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Comment by numlocked | Hacker News Reader

Wow, I have never heard this before:

“Few people remember it, but Gorbachev was negotiating with Saddam and had successfully convinced him to pull out of Kuwait. The agreement they came up with would give the Iraqis three weeks to pull out. At this point, it had become a major goal to eliminate the Republican Guard and we didn’t want them to pull their head out of the noose, so President Bush turned down the compromise and ordered the ground forces in.”

Is that true?

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I wasn't aware of that history either -- this article gives more color:

https://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/world/middleeast/20archiv...

The Iraqi invasion happened in August 1990, and America's response was in January/February 1991.

It sounds like Saddam changed his tune because he saw the buildup of American forces over that time period. If there was no threat then he probably wouldn't have agreed to any settlement.

With the ground war just days away, Mr. Gorbachev mounted a peacemaking effort. Tariq Aziz, the Iraqi foreign minister, arrived in Moscow on Feb. 21. Later that day, Mr. Gorbachev told Mr. Bush in a phone call that he sensed a “serious shift” in Iraq’s position, according to a transcript in the Bush Library.

> ordered the ground forces in

as i recall, the air war was so devastating there wasn't much of a purpose for ground troops and when it came time to "order the ground forces in" most of the work was just walking across Kuwait. They even made a movie about how much of a let down the ground war was to the Marines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarhead_(film)

I wouldn't go so far as to say there wasn't much purpose for the ground troops in the context of the goal of eliminating Iraqi military capabilities. It involved some of the largest tank battles in US history such as the Battle of Norfolk and the Battle of the 73 Easting. While we look back at some of these as a steam roll in hindsight, the truth is the engagements were larger than most of the armor battles in WW2 involving the US.

The marine advancement in to Kuwait that was part of a larger multi-national push that much of the Iraqi forces were running from. The push by 1st Inf Div, 2nd ACR, and others on the west was to cut off that retreat.

Combat theaters are large and it is never a good idea to take a narrow view of them and generalize it to the whole. The father of my childhood friend used to tell us how his deployment in Vietnam as an MP was some of the best time in his life. He spent his entire time on a post relatively far from the fighting largely killing his time trying to surf and eat BBQ.

Generation Kill is a great movie in a similar vein about the second invasion.

It's a mini series, and yes, it's brilliant

I think you mean Hollywood filmed a book written by one of those marines.

I think he said what he meant. But, I think you meant "I know you linked a wiki that explains the film is based on a memoir in the first line, but you've already exposed yourself to the 'It was a book first!' attack, and I don't want to have to turn in my 'Ackchyually Guy,' membership card." Since we're speculating.

A more charitable reading would be that you simply meant, "Yes, that movie is based on a book by one of those marines." Maybe with some added opinion on whether you enjoyed it or found it equally as enlightening.

Well, he DID say "they made a movie" so yes, obviously that is exactly what he meant.

Have you heard of the 'Highway of Death'? Iraqi forces were retreating on that highway, on their way back to Iraq. Coalition forces did not want to permit that, and slaughtered them. Thousands of vehicles destroyed, hundreds+ soldiers killed, thousands more captured.

I can't say I feel much sympathy towards the Iraqis here, but it does seem a tad bit vindictive.

Human tragedy aside (and it absolutely is, no doubt about it, on all sides), it really depends on the context.

Striking the retreating army is the 'easiest' way to 'neutralize' it, Clausewitz writes about it, and I am sure it's been practiced for thousand(s?) of years before that.

For a timely comparison: would it be 'vindictive' when Ukraine strikes the retreating Russian army in the Kyiv area before they regroup and attack the Donbas? I don't think so. Seems like a good idea, actually.

It's how battles have been won for thousands of years. The two army's approach each other and take minor casualties until one sides moral collapses, they break, and route. 90% of the deaths happened after the route.

Reminds me of the sinking of the General Belgrano during the Falklands War. The story at the time was that the Belgrano, an Argentinian warship, was leaving the Falklands to return to Argentina, when a British submarine sunk her; there were many in the UK who considered this an outrage, on the grounds that she was no longer contributing the occupation of the Falklands, so should have been left alone.

That analysis never made much sense to me, and apparently it later came out that the Belgrano wasn't leaving the Falklands anyway, and much later on the captain of the Belgrano said he thought that the British were quite right to sink it [1]!

[1] https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/britain-was-right-to-sink-th...

Well, it probably saved Kurdish lives to some degree. Remember that Iraq is a British Empire construction of three opposing ethnic groups (Shia, Sunni, Kurd) and Saddam was a Sunni oppressing the other two.

Wiping out his best soldiers may have reduced his ability to suppress the other two ethnic groups.

Or it made Shia and Kurds more active and sowed MORE conflict. Who can predict such things.

But from realist international puppet string wannabes, it neutered Saddam's military and ability to threaten Kuwait or Saudi Arabia. The US was just a mercenary army for the Kuwait and Saudi royal families in this "war".

It is obviously a matter of context. Russian army in Kyiv is indeed able to regroup and attack again. Iraqi army was by all means a defeated force that was running for its life into Iraq where civil war just started. The risk of it attacking Kuwait again was zero.

A defeated force can still regroup in, say, Baghdad and make the city much harder to take.

They were retreating, not surrendering. They were bringing with them all their arms and armor (literally, bringing their tanks back). We stopped them because they very well could have regrouped to when they were back in Iraq. They were not 'hors de combat'.

"I can't say I feel much sympathy towards the Iraqis here"

Why wouldn't you feel sympathy for people who were killed or maimed, and their families?

It's funny how I got some comments insinuating that I have too much sympathy, and yours which seems to say I have too little. I'll address both in this single comment.

What little sympathy I have, is because people died. I don't have more sympathy because 1) those Iraqis invaded another country. 2) They didn't surrender. I am well aware that retreating but not surrendering soldiers get shot in wars, and I'm not particularly upset about it when those soldiers are on the belligerent side. I have some shred of sympathy for them, only because they are still human.

>I can't say I feel much sympathy towards the Iraqis here, but it does seem a tad bit vindictive.

they could have always surrender and become POW.

I have mo idea what your background is. How do you imagine a cog in an authoritarian country to surrender during a war. Mutiny, summary executions, retaliation against family, shamed as a coward.

Many did when command and control broke down

Do you think the Ukrainians were in the wrong when they killed Russians during their withdrawal? Or are rules different for the underdog?

Just google "gorbachev saddam 1991"

The answer is "pretty much true".

I took now half an hour to check sources on that and it seems to be pretty much the color.

Curious that nobody asked to sanction the US to destroy their economy and to isolate them for that war... or any of the other wars.

the coalition built for gulf war 1 was extensive to say the least. I think that was one of Bush Sr's requirements, if anyone was going to liberate Kuwait it had to be everyone. You would have to sanction the entire coalition which was basically the entire western world.

Bush Sr. convinced everyone to stop at Iraq's border and wouldn't push further to knock out Hussain's regime. Wisely, IMO for all the reasons that are clear today. However, lots of people think this is what cost him a second term and left many people at the pentagon feeling like there was unfinished business in Iraq. This "unfinished business" is what eventually led to Bush Jr's invasion.

What cost him the second term was the economy.

Actually in the end the US went soft on Iraq. Thatcher wanted to roll into Baghdad and clean it out properly (or, she argued we’d find ourselves there again in a decade or 2). Bush disagreed.

Imagine if it were true. Then maybe no Forever Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.

Or something else horrid and gross would have developed.

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