The president of Iraq, Saddam Hussein has been the dictator of Iraq since 1979. He has used murder and aggression to retain powers, and has led Iraq into two disastrous wars. Hussein has spent billions of dollars to acquire biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons and appeared to successfully hidden equipment and materials to build these weapons from the UN Inspectors in the years since the Gulf War. His ruthless repression has enabled him to keep a tight grip on power despite American efforts to undermine his rule. .
In the second case, the stakes were much higher, as Hussein sought to annex Kuwait and take control over the enormous oil reserves. The results of the war with Iran did not reduce Hussein's ambitions and recklessness. If anything it increased them. He decided to use his armed forces to seize one of the biggest strategic prizes in the oil reserve of Kuwait.
The Gulf War was fought between Iraq, which had invaded Kuwait in 1990, and a US led coalition formed to force the Iraqis to withdraw. Iraq at times has claimed all of Kuwait and tried unsuccessfully to annex the country in 1990, an act of aggression that led to the Gulf War. In 1990-91 the United States put together a coalition of Middle Eastern and Western nations that drove Iraq from Kuwait.
The United States brought western nations and twelve Arab states into a military coalition to enforce the UN resolution. In January 1991 Operation Desert Storm began with air attacks on Iraq that lasted a month. In February, in a fast moving campaign lasting only one hundred hours, Iraqi forces were routed and driven from Kuwait. .
The first Gulf War was unjust. The world community united to expel a foreign army from a sovereign nation. The war was a complete rout of Iraq's forces. After exactly one hundred hours of ground combat, Saddam knew he had been defeated. In order to preserve his regime, he signed an unconditional surrender.
