Word: kuwait
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...West had its own bloody experience with Sadr's Da'wa. In December 1983, Da'wa attacked the American and French embassies in Kuwait. The Da'wa was the core around which Iran created Lebanon's Hizballah, another violent Shi'a group that went on to kidnap scores of foreigners and hijack half a dozen airplanes during the '80s - long before it also became a political player in Lebanon...
...curb Iran's Islamic Revolution. Many countries - including the U.S. - supported Saddam as a bulwark against Islamic fundamentalism, which they deemed a greater long-term political threat to Western interests than Arab nationalism. But Saddam followed Nasser in blundering his way to defeat, starting with his invasion of Kuwait...
...With one exception, when it has gone into combat, it has sooner or later retreated in defeat and left behind a mess to be cleaned up later. This happened in Vietnam in the '70s, Lebanon in the '80s and Somalia in the '90s. The exception was the liberation of Kuwait, but this achievement was devalued by President Bush Jr., who clearly regarded the situation in the area as unfinished family business that he had to revisit. So it is no surprise that the U.S. is now looking for a strategy in Iraq that will guarantee its exit, but little else...
...military is pushing ahead as before. It was announced that the 2nd Brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division is preparing to go from Fort Bragg to Kuwait, where they will be the reserves ready to head into Iraq. The All-Americans, as the brigade is known, are paratroopers by training and have historically had clearly defined mission - as their homepage puts it, "execute a parachute assault, conduct combat operations, and WIN." But unless this moment of rumination results in actual strategic change on the ground, it is unlikely that the brigade will be doing what it was trained...
...months before the start of the war, I visited a small village on the Iraqi border with Kuwait. The local elder, a spry septuagenarian known as Abu Mohammed, was keenly aware that when the fighting began, his small watermelon farm might be the first piece of Iraqi territory trampled by American tanks. As he cleaned his ancient AK-47, Abu Mohammed admitted that it would be no defense against the world's most powerful military machine. When I asked if he was frightened, he nodded, saying, "Not of the Americans, but of Saddam. If I don't stand and fight...