During the 1980's, there was a prolonged war between Iraq and Iran. The war was fought for many reasons, but primarily over each country's greed for one another's oil. Eventually, this led to the US's launching of "Operation Staunch". This was a US policy passed by the Reagan Administration to prevent all arms and ammunition sales to Iran or Iraq from the United States. When the US was forced to break its policy in order to save the lives of US hostages being held by Iraq, US feelings towards Iraq began to turn negative. This scandal became known as the Iraq-Contra Affair and received lots of publicity, causing the US to re-evaluate their policy against Iraq.
On August 2, 1990, President Saddam Hussein invaded and occupied Kuwait. Iraqi control of Kuwait's oil supplies would put almost the entire world at the mercy of Saddam Hussein. Despite the criticism that Hussein received from other countries and organizations, he refused to withdraw his forces.
Iraqi 25-dinar note, as with the Battle of al-Qād...
English: Iraqi-American, Samir, 34, pinning depose...
English: Image from Iraqi state television. Reprod...By the end of 1990, the United Nations had issued twelve resolves to Iraq hoping to settle the conflict, but Hussein rejected all of them.
It was becoming apparent that Hussein had no intention of withdrawing his forces, and armed intervention would be necessary. In early January of 1991, the United States received permission from the United Nations to assist Kuwait in their defense from Iraq by any means necessary. Almost overnight, Congress passed a vote supporting
armed intervention by the United States in the war between Iraq and Kuwait on January 12, 1991. The United States quickly took action, moving thousands of troops and
equipment to the foreign soil, and giving Hussein until January 15 as a deadline to have all of his forces unconditionally withdraw. Hussein proved his hostility once again when
he refused to...