Loading ...the shah was our guy, and he ruled iran with an iron hand (and some tough police). but he got cancer and died, leaving a teenaged heir. a power vacuum which called for another strong hand, and one emerged – the islamofascists.
saddam hussein was also “our guy,” and he ruled with an iron hand. he was our hired gun against iran all through the mid and latter eighties. he fought them to a standstill. when the dust settled, he asked us if he could take kuwait as a bonus for a job well done (kuwait was historically part of mesopotamia/iraq until the breakup of the ottoman empire). our state department gave him a pass for kuwait, and he took it.
THEN:
the saudis freaked out. the kuwaiti royal house was intermarried with the house of saud. they hired us to throw saddam out of kuwait. the price was that the saudis would produce enough oil to keep american gas prices under a buck a gallon for ten years. we turned on saddam and beat him down into the dirt, eventually hanging him. realpolitik isn’t pretty, and countries have glory but no honor.