The Iran-Iraq War
The Iran-Iraq War
The Iran-Iraq War, also known as the Imposed War and Holy Defense in Iran, Saddam's Qadisiyyah in Iraq, and (First) Gulf War, was a war between the armed forces of Iraq and Iran lasting from September 1980 to August 1988. It was initially referred to in the western world as the "Persian Gulf War" prior to the "Gulf War" of 1990 with the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq.
The war began when Iraq invaded Iran, launching a simultaneous invasion by air and land into Iranian territory on September 22nd, 1980, following a long history of border disputes, and fears of Shia insurgency among Iraq's long-suppressed Shia majority influenced by the Iranian Revolution. Iraq was also aiming to replace Iran as the dominant Persian Gulf state. Although Iraq hoped to take advantage of revolutionary chaos in Iran and attacked without formal warning, they made only limited progress into Iran and within several months were repelled by the Iranians who regained virtually all lost territory by June, 1982. For the next six years, Iran was on the offensive. Despite calls for a ceasefire by the United Nations Security Council, hostilities continued until August 20th, 1988. The last prisoners of war were exchanged in 2003.
The war came at a great cost in lives and economic damage - a half a million Iraqi and Iranian soldiers as well as civilians are believed to have died in the war with many more injured and wounded - but brought neither reparations nor change in borders. The conflict is often compared to World War I, in that the tactics used closely mirrored those of World War I, including large scale trench warfare, manned machine-gun posts, bayonet charges, use of barbed wire across trenches, human wave attacks across no-mans land, and extensive use of chemical weapons such as mustard gas against Iranian troops and civilians as well as Iraqi Kurds. At the time, the UN Security Council issued statements that "chemical weapons had been used in the war." However, in these UN statements Iraq was not mentioned by name, so it has been said that "the international community remained silent as Iraq used weapons of mass destruction against Iranian as well as Iraqi Kurds" and it is believed that "United States prevented the UN from condemning Iraq".
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