The Iran-Iraq War (22 September 1980-20 August 1988) was a war that lasted for most of the 1980s fought between Iraq and Iran. Fought over the Shatt al-Arab Waterway as well as over Iran's hopes of exporting Shi'a revolution to Iraq, the war cost around one million lives and was famous for its World War I style of warfare that saw the use of bayonet charges, human wave attacks, chemical attacks, trench warfare, and costly offensives. Both sides were supported by the United States at times (Iran gained F-14s from the US, while Iraq gained chemical weapons as well as military support), and Iraq bought its weapons from a large variety of many countries. In the end, the war was a stalemate, but left a lasting impact on Middle Eastern politics.
Background[]
Iraq[]
In 1968 the nationalist Ba'ath Party took power in a coup. Saddam Hussein overthrew a Ba'ath predecessor to become president in 1979. Saddam brutally ruled this mainly Shi'a country through its governing Sunni minority. He also persecuted its Kurdish minority. He viewed the Iranian revolution with concern, as he feared it might spread to Iraq. Border disputes with Iran and Iraqi support for Iranian separatist groups increased the tension between them.
Iran[]
In 1979, the corrupt pro-Western Shah of Iran was overthrown in a popular Islamic uprising that brought Ayatollah Khomeini to power. Iran became the world's largest theocracy and a leading centre of Shi'a Islam, threatening not only Iraq, but the other Sunni kingdoms around the Gulf.
Wars[]
The pretext for Iraq's war against Iran, which began in 1980, was the disputed ownership of the Shatt al-Arab waterway between the two countries that leads into the Gulf. Iran and Iraq had clashed over the waterway in the early 1970s, but reached an agreement in 1975. Now, the fall of the Shah, the new Islamic government's antagonism to the US, and its subsequent purges of Iran's armed forces all suggested that Iran might be weak. The result was an opportunistic attack on 22 September 1980 that Saddam hoped would topple the Iranian government, enlarge Iraq's oil reserves, and establish his leadership in the Gulf and wider Arab world.
The Iraqi air force attacked ten airfields but failed to destroy the Iranian air force on the ground. The next day, Iraq launched a ground invasion along a 650-km (400-mile) front, with four divisions crossing Iran's southern border, to besiege Khorramshahr and Abadan, one division invading in the centre to block a potential Iranian invasion route, and another division in the north to protect the Iraqi oil complex at Kirkuk.
Stalemate[]
The Iraqi invasion soon stalled in the face of vigorous, if disorganized, Iranian resistance. Iran retaliated with air strikes against targets in Iraq, including oil installations and their capital, Baghdad. Its air force quickly gained air superiority, while the Iraqis did not have enough bombers to be effective against a country the size of Iran. Saddam's hopes that opponents of the Ayatollah's government would rise against it were dashed, as Iranian nationalism led people to rally round their government and resist the Iraqis, not welcome them.
An Iranian counterattack in March 1982 recovered lost territory, and Iraq withdrew its forces in June, agreeing to a Saudi Arabian plan to end the war. Iran refused to compromise, however, insisting on the removal of Saddam from power. In July its forces crossed the Iraqi border and headed for Basra. They were met by a vastly increased Iraqi army - approaching one million strong - and entrenched in formidable border defenses, who repelled the attack with coordinated small arms and artillery fire and by the use of gas, a regular feature of the Iraqi war effort. In 1984 Iraq launched an air bombardment of 11 Iranian cities to force the country's government into peace talks. The Iranian response against selected Iraqi cities began the first of five "wars of the cities" that took place during the conflict.
Offensives by both sides in 1985 and 1986 failed to break the stalemate, as neither side had sufficient artillery or air power to support large-scale ground advances. The rest of the war consisted of both sides bombing each other's cities and exchanging Scud missile attacks. Iraqi chemical attacks in 1988 against Kurdish targets in both Iran and Iraq enraged the Iranians but they did not have the means to continue the war and agreed a ceasefire on 20 August.
Aftermath[]
The pre-war territorial status quo was restored, although at the cost of perhaps a million lives and two much-weakened economies. Crucially, however, Iraq had received support from many Western and Arab countries, including funding from oil-rich Kuwait, one of its biggest creditors. In its impoverished state, Iraq looked to Kuwait to solve its problems and cancel its debts. Unwisely confident that the West would not intervene, Saddam Hussein sent his troops to invade and occupy Kuwait on 2 August 1990.