A Brief History of US Interventions in the Middle East 1949-2002


By Ty Moore


1949: CIA backs military coup in Syria, ousting elected government.

1953: CIA overthrows democratically elected Iranian government, placing
the Shah in power. In 1951, Iranian parliament had nationalized the
British Anglo-Iranian oil company. This popular move was spearheaded by
the reformer, Mossadegh, who was elected prime minister shortly after.
Britain and the US organize ruthless economic blockade. Shortly before the
coup, the Communist Party calls a 100,000 strong demonstration to protest
the US and the Shah. Nine hours of street fighting finally quells popular
rebellion against the coup.

1954: Iranian oil re-privatized, with US and Britain in control. Popular
opposition compels the Shah to rule through a reign of terror unrivalled
in the region. US helps fund huge military and police build-up, and trains
Savak, the notorious secret police. Amnesty International would write in
1976 that Iran had the "highest rate of death penalties in the world, no
valid system of civilian courts and a history of torture which is beyond
belief. No country in the world has a worse record in human rights than
Iran."

1957-58: Syria and Egypt take steps toward a merger, reflecting
revolutionary yearning of the Arab masses to unite against Western
imperialism. The US Sixth Fleet is dispatched, and huge arms shipments are
delivered to US client regimes. Syria and Egypt claim to uncover "at least
eight separate conspiracies to overthrow one or the other government, to
assassinate Nasser, and/or prevent the merger of the two countries."
Independent evidence detailing several of these failed plots subsequently
emerges.

1958: Iraq and Lebanon: Two weeks after 1958 Egypt/Syria merger, the US
establishes "Baghdad Pact," uniting monarchies and puppet regimes against
threat of Nasserism and growing Soviet influence. Mass rioting erupts
throughout the region. Iraqi troops are ordered into Jordan to put down
unrest. Under popular pressure, the army mutinies and instead marches on
the royal palace. The hated King, Crown Prince, and Prime Minister are
lynched.

The next day, US Marines land in Lebanon and British troops are dispatched
to Jordan. A virtual civil war erupts as 14,000 US troops enter Lebanon at
the invitation of the unpopular, CIA-backed government of Chamoun.
Lebanese forces manage to put down the rebellion after months of urban
clashes. President Eisenhower would later write: "This somber turn of
events could, without a vigorous response on our part, result in the
complete elimination of Western influence in the Middle East."

1963: Right wing of Iraq's Ba'ath party leads successful coup with US
support, after unsuccessful US assassination attempt against Iraqi leader,
Abdul Karim Qassim. The CIA provides Ba'ath party with names of Iraqi
communists to murder, and the CP is ruthlessly slaughtered.
1968: A counter-coup, in which Saddam Hussein participates, leads to
nationalization of Iraqi oil in 1972.

1973-75: To destabilize Iraq during a border dispute with Iran, US
supports Kurdish rebels with $16 million in arms, promising to back them
in their struggle for autonomy. When Iran and Iraq reach an agreement in
1975 and seal off their border, Iraq proceeds to violently suppress the
Kurdish rebellion. US ends support for Kurds and denies them refuge. Henry
Kissinger, architect of the ploy, explained, "covert action should not be
confused with missionary work."

1973, 1978: A nationalist coup in 1973 brings down the Afghan monarchy. A
1978 coup puts the Stalinist Peoples Democratic Party in power. Afraid of
growing Afghan ties to the Soviet Union, US begins covert funding for the
reactionary Islamic Fundamentalist rebels. Mujahideen "Freedom Fighters"
(according to President Ronald Reagan), are lead by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar,
whose "followers first gained attention by throwing acid in the faces of
women who refused to wear the veil." Six months later, the Soviet Union
sends in troops to prop-up the Afghan government.

1979-92: US gives over $3 billion in arms and aid to the Mujahideen in
Afghanistan. CIA sets up training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan - some
of the same "terrorist training camps" the US will bomb in 2001. Osama bin
Laden and many other of today's Islamic Fundamentalist terrorist leaders
are direct recipients of US aid and training. By 1992, more than a million
Afghan people will have died, three million disabled, and five million
made refugees, in total about half the population. The civil war continues
to this day.

1979: Striking oil workers and students in Iran call for ousting the Shah,
sparking a revolutionary uprising. US tells Shah it supports him "without
reservation" and urges him to violently crush protest, but Shah is
overthrown.

1980: Iraq invades Iran. Though antagonistic to both countries, the US
intervenes to promote and prolong the conflict, looking to weaken both
regimes. US opposes UN resolution condemning Iraq's invasion, takes Iraq
off its list of nations supporting terrorism, and allows US arms transfers
to Saddam Hussein. US urges Israel to arm Iran, and in 1985 the US
secretly provides arms to Iran directly.

1982-83: Heavily funded, armed, and backed by the US, Israel invades
Lebanon. Over 17,000 civilians are massacred. US blocks several UN
resolutions calling for an Israeli withdrawal. In 1983, US troops also
land in Lebanon to intervene in the civil war.

1984: Iraq uses chemical weapons on Iran; US subsequently restores
diplomatic relations with Iraq. A US Defense Intelligence Agency official
involved in aiding Iraq later commented that the Pentagon "wasn't so
horrified by Iraq's use of gas. It was just another way of killing
people."

1987: As Iran gets the upper hand in war with Iraq, the US moves to
decisively back Iraq. A massive US armada in Persian Gulf ensures arms
deliveries to Iraq. When a US gunship shoots down an Iranian civilian
airliner, killing 290 passengers, Vice President Bush says, "I will never
apologize for America. I don't care what the facts are."

1985-90: The US showers Iraq with billions in arms, loans, and aid. After
Saddam Hussein uses chemical weapons to murder thousands of the Kurdish
opposition in Iraq, the Bush administration continues to license the sale
of chemical weapons, and blocks UN initiatives to curb their use.

1991: After Iraq invades Kuwait in 1990, US launches Operation Desert
Storm - the most aggressive, high-tech military campaign in the history of
warfare. Dropping more bomb tonnage than in all of Vietnam or World War
Two, the 43 day air campaign kills between 100,000 and 200,000 Iraqis and
destroys civilian infrastructure. Fearing a popular revolt and the
destabilization of the region, the US refuses to aid previously encouraged
uprisings by Kurds and Shi'as in the weeks after the war. US denies the
rebels access to captured Iraqi weapons, and allows Iraqi helicopters use
of "No-fly Zone" airspace to crush the uprising.

1990-now: Severe economic sanctions imposed on Iraq by the UN. By UN
estimates, the sanctions have cost over a million lives, half of them
children. About 5,000 children die each month, mostly from malnutrition
and treatable diseases. From the most economically advanced country in the
region before the US attack, Iraq today is among the most destitute.

1998: Renewed US and British bombing campaign - called Operation Desert
Fox - against Iraq after it exposes US spies among UN weapons inspectors
(later admitted by US officials). The UN pulls out inspectors before
bombings, which continue to the present on average every other day.
2001: Following the September 11th terrorist attacks, the US launches a
war on Afghanistan, killing over 3,500 people. US led UN occupation of the
country props up US puppet regime of Karzai.

Middle East History
Colonial Rule Before World War II

In the mid 19th century, as the Ottoman Empire crumbled, the Western
powers set determined eyes on the Middle East. Lord Curzan declared that
the Persian Gulf should become a "British Lake." By the end of World War
I, Britain and France assumed direct control of the territories of Egypt,
Persia (Iran), Iraq, Palestine, and Syria. Western occupation, sanctioned
by the UN precursor (the League of Nations), was in part also designed to
crush the revolutionary ferment that swept the region following the
Russian Revolution of 1917.

French and British imperialism arbitrarily carved up the vast territory
inhabited by the Arab peoples to create artificial nation-states. These
were created for colonial convenience and to break apart the Arab nation,
making it easier to foist subservient, corrupt monarchies.

In 1921, Britain imposed a new monarch on Iraq - Faisal, "a king who will
be content to reign, but not to govern," in the words of a British Foreign
Office bureaucrat. The subsequent mass uproar was suppressed in brutal
massacres in 1920-4. The brutality of British rule was captured in an
infamous quote from Winston Churchill, who said "I do not understand this
squeamishness about the use of gas. I am strongly in favor of using
poisoned gas against uncivilized tribes."

By 1932, a limited "independence" was granted to Iraq, with Britain
keeping its military bases and control of most industries. Winston
Churchill explained that under this treaty British imperialism would
remain "the owners or at any rate the controllers at the source of at
least a proportion of the oil which we require." Or as the British
military chief of staff explained, it gave "the appearance of complete
equality... Whatever the de jure arrangements, we must retain the de facto
control."

In the aftermath of World War Two, the colonial revolution surged forward
on a global scale. Western European imperialist powers were economically
devastated by the war and faced revolutionary upheavals at home. The
Soviet Union emerged as a global power and, despite the horrors of
Stalinist dictatorship, represented an important counterweight to Western
imperialism.

The United States emerged as the dominant power in the capitalist world.
From the Middle East to South East Asia, the US moved to displace the
European powers as masters of the resources and peoples in the colonial
world and the main defender of capitalist interests against radical
movements for social change.