(IM BACK) Weekly history Post: Gulf War

Time Period: 1991-91

Combatants: Iraq, Kuwait, UN coalition (USA, France, Canada, France, Australia, etc.)

In the late 80's and early 90's,  The newly borderline Fascist Iraqi government wanted more power, and, if you took history class, "Who ever controls the oil controls the world", And lucky for them, the middle east is full of oil. the reason they needed money and power was that they needed money to pay off their debt from their recent war with Iran (1980-88). But because they were in so much debt, they couldn't just fight any country in the region, so they needed a fight with someone small. lucky for them, they share a southern border with tiny Kuwait, an easy fight, right? WRONG. on August 2 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait, and in return, the UN formed a plan to counter them.

There were 2 stages the UN planned to stop the Iraqi's:

Operation desert shield: the UN forming a coalition of 34 countries to counter Iraq

Operation desert storm: Bombing the Iraqis then ground combat

Anyway, it only took 2 days for  the Iraqis to overrun Kuwait and annex it as its 19th province. At this time, the UN started its 5 week bombing campaign on January 17, 1991. after that, they started a 4 day ground campaign, and at that point, the iraqis fled Kuwait, back into Iraq. And the war was over, but that was only the beginning of the US military action in the middle east.