 1991. By that time, some 500,000 allied ground, air, and naval forces?chiefly from the United States, Saudi Arabia, Great Britain, Egypt, Syria, and France?were arrayed against an Iraqi army estimated at that time to number 540,000. Under the command of U.S. General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the multinational coalition began intensive aerial bombardment of military targets in Iraq and Kuwait within 24 hours after the UN deadline expired, using advanced weaponry such as laser-guided bombs and cruise missiles, as well as conventional weapons. After establishing air superiority, coalition forces disabled Iraq's command and control centers, especially in Baghdad and Al Basrah of transport and communication between Baghdad and the troops in the field; and relentlessly attacked Iraq's infantry, which was dug in along the Saudi-Kuwaiti border, and the 125,000-man Republican Guard in southeastern Iraq and northern Kuwait. Some Iraqi aircraft were shot down; many more were bombed in shelters or fled to Iran. Iraq retaliated by using mobile launchers to fire Scud missiles at Saudi Arabia and Israel, a noncombatant; the U.S. countered this threat with patriot antimissile missiles. In mid-February, with its military and civilian casualties rapidly mounting, Iraq signaled its willingness to withdraw from Kuwait. A series of conditional Iraqi offers, mediated by the Soviet Union, were rejected by the coalition. Instead, allied forces began a coordinated air-land offensive, breaching Iraq's main line of defense at the Saudi-Kuwaiti border and swiftly advancing through southern Iraq to outflank the main Iraqi force and cut off the Republican Guard's principal avenue of retreat. Within 100 hours, the city of Kuwait had been liberated, and ten of thousands of Iraqi troops had deserted, surrendered, or been captured or killed. Coalition combat losses were astonishingly light: as of February 28, when offensive operations were suspended, only 149 allied troops had been killed and 513 wounded. Damage to Kuwait was extensive, however, as retreating Iraqi forces looted the capital and set fire to most of Kuwait's oil wells. Iraqi representatives accepted allied terms for a provisional truce on March 3 and a permanent cease-fire on April 6. Iraq agreed to pay reparations to Kuwait, reveal the location and extent of its stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and eliminate its weapons of mass destruction. Subsequently, however, UN inspectors complained that the Baghdad government was frustrating their attempts to monitor Iraqi compliance. The war in the Persian Gulf was a war of religios fervor, and cruel leadership. Desert Storm was the same type of war that had occured in this area for many years except for one fact. In Operation Desert Storm, sophisticated technology was used to end the war in a quick and timely manner. In 1979 Saddam Hussien took control of Iraq, and immediatly set the tone for his rule by killing 21 of his cabinet members. He wanted to make his country whole once again so in 1990 he invaded Kuwait and in less than 4 hours he had taken Kuwait and controlled 24% of the worlds oi l supplies. It seemed as if his next target was Saudi Arabia. This was where the United States entered after a call for protection by Saudi Arabia. The United States set a deadline, January 15, 1991 for all Iraq forces to be out of Kuwait, but Saddam ignored the deadline. That triggered Desert Shield, or the build-up of troops in the region and eventually lead to Desert Storm, a all-out attack to free Kuwait. It can be clearly said that due to the extreme power and sophistication of the U.S. and her allies that Saddam and his tiny nation of 17 million people stood no chance against the military might that is the United States and its Allies. Chronology: Important Events 1990 Hussein accuses Kuwait on 17 July of oil overproduction and theft of oil from the Rumailia Oil Field. 1990 On 25 July US Ambassador to Iraq, April