Word: saddamism
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Prudence or Pandering? It is clear that Saddam expected to get away with seizing Kuwait and that Washington was startled by his decision to embark on this wild course. Both miscalculations were serious failures of U.S. policy: it was a tactical error not to lay down Day-Glo markers around Kuwait and a strategic one to misread Saddam's expansionist goals...
While the Administration's pro-Iraq tilt in 1989 and 1990 failed spectacularly in the end -- Bush himself admits it "was not successful" -- it had logic at the time. The original impetus was fear of the Ayatullah Khomeini's Iran. Even though Saddam had provoked the Iran-Iraq war in 1980, Washington began helping Iraq to stave off an Iranian victory. The Reagan Administration removed Baghdad from its list of terrorist countries, exchanged ambassadors, overlooked purchases of weapons from U.S. allies and secretly handed over intelligence about Iran's capabilities and intentions...
When the war ended in 1988, Iraq was the strongest power in the Persian Gulf. Some State Department officials thought tilting back from Baghdad would be prudent. There was ample evidence of brutality by Saddam, including use of poison gas against Iranians during the war and on his own people in the Kurdish city of Halabja, where at least 5,000 civilians were killed. Iraq was also considered a regional bully...
...Bush reaffirmed the pro-Baghdad approach, signing a directive in October 1989 calling for closer ties to Saddam and the continued supply of guaranteed credits to buy U.S. grain ($500 million worth were extended the next month) and technology. His rationale: Iraq had the region's largest army, second largest oil reserves, ties to Moscow that would be nice to weaken and big ambitions to be a local power. The U.S. wanted some influence -- and some export sales...
...Saddam's behavior only got worse. In late 1989 and early 1990, U.S. officials saw signs that he was harboring Palestinian terrorists and building a "super gun" and nuclear bombs. Saddam called for the U.S. to vacate the gulf and threatened "to burn half of Israel" with chemical weapons if attacked...