The Persian Gulf War – Class Documents
VISUAL SOURCE DOCUMENT I
Information on Document I
The Persian Gulf was not a particularly safe place in the world in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Mired by years of war and dictatorial rule, the Middle East proved to be an area of mistrust
towards westerners. Despite all of its drawbacks, the Middle East is also the area exporting most
of the world’s oil. Western powers such as the United States depend on the oil of the region and
secure and uninterrupted access to it. Saddam Hussein’s success in overrunning Kuwait and
eventually Saudi Arabia would put one man in control of a vital resource needed by the US.
Was the Middle East a place the United States needed to be? As a group, choose a position
from the choices below. Use information from the Visual Source to defend your position.
A. Of course! The United States, with or without allies, should intervene in the Middle East. We
have too much at stake to allow a tyrant like Saddam Hussein run amok in the Middle East
B. No Way! The Middle East can take care of their problems, and we can take care of our own!
Document II: Timeline of the War
January 9
Peace talks between U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker, III and Iraqi representative Tariq
Aziz end in a stalemate.
January 10
Congress begins debate on a resolution authorizing President Bush to use force to expel the Iraqis
from Kuwait.
January 12 The resolution passes in both houses of Congress by narrow margins.
January 16- The Coalition air war begins. Bombers and cruise missiles strike at power plants, munitions
17
factories, and other strategic targets. The bombardment will last 42 days.
February
15
Hussein offers a peace plan loaded with conditions. Bush calls the proposal "a cruel hoax."
February
21
Iraq and the Soviet Union present a peace treaty. Bush rejects it as inadequate.
February
22
President Bush issues an ultimatum: Accept all UN conditions by noon tomorrow or a massive
ground campaign will be launched.
February
24
Diversionary forces lure Iraqi forces to the east as the main Coalition force moves in on the Iraqi
western flank, taking the Iraqi army by surprise. Within two days the Coalition takes 30,000 Iraqi
prisoners.
February
25
An Iraqi Scud missile hits an American military barracks in Saudi Arabia, killing 28 soldiers and
injuring 97 more.
February
26
Iraqi troops try to take the main road out of Kuwait City, causing a huge traffic jam. Coalition
aircraft bomb the road, killing 10,000 Iraqi troops.
February
27
Allies take Kuwait City.
February
27-28
The largest tank battle since World War II takes place. Hundreds of Coalition tanks, armored
infantry vehicles, and combat helicopters destroy 200 Iraqi tanks. No Coalition losses are
reported.
February
28
Hussein agrees to end the fighting.
April 3
The UN Security Council orders Iraq to cancel its annexation of Kuwait, assume liability for war
damages, and disclose all stocks of nuclear and chemical weapons.
April 6
Iraq submits to the terms of the UN order.
Information on Document II
The above timeline of the events of 1991 show the course of the brief war between the United
States with its allies against Iraq.
Did the United States conduct the war in a reasonable and honorable manner?
A. Yes! The United States fought the war the right way.
B. No! The United States destroyed an overmatched opponent beyond what was necessary.
Document III: Why the US didn’t overthrow Saddam Huissein
Why the U.S. Did Not Overthrow Saddam Hussein
November 1, 2001 · By Stephen Zunes
There are many valid critiques of U.S. policy toward Iraq before,
during, and after the Gulf War. Failing to invade and overthrow the
Iraqi government, however, is not one of them.
There has been a curious bout of revisionist history in recent weeks criticizing the U.S. decision not to
"finish the job" during the 1991 Gulf War and overthrow the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein.
With such a lopsided victory in the six-week military campaign, these right-wing critics argue the U.S.
could have easily marched into the capital of Baghdad and ousted the dictator.
However, the decisive military victory--which came with relatively few American casualties--resulted in
large part because Iraqi forces were concentrated in flat, open desert. This was conventional and
open combat, where U.S. forces could excel and take full advantage of their firepower and
technological superiority. Had U.S. forces moved north toward Baghdad, however, they would have
had to march through more than 200 miles of heavily populated agricultural and urban lands.
Baghdad itself is a city of more than five million.
Invading U.S. forces would have been faced with bitter, house-to-house fighting in a country larger
than South Vietnam. Iraqis who may have had little stomach to fight to maintain their country's
conquest of Kuwait would have been far more willing to sacrifice themselves to resist a foreign
Western invader.
The UN Security Council had authorized member states to use military power to enforce its
resolutions demanding an Iraqi withdrawal from occupied Kuwait. There was no authorization to
invade Iraq. The U.S., by basic tenets of international law and in the eyes of international community,
would have become the aggressor.
The broad coalition of nations so assiduously put together by President George Bush would have
fallen apart. Indeed, press reports and my own interviews with foreign ministers and other
government officials of the Arab Gulf monarchies following the war indicated absolutely no support for
carrying the war any further. Indeed, there was already a strong sense that the U.S. had inflicted
unnecessary damage on Iraq's civilian infrastructure with serious humanitarian consequences, going
well beyond what was necessary to rid Iraqi forces from Kuwait.
Even Washington's European, Canadian, and Australian allies were adamantly opposed to extending
the war to Baghdad. The U.S. would have had to do it alone.
If an occupying U.S. army had succeeded in overthrowing Saddam Hussein, then what? Would a
government installed by an invading Western power that had just ravaged the country with the
heaviest bombing in world history have any credibility with the Iraqi people? American occupation
troops would have been subjected to constant hit-and-run guerrilla attacks from Baghdad's narrow
alleyways, forcing the U.S. into a bloody counterinsurgency war. At best, the U.S. would have had to
lead an extensive effort at the kind of "nation-building" that Bush's son and other Republican leaders
have repeatedly denounced in recent years.
Even putting the logistics aside, there is little evidence that the U.S. even wanted Saddam Hussein
overthrown. When Kurds in the north and Shiites in the south of the Iraq rebelled in the aftermath of
the Gulf War and threatened Saddam Hussein's regime, the U.S. decided to ban only the use of
fixed-wing aircraft by the Iraqi air force, which could have threatened U.S. troops. However, by
allowing Saddam's helicopter gunships to operate unimpeded, the rebels were crushed.
The Bush administration feared that a victory by Iraqi Kurds might encourage the ongoing Kurdish
uprising in Turkey, a NATO ally. They also feared what a radical Shiite Arab entity would mean to
U.S. Gulf allies with restive Shiite populations.
Keeping Saddam Hussein in power while subjecting his country to debilitating sanctions and sending
in international inspectors to destroy his offensive military capabilities seemed at the time like the
preferred alternative.There are many valid critiques of U.S. policy toward Iraq before, during, and
after the Gulf War. Failing to invade and overthrow the Iraqi government, however, is not one of them.
Did the United States fail in not overthrowing Saddam Hussein when they had the chance in
1991?
A. Yes! Saddam Hussein was a tyrant and deserved to be overthrown. He cost the United
States a lot of time and money
B. No! The United Nations and US did what they came to do.