Friday, May 28, 2010
The Persian Gulf War
“America will never seek a permission slip to defend the security of our people”’
-G.W.B. http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/g/george_w_bush.html
By May 28-30 1990 Saddam Hussein demanded an overproduction of oil by Kuwait. July 15-17 Iraq assumes that Kuwait stole their oil. This obviously initiated conflict between the two countries. In response to that, Iraq started their military build-up in July on the 22nd. Knowing these dates you are probably wondering, what about the United States? That’s exactly what I am going to be arguing in this web log. Was it righteous of the U.S.A. to step in or not? How did it turn out? And, would it have been better for us not to?
In my opinion, August 2nd 1990 was the beginning of the Persian Gulf War, because this was the exact date Iraq invaded Kuwait. Soon after, Saudi Arabia requested U.S.A. soldiers to help defend them. On August 8th Saddam Hussein annexed Kuwait. The following day the first U.S. soldiers were deployed. I think it was the right thing to do to send our soldiers to Saudi Arabia. Without us, Saudi Arabia would be reduced to kibbles and bits. The coalition between the U.S. and thirty-four more countries was unbearable for Iraq. On August 10th Saddam Hussein announced a “Jihad” or Holy War against the U.S. and Israel. In response to this the United Nations passed a resolution known as “678”. This gave Iraq a deadline to step out of the war. The deadline was January 15, 1991. As I stated earlier, the U.S. made coalitions with thirty-four countries. Three of them were France, South Korea, and the United Kingdom. On January 12th, 1991 the United States Congress gave military forces the objective to force Iraq out of Kuwait. Our strategy for attacking Iraq was somewhat similar to Blitzkrieg. We started with Aerial attacks which were then followed up with ground assaults. President George W. Bush deployed 430,000 soldiers into Saudi Arabia. The war being fought on the ground was huge. But our military was one of, if not, the best military ever. This war or battle was commonly known as “Desert Storm”. You have probably heard of this war because it was the final conflict that the U.N. and all the other nations agreed upon. This treacherous, awful, and sad war ended on November 30, 1995. As a result, Iraqi territory was being occupied by the coalition. Also a peace conference was held and both sides did end up signing the agreement known as the “Cease Fire” agreement. March 10, 1991 was the date when 450,000 U.S. soldiers exited the Persian Gulf. I think that if we would not have stepped into this war then the conflict would still be proceeding and America would be just as safe as we are now. So to answer the question I think it was superbly righteous of us to step in because we were protecting an innocent country, and we were also protecting our oil systems. Now what do you think other countries are thinking? Maybe they are thinking wow! I support America because they are doing the right thing by protecting innocent countries and standing up for what is right. This was exactly what we did.
Links: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gulf/
http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0838511.html
http://www.watchblog.com/democrats/archives/005892.html
Word count: 542
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Overall I thought our blog was interesting. However, why did Iraq assume that Kuwait stole their oil?
ReplyDeleteOther countries should be very thankful for what America did. There always has to be a responsible one to step in, and take charge.
ReplyDeleteHow do you "steal" another countries oil? By sneaking pumps into their growned that redirect the oil back to your own country? That seems like such a lame assumption...And why did they declare Jihad on Israel? Espacially if they were not involved in the oil shinanigans. This just proves Siddam Hussein was crazy all along. We should have arrested him at this point, it would have saved us a whole lot of trouble in the future.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your point Chelsea. But we couldn't just arrest Siddam Hussein. That would be like the Iraqi government waltzing into the oval office and abducting Obama. In a perfect world, we could all just arrest dictators, but unfortunately, most of them are either playing hide and go seek in holes in the ground or guarded by several tons of nukes. So ultimately, I think the US is making lemonade out of lemons, or rather, plucking those lemons out of their trees and painting them red, white, and blue. Its going to take a lot of effort, but I do think it is America's responsibility to be involved in foreign affairs.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Mike, no one else was going to step in and without the U.S. stepping in they could be "stealing" oil from others countries.
ReplyDeleteI would have to agree with McKenna, your article was really well written but im still not sure why Hussein annexed Kuwait?
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