DETERRENCE AND SADDAM HUSSEIN: 

Lessons from the 1990-1991 Gulf War

by

Barry R. Schneider 

The Counterproliferation Papers 

Future Warfare Series No. 47

USAF Counterproliferation Center

Air University 

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 
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Deterrence and Saddam Hussein: 

Lessons from the 1990-1991 Gulf War 

Barry R. Schneider 

August 2009 

The Counterproliferation Papers Series was established by the USAF 

Counterproliferation Center to provide information and analysis to assist 

the understanding of the U.S. national security policy-makers and USAF 

officers to help them better prepare to counter the threat from weapons of 

mass destruction. Copies of No. 47 and previous papers in this series are 

available from the USAF Counterproliferation Center, 325 Chennault 

Circle, Maxwell AFB AL 36112-6427. The fax number is (334) 953-7530; 

phone (334) 953-7538. 

Counterproliferation Paper No. 47 

USAF Counterproliferation Center

Air University 

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 36112-6427

The Internet address for the USAF Counterproliferation Center is: 

http://cpc.au.af.mil
Contents 

Page 

Disclaimer ................................................................................................... ii

About the Author ....................................................................................... iii

Notes .............................................................................................................. 
ii

Disclaimer 

The views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do 

not reflect the official policy or position of the U.S. Government, 

Department of Defense, or the USAF Counterproliferation Center. 
iii

The Author 

Dr. Barry R. Schneider is the Director of the USAF Counterproliferation 

Center (CPC) at Maxwell AFB, AL, and is also a Professor of 

International Relations at the Air War College. 

Dr. Schneider specializes in WMD counterproliferation and 

nonproliferation issues as well as the profiles of adversary leaders and 

their strategic cultures. He is the author of Future War and 

Counterproliferation: U.S. Military Responses to NBC Proliferation 

Threats (Praeger, 1999); the editor of Middle East Security Issues, In the 

Shadow of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation (CPC, 1999); and 

contributor to and co-editor of Know Thy Enemy II: A Look at the World’s 

Most Threatening Terrorist Networks and Criminal Gangs (CPC, 2008); 

Avoiding the Abyss: Progress, Shortfalls and the Way Ahead in 

Combating WMD (CPC, 2005; Praeger, 2006); Know Thy Enemy: Profiles 

of Adversary Leaders and Their Strategic Cultures (CPC, 2003); The 

Gathering Biological Warfare Storm (CPC, 2002); Pulling back from the 

Nuclear Brink: Reducing and Countering Nuclear Threats (Frank Cass 

Ltd., 1998); Battlefield of the Future: 21st Century Warfare Issues (Air 

University Press, 1998); Missiles for the Nineties: ICBMs and Strategic 

Policy (Westview, 1984); and Current Issues in U.S. Defense Policy

(Praeger, 1976). 

Dr. Schneider served as a Foreign Affairs Officer (GS-14) and Public 

Affairs Officer (GS-15) at the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament 

Agency, as a Congressional staffer on arms control and defense issues, 

and was a Senior Defense Analyst at The Harris Group and the National 

Institute for Public Policy. He has been a faculty member at the Air War 

College since 1993. In this capacity he has taught Air War College core 

courses of instruction and elective courses such as International Rivals, 

Homeland Security Issues, International Flashpoints, Counterproliferation 

Issues, 21st Century Warfare Issues, and CBW Issues for the USAF. 

Dr. Schneider has taught courses at six other colleges and universities, and 

has a doctorate in Political Science from Columbia University. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein: 

Lessons from the 1990-1991 Gulf War 

Barry R. Schneider 

War and deterrence both begin in the minds of men. Deterrence is a 

psychological phenomenon and begins between the ears of the adversary 

you are trying to influence. When you seek to deter a rival from doing 

something you do not wish him to do, you must find a way to influence his 

perceptions of situations, for people act not necessarily on reality but on 

their perception of it. As Henry Kissinger once said, “A bluff taken 

seriously is more useful than a serious threat interpreted as a bluff.”1

To deter, you need to influence the rival‟s cost/gain evaluations. He 

needs to understand that he has far more to lose by initiating conflict, or 

by escalating it to unacceptable levels, than by not doing so. 

In this study, we look at President Saddam Hussein of Iraq and 

President George H.W. Bush of the United States and their respective 

governments‟ attempts to deter one another in the period just before Iraq 

invaded Kuwait in August 1990 and through the subsequent Gulf conflict 

that ended in February 1991. On the United States side of this deterrence 

effort, one must also include the deterrent effect of U.S. coalition partners 

in the crisis and war. 

In this analysis we look at a series of deterrence questions: 

1. What are the limits of deterrence theory? Are the clearly stronger 

military powers able to deter significantly weaker powers all or most 

of the time? 

2. What are the elements of deterrence strategy that Western strategists 

developed during the Cold War confrontation with the Soviet Union? 

3. Why was Saddam Hussein not deterred from ordering the Iraqi 

invasion of Kuwait in August 1990? 
2. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

4. Why was Saddam Hussein not deterred from facing vastly superior 

and coalition forces assembled to force him out of Kuwait between 

August 1990 and January 1991? 

5. Why were the United States and the coalition forces not deterred by 

Iraq from initiating combat in January 1991? 

6. Why did Saddam Hussein not resort to use of his chemical and 

biological weapons in the war as an equalizer against more powerful 

coalition forces? 

7. Why during this conflict was Saddam Hussein not deterred from 

attacking Israel, a state with a nuclear arsenal? 

8. Why did the United States and the coalition not pursue Iraqi forces 

into their country and end the Saddam Hussein regime in Baghdad? 

Was the United States deterred from pursuing the war all the way to 

Baghdad by the residual Iraqi military capability? 

9. Was the United States deterred from the use of nuclear weapons in the 

war by the threat of Iraqi retaliation with chemical and/or biological 

weapons? 

10. What conclusions and lessons can be extracted from this conflict 

regarding deterrence as a strategy for future crises? 

The Limits of Deterrence 

Deterrence is based on deductive reasoning, not evidence from 

history. It is a rational deduction that a weaker power should not be 

willing to risk almost certain defeat if it starts a war with a much more 

powerful rival. Also, it is a logical assumption that leaders of countries 

should not enter into conflicts where it appears to them that they would be 

incurring catastrophic losses or would likely lose things the leadership 

values most. 

On the face of it, this seems very rational and almost indisputable. 

The problem is that deterrence does not work so often and so clearly in the 

real world. An inductive approach that looks at the empirical evidence 

from past international conflicts shows a very mixed picture. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .3

Surprisingly, reviews of case studies show that history is full of 

occasions when demonstrably weaker opponents have initiated what 

appear to be absolutely irrational attacks on much stronger opponents.2 

According to one RAND study, in 22 percent (17 of 76) of conflicts 

that occurred from 1816 to 1974, weaker military powers initiated wars 

with stronger states. This obviously can have disastrous results in some 

cases. For example, in the 1864-1870 War of the Triple Alliance, 

Paraguay‟s dictator, Francisco Solano Lopez, invaded Brazil. He also 

attacked Argentina when that state did not allow his forces free passage 

through their territory. Uruguay then joined these two giants in the conflict 

against Paraguay. By the end of this ill-advised aggression by Paraguay, 

that small country had 85 percent of its population killed, reduced from 

1.4 million in 1864 to just 0.22 million by 1870. By the war‟s end, 

Paraguay had just 29,000 adult males left alive.3

 Such wars can be caused 

by crazy rulers. 

They can also be initiated by those simply unwilling to live under the 

heel of the enemy, thereby putting honor and their cause above survival. 

Think, for example, of Patrick Henry‟s famous words in the American 

Revolution, “Give me liberty or give me death.” The signers of the 

American Declaration of Independence in 1776 all were willing to risk 

their lives in their cause. Indeed, 

[F]ive signers were captured by the British and brutally 

tortured as traitors. Nine fought in the War for 

Independence and died from wounds or from hardships 

they suffered. Two lost their sons in the Continental Army. 

Another two had sons captured. At least a dozen of the 

fifty-six had their homes pillaged and burned... Seventeen 

of them lost everything that they owned.4

Weaker states also start ill-advised wars due to wishful thinking, 

misperception, group think, illogic born of stress, or a stubborn refusal to 

confront the facts.5

 In some historical cases, decision-makers have chosen 

to focus primarily on their aims and own resources and have discounted 

those of the adversary despite clear evidence that they will lose if they 

push further into the crisis. 
4. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

Another situation that pushes weaker powers to attack much stronger 

states is when time is considered not to be on their side. Saddam Hussein 

in 1980 is thought to have attacked Iran, a larger country with more 

resources and three times the population of Iraq, because he feared that 

Iran would attack in a year or so when it was better organized. Leaders 

sometimes feel forced to start a war immediately when their chances of 

success, while slim, would be even poorer at a later time. 

Weaker indigenous groups also often launch wars against stronger 

opponents out of nationalist sentiment and a desire to remove foreign or 

rival group influences. This is an old story repeated many times as 

revolutions opposed colonial regimes or the domination of other ethnic 

groups. In many cases these revolutionaries are pitting their superior zeal 

and a greater stake in the outcome against superior rival military forces 

that often do not have the same commitment to victory over time. Many 

times these revolutions and insurgencies fail. Sometimes, however, the 

fortunes of the sides reverse over time such as happened in China when 

communist guerrilla forces challenged initially superior nationalist 

Chinese forces and eventually became the stronger side in winning a 

protracted civil war. 

Others may decide to fight an enemy with superior potential rather than 

give up long-standing goals or a way of life. They may be willing to bet 

that their willingness to absorb casualties is greater than the rival‟s, and that 

he will tire of the war and be willing to sue for peace short of total victory, 

leaving the smaller state that initiated the war in possession of their goals. 

This appears to be the line of thought of the Japanese leadership before 

Pearl Harbor and of Saddam Hussein after the coalition buildup in Saudi 

Arabia had put a powerful army in Saudi Arabia in the fall and winter of 

1990 after his invasion of Kuwait. It also appears to have been the mindset 

of the Confederate leaders when they challenged the much more populous 

and industrialized North in the American Civil War. 

Moreover, deterrence assumes that state leaders can control their 

subordinates. Leaders of weaker states might not authorize an attack on a 

stronger power, but it may take place anyway because some subordinates 

do not follow orders. 

Others might decide to strike out and start a war if they believed their 

regime was about to fall. Some might initiate a conflict or escalate one 

against a hated enemy for highly emotional reasons or if they calculated it 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .5

might marshal more domestic support for their leadership at home. This is 

the inside-outside theory of war causation, a conflict started for internal 

domestic reasons. This appears to have been a partial cause of the 1982 

Argentine-United Kingdom war in the Falklands, where for largely domestic 

political reasons the ruling junta challenged British control of the islands. 

Still other leaders might be religious, cultural, or ideological zealots 

who will stop at nothing to destroy some hated adversary, leaving the 

consequences to chance. For example, at the height of the Cuban Missile 

Crisis the Castro brothers, in a fit of revolutionary zeal, were urging the 

Soviet leadership to fire at the United States their nuclear-tipped missiles 

stationed in Cuba, even though it meant their own likely deaths and the 

wholesale destruction of their country. Some initiators of combat may 

care more about their place in history rather than about the immediate 

consequences for themselves and their people. 

However, this is not to say that deterrence cannot or should not work 

in the majority of cases. Rather, it is wise to remember that deterrence of 

war or escalation still can fail, even when a much stronger power 

confronts a weaker one, or even where both sides would suffer 

catastrophic warfare losses if they entered into a conflict. 

Cold War Deterrence Theory 

Luckily this did not happen during the Cold War when a central 

nuclear war could have caused hundreds of millions of deaths. By 1949, 

both the United States and Soviet Union had nuclear weapons, and both 

sides held the life or death of the rival society in their hands. The peace 

was secured by the dual hostage situation described as mutual assured 

destruction.6

 If the system failed, it would have failed deadly. 

Deterrence theory developed as U.S. and allied policy-makers and 

strategists worked to understand the implications of nuclear weapons and 

how they might be used to keep the peace and advance U.S. and allied 

security. Several elements were eventually recognized as fundamentally 

important to strategic deterrence. 

First, it was deemed crucial that the U.S. and its allies maintain a 

nuclear retaliatory force that could inflict what an aggressor leadership 

would consider unacceptable damage to themselves and their vital 
6. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

interests.7 Aggressors must be made to believe that the risks of attacking 

the United States and its allies were clearly and significantly greater than 

any conceivable rewards they might gain from such action. 

Second, a potential aggressor must be made to realize that the U.S. 

and allied leaders not only must have such lethal capabilities, but also 

must be willing to use such retaliatory power if challenged. Adversary 

risk-taking leaders must be convinced, by word and deed, that our leaders 

are willing, not simply to threaten to use force in response to aggression, 

but also to act should the line be crossed. Without both the physical 

capability to inflict unacceptable levels of damage on an aggressor party 

and the evident will to use such force, the U.S. and allied deterrent would 

lack credibility and might risk war where an adversary adventurer 

misperceived the situation. For example, this might have been the cause 

of the October 1962 Cuban missile crisis.8

Third, the origin of the attack must be known if the real aggressor is 

to be deterred. If an adversary leader thought he could disguise the origin 

of his attack, perhaps making it seem as if it came from another state, he 

might feel he could strike and escape the consequences. This is the 

problem discussed by the late Herman Kahn when he talked about the 

possibility of what he termed catalytic war.9

 Party A might strike Party B, 

making it look like it came from Party C, causing B and C to fight. Thus, 

a vigilant early warning and tracking system and an effective forensics 

capability should be a fundamental part of any successful deterrent 

posture. Deterrence requires a return address. 

Fourth, the U.S. and allied retaliatory forces must be able to ride out 

an adversary surprise attack and still retaliate with overwhelming and 

accurate force, holding hostage what the rival leaders value most. This 

has led the United States to rely on a mix of forces in a strategic triad of 

nuclear-armed ICBMs deployed on U.S. soil, strategic bombers, deployed 

worldwide, carrying both nuclear standoff missiles and nuclear gravity 

bombs, as well as nuclear-tipped SLBMs carried on ballistic missile 

submarines that roam the world‟s oceans. Even the former Soviet Union, 

with its very extensive nuclear forces, could not have hoped to 

preemptively destroy so much of the U.S. and allied nuclear forces as to 

escape nuclear annihilation in return. It was seen as impossible for anyone 

to destroy all retaliatory elements of the U.S. alliances and strategic triad 

to the degree necessary to escape assured destruction in return. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .7

Maintaining this “second strike” capability was deemed an essential 

component of a classical deterrence posture. 

Finally, deterrence is based on assuming an opponent has complete 

knowledge of the situation and will act rationally. This sounds plausible but 

how do you define rationality? Are suicide bombers rational? Further, if 

adversary leaders are willing to die, or see most of their followers die, in 

order to inflict terrible wounds on the United States and/or its allies, then 

deterrence may fail even if you can “take them with you.”

In an era where there are multiple personalities guiding rogue states, 

some of them high risk takers, deterrence could fail. If it fails, the United 

States and its coalition partners will need capable counterforce units and 

excellent missile and air defenses all the more to limit casualties and 

preserve the chance for a military victory. In a crisis that has not yet 

escalated to war, the presence of such capable offensive strike forces and 

effective defenses may help to deter war. 

If an adversary knows that there is a good chance his deployment of 

chemical, biological, radiological, and/or nuclear (CBRN) weapons may 

attract U.S. counterforce strikes that could destroy his weapons before 

they can be employed, he might be deterred from acquisition or attempted 

use of them. The same logic pertains to a situation where his use of WMD 

in wartime would be nullified by effective active and passive defenses. 

Either way, through offense or defense, if U.S. and allied forces were to 

rob him of a potent threat, he may be more reluctant to incur the costs of 

building and deploying such weapons. Thus, a rogue state regime may be 

deterred by the threat of retaliation or by the threat of having his attack 

neutralized by effective defenses. He might be deterred either by the 

sword or the shield, or by a combination of both. Deterrence produced by 

possessing effective military countermeasures (i.e., deterrence by denial) 

and deterrence produced by the threat of an overwhelming retaliation 

should be mutually reinforcing. 

On the other hand, we can never be absolutely sure when deterrence 

has worked, but it is obvious when it has failed to work. When it fails, a 

war begins or a conflict escalates. When a deterrence policy and posture is 

successful, this is a non-event since no war starts or no escalation takes 

place. However, correlation is not necessarily causation. Just because A 

precedes B, it does not prove A caused B. Indeed, B might have another 

cause altogether.10
8. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

How does one prove that without a certain deterrence policy that 

something, otherwise, might have happened? Unless one were able to step 

out of the present and rerun history to see what would have happened 

differently without a given deterrence policy or posture, you cannot prove 

that the deterrence stance caused the outcome. So deterrence is far from 

an exact science. Deterrence is an art and we can only infer when it is 

successful since we have not yet found a way to read an adversary‟s mind 

or re-run historical events with one or more of the variables changed.

The Faceoff: 

George H.W. Bush versus Saddam Hussein 

The 1990-1991 Gulf War involved 34 coalition governments and 

leaderships all pitted against Iraq. It was not simply crisis bargaining and 

warfare directed by two men. Thirty-four coalition leaderships had to be 

coordinated and military personnel from 34 militaries had to be made into 

one effective fighting force with unity of command. 

Things were simpler on the other side. In Iraq, all important military 

and diplomatic decisions were those of Saddam Hussein acting essentially 

alone. This was far less true of President George H.W. Bush, but in the 

end it was he who mobilized and led the coalition to war, and it was he 

who made the final decision about when to attack the Iraqi Army in 

Kuwait, and, after 40 days of air bombardment and 100 hours of a ground 

war later, it was his decision to declare and negotiate a ceasefire with Iraq 

that stopped short of going on to Baghdad. 

It would be difficult to find two more different men facing each other 

in a crisis or a war. They were separated widely in their education, 

exposure to the wider world, family upbringing, values, culture, language, 

regional, and political system. Moreover, the leader of each country 

inherited a different set of world, regional and domestic problems and 

pressures. Both inherited a different set of previous commitments and 

policies from their predecessors and had a different public to deal with. 

Saddam Hussein and George Bush, therefore, came to this 1990-1991 

conflict with very different backgrounds and perspectives. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .9

Simply put, George Herbert Walker Bush was born to privilege and 

power. His father was a U.S. Senator. Saddam Hussein was born in a 

poor Iraqi village and his father died before he was born. Bush attended 

Andover Preparatory School and Yale University. Hussein dropped out of 

school in his teenage years, and did not finish high school until he was 24. 

At the time, he was being sought in Iraq for an attempted killing of the 

Iraqi President, and was a fugitive living in Cairo, Egypt. Saddam never 

completed a college degree, although he attended several law classes 

while in Egypt. 

The two also differed in other ways. Bush served as a pilot in the 

U.S. Navy in World War II, engaged in 58 air combat missions, and won 

the Navy Cross for bravery. Saddam Hussein never served in the Iraqi 

military, and, when he applied as a young man, he was denied entry into 

the Iraq Military Academy, one of the few paths available for poor Iraqis 

attempting upward mobility in their society. 

Bush was widely traveled and had served overseas as U.S. 

Ambassador to China and later as Chief U.S. Ambassador to the United 

Nations. Hussein never has traveled outside the Middle East. Bush was 

very knowledgeable about the international system and worldwide threats. 

He served as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Saddam worked 

exclusively within the Ba‟ath Party where he first served as an organizer, 

then as a hit man, and later as the feared head of party security responsible 

for thousands of executions. 

Bush served in elective politics in the United States, first as a 

Congressman from Texas, later as Chairman of the Republican Party 

National Committee, and finally as Vice President and President of the 

United States. By 1990, Bush already had won five elections on his way 

to the top of the U.S. political system. On the other hand, Saddam Hussein 

murdered and terrorized his way to the top of the Iraqi political system. 

He had never won an election until after he seized the Presidency in 1978. 

All political contests thereafter probably were rigged as he built a 

terroristic police state. 

His was a fearful and feared regime, and Saddam Hussein essentially 

was the sole foreign policy and defense policy decision-maker in Iraq. It 

could be said that “Saddam was Iraq and Iraq was Saddam” from the 

standpoint of policy decisions. As Charles Duelfer later concluded in a 
10. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

2004 report to the Director of Central Intelligence, “Saddam Hussein so 

dominated the Iraqi regime that its strategic intent was his alone.”11

It is instructive to realize how little knowledge Saddam Hussein had 

of the United States or its leaders. While President Bush was no Middle 

East expert, he was far better informed than Saddam about the other side‟s 

capabilities. However, both leaders lacked a clear knowledge of the other. 

FBI interrogator George Piro, assigned the task of interrogating Saddam 

after his capture in 2003, concluded from months of interviews that: “One 

striking theme that emerged was just how little we knew about Saddam 

and how little he knew about us.”12

These two leaders came from opposite ends of the earth. One is 

reminded of the Kipling verse when considering these two: “East is East, 

and West is West, and never the twain should meet.” Their cultures were 

very different as were their life experiences. Saddam was a thug and mafialike Iraqi leader, originally born in poverty, who maneuvered and eventually 

killed his way into power in Iraq. In 1991, two of his biographers concluded 

that, “In the permanently beleaguered mind of Saddam Hussein, politics is a 

ceaseless struggle for survival. The ultimate goal of staying alive and in 

power justifies all means. Plots lurk around every corner. Nobody is 

trustworthy. Everyone is an actual or potential enemy.”13

Bush was an American blue blood who started from a favored position 

and then achieved his way to the top of the U.S. political system. When they 

confronted each other over Kuwait, President Bush was leader of the richest 

country in the world at the head of the most powerful military force ever 

deployed. Confronting him was President Saddam Hussein, with his 

million man army, the fourth largest in the world, now sitting astride 19 

percent of the world‟s oil supplies after his occupation of Kuwait.

The Invasion of Kuwait 

After the Iran-Iraq war, very badly needing funds to rebuild and 

protect his regime, Saddam Hussein ordered his forces to seize oil-rich 

Kuwait in order to repay his creditors, recoup his wealth, and re-equip his 

security and armed forces.14 At that time “Iraq had approximately $80B in 

debts stemming from the war with Iran, compared with a GNP of about 

$35B, with a hard-currency income of about $14B.”

15
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .11

If his biographers are to be believed, Saddam Hussein probably 

invaded Kuwait only after long and careful thought. In previous critical 

decisions he was a careful planner. For example, when deciding whether 

to nationalize the nation‟s oil wells in 1972, Saddam exhibited a blend of 

caution and boldness. His chief biographers say that, 

[T]he nationalization affords yet another vivid example of 

Saddam‟s calculated risk-taking style of operation. He 

proved himself a cautious, yet daring decision-maker who 

did not flinch before a challenge. Weighing his options 

carefully and taking the necessary precautions, he did not 

rush into a hasty decision. But, once he made up his mind, 

he moved swiftly and resolutely toward his target.16

Later, after the invasion when his aggression against Kuwait was 

challenged by the United States and most of the rest of the world, Saddam 

refused to back down as the U.S.-led coalition poured military personnel, 

equipment, and supplies into nearby Saudi Arabia starting in August 1990 

until continuing until the end of hostilities in February 1991. Early in this 

military buildup tensions were high at the White House because it took 

months to get enough firepower transferred to the theater to offset an 

initial Iraqi Army advantage in the theater. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia and 

its oil reserves seemed at the mercy of Iraq‟s Army if Saddam chose to 

continue its operations and invade the Saudi kingdom. 

Clearly, at this point the United States leadership had spelled out its 

determination to defend Saudi Arabia and its desire to compel Iraq to 

withdraw from Kuwait. To bolster this deterrence posture, the U.S. had 

the clear potential military might to defeat Iraq, and this was augmented 

by clear verbal and non-verbal signaling of U.S. and allied intentions. The 

U.S. was engaged in a continuing military mobilization in the Gulf, and 

was engaged in a worldwide diplomatic campaign to enlist allies into a 

coalition and to condemn Iraq‟s invasion at the United Nations.

Why didn‟t Saddam Hussein realize the catastrophe he was about to 

suffer and withdraw his forces back to Iraq before the coalition juggernaut 

destroyed his armed forces in the field? There are several hypotheses. 

First, he might not have had situational awareness and may have believed 

the U.S. President and coalition leaders were simply bluffing. Second, 

Saddam might have engaged in wishful thinking and not faced the 
12. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

unpleasant possibilities he had not foreseen. Third, he might not have 

understood the total mismatch his forces were facing and how few 

casualties they could inflict on a technologically superior force. Fourth, 

Saddam might have feared that a military withdrawal would undermine his 

leadership and status in Iraq and lead to his replacement. Fifth, Saddam 

may have calculated that he simply could not do without Kuwait‟s oil 

revenue to finance his own depleted treasury and to rebuild his security 

forces and army, and, thus, perhaps he was gambling on being able 

somehow to keep his Kuwaiti prize.17

As the crisis deepened and war was about to begin again, the United 

States sought to persuade Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait without a fight, 

or, if a war was inevitable, at least tried to persuade the Iraqi leader not to 

order the use of chemical or biological weapons by warning that he would 

face dire consequences. 

Saddam Hussein, on the other hand, may have sought to deter a 

coalition attack or a U.S.-U.K.-French use of nuclear weapons by 

threatening retaliation with his chemical and/or biological weapons. Once 

the war began, the U.S. hoped in vain to deter Saddam from attacking 

Israel, and, once that failed, acted to influence the Israelis to let the U.S. 

and coalition troops do the retaliating for them, rather than have Israel 

enter the war and split the coalition. 

Saddam, facing a superior foe, misunderstood what a mismatch it was 

for his army and air forces to try to compete with the coalition forces, and 

felt that high U.S. casualty rates would buy him a compromise peace that 

would have left his regime intact. He badly miscalculated on how many 

casualties his forces could inflict, but his residual chemical and biological 

weapons, unused in the conflict, might have helped deter a U.S. invasion 

and occupation of Iraq after Saddam‟s forces had been driven from Kuwait.

Sometimes an adversary leader may operate in a world of his own, 

surrounded by “yes-men,” and cut off from realistic intelligence about the 

United States, its allies, and their intentions. This appears to be the case 

with Saddam Hussein at the time of Desert Storm. Such an enemy leader 

may disregard the messages and intelligence reports he receives, 

preferring instead to follow his own thinking and adhere to previous 

stereotypes or misinformation. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .13

U.S. Attempts to Deter Iraq from invading Kuwait 

(July-August 1990) 

When trouble brewed over rights in the Rumaila oil fields, a disputed 

area along the Iraq-Kuwait border, President Bush sent his ambassador, 

April Glaspie, to see if the dispute could be settled peacefully. Her 

meeting with Saddam Hussein appeared to be cordial and gave no hint of 

his inclination to take military action against Kuwait. Nor did it say much 

about the United States interest in backing Kuwait in the dispute. Indeed, 

according to reports, “U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie told Saddam that 

„We have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border 

disagreement with Kuwait.‟”18 Later, the U.S. State Department followed 

with another message that said that Washington had “no special defense or 

security commitments to Kuwait.” Saddam must have seen this as an 

indication that he would have little to fear from the United States if he 

intervened in Kuwait. 

Although it is likely that Saddam Hussein had already decided on the 

invasion of Kuwait at that time, Ambassador Glaspie reported that he 

seemed inclined to negotiate. This was communicated to President Bush 

who then had the U.S. State Department transmit the following message 

back to the Iraqi leader stating that: 

I am pleased to learn of the agreement between Iraq and 

Kuwait to begin negotiations in Jeddah to find a peaceful 

solution to the current tensions between you. The United 

States and Iraq both have a strong interest in preserving the 

peace and stability of the Middle East. For this reason we 

believe these responsibilities are best resolved by peaceful 

means and not by threats involving military force or 

conflict.19

Perhaps if this letter had included a stronger tone, one that 

emphasized a threat to use military power to block any move by Iraq to 

settle the dispute by means of the Iraqi Army taking over Kuwait, Saddam 

might have put the invasion plan on hold. Using 20-20 hindsight, it is 

easy now to conclude that President Bush‟s letter, though very reasonable 

on its face, was evidently not the warning shot across the bow that the 
14. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

situation required. The U.S. response was too mild to influence a dictator 

who did not play by any agreed upon international rules and who was bent 

on seizing a rich prize that could solve most of his financial and security 

problems if his aggression went unopposed. 

Saddam Hussein might have interpreted the mild U.S. response as a 

green light to do what he wanted to do. Certainly it was not a stern 

warning to cease and desist. He might well have calculated that the 

United States was distracted elsewhere and that it would not respond 

forcefully to a fait accompli. Kuwait might have looked like a lucrative 

prize that could easily be taken, an immediate benefit that could be 

realized with only a distant, intangible and uncertain risk being run in 

undertaking to occupy it. This would fit with the pattern of Saddam 

Hussein‟s operational code at home and abroad. Plan carefully, conceal 

your moves, and then strike decisively and violently to achieve your ends. 

Preemptively attack against your unprepared, unsuspecting, misled 

opponent. Moreover, Saddam did not think the United States leadership 

had much of an appetite for combat or battle casualties, as they had 

withdrawn when they had had their fill of casualties in previous conflicts 

in Vietnam and Lebanon. 

As James Baker notes in his memoir, “With his flagrant move into 

Kuwait, Saddam Hussein‟s ambitions revealed themselves in all their 

grandiosity.”20 The question that comes to mind regarding this scenario is 

why the United States did not do more to deter this attack on Kuwait. The 

answer was that the Bush administration leadership was distracted and 

simply did not anticipate such a violent move from Saddam Hussein. 

Writing eight years later in his memoir, former Secretary of State 

James Baker explained: 

With the benefit of hindsight, it‟s easy to argue that we 

should have recognized earlier that we weren‟t going to 

moderate Saddam‟s behavior, and shifted our policy 

approach sooner to a greater degree than we did. At the 

least, we should have given Iraqi policy a more prominent 

place on our radar screen at an earlier date. I believe the 

reasons we didn‟t change our policy approach earlier and to 

a greater extent are myriad and complex. And while I wish 

we‟d focused more attention on Iraq earlier, given what 

happened, I remain unpersuaded that anything we might 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .15

have done, short of actually moving armed forces to the 

region, would have deterred Iraq‟s invasion of Kuwait.21

Furthermore, Baker believes that there was little support at first for 

blocking Saddam‟s ambitions in Kuwait. In his “view the only realistic 

chance to deter Saddam would have been to introduce U.S. forces into the 

region – and neither the Kuwaitis, the Saudis, the Soviets, nor the Congress 

would have supported that course before August 2. Indeed, it was only the 

shock of the invasion that allowed us to intervene militarily at all.”22

Furthermore, the United States was fully occupied with events 

happening inside the Soviet Bloc as the Berlin Wall came down and 

Eastern Europe began to revolt against communist party control in 

Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, and East Germany and Soviet leader 

Mikhail Gorbachev was unwilling to implement the “Breshnev Doctrine,” 

and use the Red Army to terrorize the Eastern Europeans back into 

submission. The United States foreign policy leadership was primarily 

focused on these events and too little attention was paid to the local 

squabble between Iraq and Kuwait over oil rights along their border. 

Saddam acted when the U.S. focus was directed elsewhere. His 

invasion caught everyone unprepared. As James Baker recalls, 

Without exception, our friends in the region consistently 

argued that Saddam was only posturing and that 

confrontation would simply make matters worse. Simply 

put, the reason why nobody believed Saddam would attack 

is because no realistic calculation of his interests could 

have foreseen a full-scale invasion of Kuwait. 

Shevardnadze had put it correctly in Moscow on the third 

day following the invasion: “this was an irrational act that 

made no sense.”23

Baker also recalls that, 

[E]ven the Israelis believed that Saddam was bluffing to 

bully the Kuwaitis into economic concessions. Israel‟s 

intelligence service, the Mossad, told U.S. intelligence 

counterparts that Saddam‟s rhetoric was designed to deter 

an Israeli attack, not threaten one of his own. As late as 

July 31, King Hussein and President Mubarak reassured us 
16. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

that Saddam was engaged in verbal bluster, not literal 

threats. Ironically, most of our allies privately worried 

throughout the spring and summer of 1990 that the United 

States might overreact to Saddam‟s new aggressiveness!24

However, no one who understood Saddam Hussein‟s volatile nature, 

his extreme ambition and his lifelong tendency toward violence should 

have been surprised. Just the fact that a strong military under his 

command resided next door to a poorly defended neighbor in Kuwait that 

was oil rich should have suggested vigilance in any crisis brewing 

between the two. One has the image of a Lion contemplating a Lamb with 

the latter about to become dinner, or in Kuwait‟s case, an oil prize that 

represented 8 percent of the world‟s proven oil reserves, sitting next to 

Saudi Arabia, another relatively defenseless state that owned another 25 

percent of the world oil reserves. Coupled with Iraq‟s estimated 11 

percent, Saddam Hussein would control much of the Middle East oil 

supply. However, the United States and the rest of the world were caught 

by surprise and were unprepared to take the deterrence steps that might 

have persuaded Saddam to stop short of an invasion of Kuwait. 

Saddam Hussein‟s first name translated into Arabic means “one who 

confronts.” He had lived up to that throughout his entire violent lifetime. 

The “Butcher of Baghdad” had a career that was filled with blood and 

violence. He was thought to have killed his first victim when only a 

young teenage boy. He was a hit man for the Ba‟athist Party and tried to 

assassinate the leader of Iraq. Later, when his cousin ruled Iraq, he served 

as the head of a lethal and brutal security service that killed opponents 

without remorse. He ruled with fear and his models were Stalin and Hitler 

whose biographies he had read with admiration. In 1978 he forced his 

cousin from power and took over as leader of Iraq. The bloodbath in Iraq 

escalated as he exterminated tens of thousands of domestic adversaries. In 

one of his first acts as Iraq‟s supreme leader, he called a meeting of 

hundreds of top Ba‟ath Party leaders, singled out many of them for socalled acts of disloyalty, arrested and read them their death sentences on 

the spot, and forced the remainder of his party leaders to serve in firing 

squads that shot their doomed colleagues the next day. 

Not satisfied with violence against possible domestic opponents, 

Saddam Hussein almost immediately went to war with his neighbors. In 

1980, less than two years after the coup that brought him to power, he 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .17

ordered his army to attack Iran. The result was an eight year war that bled 

both states and featured the extensive use of chemical weapons and 

ballistic missile attacks, both initiated by Saddam‟s commands. In 

retrospect, the United States and other states concerned with the security 

of the region and its important oil reserves should have anticipated 

possible violence from a dictator whose entire career was marked with a 

resort to violence in solving his problems or acquiring his goals. 

Coalition Deterrence of Iraq from invading Saudi 

Arabia, 1990-91

During the initial phases of the 1990-1991 Gulf War, both sides 

attempted to deter the other from certain actions. Saddam sought to deter 

U.S. intervention into the conflict by the threat of heavy U.S. and coalition 

casualties. From August 1990 until January 1991, the United States and 

the other coalition partners sought to deter Saddam from ordering his 

forces, then in Kuwait, to invade Saudi Arabia before it could be 

adequately defended. Iraq already had 11 percent of the world‟s proven oil 

reserves when Saddam Hussein ordered his forces into Kuwait. Had he 

held on in Kuwait, he would have gained another 8 percent of the world‟s 

oil reserves, or 19 percent overall. Had he continued on and conquered 

Saudi Arabia, a country that owns 25 percent of the world‟s oil reserves, 

Saddam would have controlled 44 percent of the world‟s oil reserves. 

Clearly, he had to be stopped or U.S. and allied vital interests in the region 

would have been threatened. 

However, it is not at all clear whether Saddam Hussein ever seriously 

considered invading Saudi Arabia after consolidating his hold on Kuwait. 

Thus, we do not know if deterrence worked or was not needed in this case. 

Certainly the thin Saudi and United States forces there in August and 

September 1990 could not have offered much resistance. However, to 

invade Saudi Arabia would have shed U.S. and Arab blood and perhaps 

the few U.S. forces sent immediately to the Saudi kingdom served as a trip 

wire, a down payment on further U.S. fighters to come and give battle to 

the Iraqi Army should they be attacked. Thus, an Iraqi attack on Saudi 

Arabia almost certainly would have triggered a war with the United States, 
18. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

something the Iraqi dictator almost certainly should have wanted to avoid 

if possible. Thus, the U.S. forces trip wire force quite likely served to halt 

the Iraqi force at the Saudi border until a military buildup there would 

permit coalition offensive action in January 1991. 

Saddam’s Failure to Hold the Coalition at Bay

Once the U.S. began to move its own forces into the region after the 

Iraqi seizure of Kuwait, Saddam Hussein had one of two moves available. 

First, he could order his forces to attack and occupy much of Saudi 

Arabia just as they had in Kuwait. If he was to do this, he would have had 

to act immediately, for time was not on his side. A seizure of the Saudi 

kingdom would have greatly complicated the United States task of 

introducing large forces into the region. Certainly, he could have inflicted 

far more casualties and been much harder to dislodge from Kuwait if he 

had continued his offensive in August or September 1990 on into Saudi 

Arabia. In retrospect, the best defense he could mount was a good offense 

early before Operation Desert Shield could establish a significant force in 

the region to oppose his forces. 

His second option was to do nothing except build up his defenses 

along the Saudi-Kuwait border and watch as the coalition troops poured 

into the theater opposite his army in Kuwait. Saddam elected the second 

option and relied upon his large army in Kuwait to deter an attack by 

threatening large coalition casualties should they attack. This was a 

contest of wills with the U.S. President and his allies, and ultimately 

Saddam Hussein lost. The coalition was not deterred from war and the 

result was a catastrophic defeat for the Iraqi military. 

Why was the coalition not deterred from attacking Saddam‟s forces in 

Kuwait? First, Iraq was dealing with states and forces much greater than 

his own. President Bush and his advisers and the other coalition leaders 

had a much greater appreciation of the qualitative superiority of their 

forces than did Saddam. Operation Desert Shield had put an impressive, 

well equipped army of 543,000 U.S. troops and thousands of other 

coalition military personnel at the disposal of General Schwarzkopf and 

President Bush by January 1991. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .19

It was clear to most military experts that the coalition would have 

control of the air and sea around Kuwait. Further, coalition ground forces 

had superior armor, superior artillery, superior mobility, superior training, 

superior protective gear against chemical and biological weapons, and 

superior intelligence. 

Further, the United States, United Kingdom, and France were states 

with nuclear weapons and Iraq had been warned that any use of CB 

weapons would possibly be met with overwhelming responses. The bottom 

line was that it was not likely that Iraq could win a war with the coalition. 

Beyond this, most of the states in the region and the West would not 

allow Iraq to pose such a threat to their oil supplies and economies. As 

previously noted, Kuwait controlled 8 percent of the known world oil 

reserves and its neighbor, Saudi Arabia, 25 percent. Add to this Iraq‟s 

control of 11 percent and Saddam Hussein would either have or directly 

threaten up to 44 percent of world oil supplies. It was deemed in no one 

best interest to allow this to happen. Therefore, if Iraq did not willingly 

quit Kuwait, it must be expelled and the coalition had the military means 

to make this happen. Saddam had very weak deterrent cards to play in this 

scenario and he was unable to deter the coalition attack that began on 

January 17, 1991. 

Saddam’s Fallback Position:

Deterring a Coalition March to Baghdad 

Why did Saddam Hussein refuse to withdraw from Kuwait as the 

coalition military buildup continued opposite his forces in Kuwait from 

August 1990 until January 1991? At some point, one would have thought 

that he would have realized that a military superpower and its allies would 

easily defeat his forces and bring catastrophic consequences to his armed 

forces and regime. What kept him from retreating in the face of 

overwhelming force before the coalition military hammer struck? 

It is possible that Saddam Hussein believed his own rhetoric and 

believed either that the coalition, despite the buildup of forces in Saudi 

Arabia, was bluffing or that his army could hold its own in combat with 

the United States. 
20. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

It is likely that Saddam felt that he needed the resources from Kuwait 

to rebuild his regime and its security forces to remain in power. He might 

also have reasoned that a forced retreat from Kuwait, coupled with the 

disastrous war he had just concluded with Iran, would so weaken him at 

home that rivals might take encouragement from his weakened position 

and reputation to overthrow his regime and execute him. He might have 

calculated that it was better to fight and rally the Iraqi people against a 

foreign foe than to capitulate and face their censure. 

Saddam Hussein appeared to believe that even if Iraq failed to deter a 

coalition attack on his forces and country, he nevertheless calculated that 

he could deter the U.S.-led coalition from horizontal escalation25 of the 

conflict into Iraq. He believed that he could mount a stout enough defense 

so that the coalition could not overrun his forces and occupy Iraq. He felt 

that the U.S. leadership would stop short of attempting a total victory once 

U.S. forces absorbed very high casualty rates. He might also have 

retained hopes that he could hang on to some of the Kuwait oil fields if the 

fighting led to a stalemate. 

Saddam Hussein also thought the United States was less formidable 

than many others believed. Six months before his invasion of Kuwait, 

Saddam addressed the fourth summit of the Arab Cooperation Council in 

Jordan and stated: 

Brothers, the weakness of a big body lies in its bulkiness. 

All strong men have their Achilles heel. Therefore...we 

saw that the United States departed Lebanon immediately 

when some Marines were killed... The whole U.S. 

Administration would have been called into question had 

the forces that conquered Panama continued to be engaged 

by the Panamanian Armed Forces. The United States has 

been defeated in some combat arenas for all the forces it 

possesses, and it has displayed signs of fatigue, frustration, 

and hesitation when committing aggression on other 

people‟s rights and acting from motives of arrogance and 

hegemony...26

As one analyst has written: 

Saddam was hoping for a political not military victory in 

the Gulf War. He believed that he would triumph if, in the 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .21

course of the ground war, Iraq inflicted substantial 

casualties on the Americans. On one occasion he even 

mentioned a casualty figure that believed would break 

America‟s will to fight; “We are sure that if President Bush 

pushes things toward war and wages war against us – his 

war of aggression which he is planning – once five 

thousand of his troops die, he will not be able to continue 

this war.”27

As a result of this conclusion, Saddam Hussein issued orders to his 

generals to direct their forces so as to “inflict „maximum casualties‟ on 

U.S. soldiers when the fighting started.”28

 He believed that U.S. leaders 

would face mounting domestic pressure to halt their war efforts as the 

killing continued and the numbers of U.S. dead increased. 

Former Secretary of State Baker recalls that “In retrospect, the war 

may seem to have been a clinical and relatively straightforward affair. At 

the time, however, we were confronted with very sobering casualty 

figures, estimated by the Pentagon to be in the thousands; the specter of 

possible chemical and biological attacks; and a war expected to last for 

months not days.”

29

Baker summarized: “Moreover, Saddam may have misread history. 

He apparently was fixated by our experience in Vietnam and, like Hafez 

al-Assad, thought our pullout from Lebanon after the Beirut barracks 

bombing in October 1983 showed Americans were „short of breath.‟ 

Unlike Assad, however, Saddam was willing to test that proposition in a 

high profile, high-risk way.”

30

As one analyst put it, Saddam Hussein was “a great believer in the 

eventual victory of the side willing to suffer the most.”31 To win the war 

politically, if not militarily, Saddam was willing to lose thousands more of 

Iraqi dead to inflict the requisites number of American dead to achieve his 

ends. 

General Norman Schwarzkopf clearly was worried that Iraqi chemical 

weapons might cause major coalition casualties. In his memoir he wrote, 

You can take the most beat-up army in the world, and if they 

choose to stand and fight, we are going to take casualties: if 

they choose to dump chemicals on you, they might even 

win....My nightmare was that our units would reach the 
22. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

barriers in the first hours of the attack, be unable to get 

through, and then be hit with a chemical barrage. The 

possibilities of mass casualties from chemical weapons was 

the main reason we had sixty-three hospitals, two hospital 

ships, and eighteen thousand beds in the war zone.32

Schwarzkopf was also worried that Saddam Hussein was prepared to 

use chemical weapons on the coalition army if it tried to go around the 

Iraqi flanks.33

Indeed, Saddam Hussein was perhaps both right and wrong in his 

deterrence estimates in late 1990. He was clearly mistaken about his 

Army‟s ability to inflict five thousand or more coalition casualties in that 

war. The U.S. personnel killed in action were 148 battle-related deaths 

and 145 out-of-combat deaths.34 In addition, the U.K. suffered 47 deaths, 

38 from Iraqi fire. France suffered two deaths and the Arab countries, not 

including Kuwait, suffered 37 deaths.35 On the other hand, it is clear that 

President George H.W. Bush was seeking to minimize both coalition and 

Iraqi casualties and one reason he halted the war after only 100 hours of 

fighting was to stop the slaughter, on both sides, even at the price of not 

directly toppling Saddam‟s regime in Baghdad, despite having that 

possibility well within his grasp when he ordered the ceasefire.36

Colin Powell, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, worried also 

about the downwind effects of targeting Iraqi biological warfare 

laboratories and facilities. He feared for civilians and coalition military 

personnel operating downwind, yet felt that these sites still needed to be 

neutralized in the air campaign if possible. Powell was even more 

concerned about the effects of possible biological weapons attacks on 

allied troops than those of chemical attacks.37

And who can say if the Iraqi military had been able to fight a much 

more protracted war, that the Bush Administration might not have called a 

ceasefire and settled on a compromise peace as the U.S. casualty toll 

reached Saddam‟s estimate of 5,000 dead Americans? Note that in the 

present war in Iraq, in mid-2009, U.S. casualties have yet to reach 5,000 

killed, but the United States is withdrawing without having completely 

defeated the Iraqi insurgency, as the cost of continuing indefinitely is 

perceived as unacceptable.38

Once the shock and awe of the coalition combined arms attack sent 

the Iraqi forces into precipitate retreat, there was little to stand between the 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .23

U.S.-led forces and Baghdad. However, President Bush was deterred from 

going beyond the Kuwait borders with Iraq for eight reasons. 

First, the United States did not want Iraq to dissolve, but, rather 

wanted it to serve as a balancer to Iranian power in the region. 

Second, President Bush wished to stay within the limits of the United 

Nations mandate given him and feared he would lose the unity of the 

coalition if he widened the war beyond such legal limits. UN resolutions 

limited coalition actions to expelling Iraq from Kuwait. 

Third, the United States did not want the war to be perceived as a war 

of conquest for oil. President Bush felt the continuation of the war into 

Iraq would cause the U.S. to be portrayed as the aggressor rather than Iraq. 

Fourth, President George H.W. Bush did not want the costs of 

occupying, pacifying, and rebuilding Iraq if the U.S.-led coalition took it 

over. Moreover, there was no organized Iraqi opposition to turn power 

over to, so the occupation would be lengthy and painful. 

Fifth, President Bush wished to limit the economic and human costs of 

the war, not only to the coalition but to Iraq as well. He believed that 

entering Iraq would increase the will of the Iraqi army to fight since they 

would be defending the homeland rather than Kuwait. President Bush and 

his advisers also felt that they did not want to get into an urban house-tohouse war, or a chemical or biological weapons war, with increased U.S. 

and coalition casualties. 

Sixth, the U.S. leaders did not expect Saddam Hussein to be able to 

stay in power once the dimensions of his defeat were felt in his country. 

Carrying the war into Iraq might have made him a national hero in Iraq, 

rather than a defeated adventurer. As James Baker wrote in his memoirs, 

“Strategically, the real objective was to eject Iraq from Kuwait in a 

manner that would destroy Saddam‟s offensive military capabilities and 

make his fall from power likely.”

39

 President Bush and his advisers felt 

that the U.S. political and military war aims had been obtained. 

Seventh, U.S. leaders wanted to prevent Israel from intervening in the 

conflict and thereby undermining the Arab ally participation in the war. 

Also, had Saddam ordered chemical and/or biological attacks on Israel as 

the war continued, the Israeli leadership might have responded with a 

nuclear attack on Baghdad. What might have occurred after such an 

exchange would have been very uncertain, but it was not a problem the 

Bush administration wished to risk. 
24. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

Finally, an invasion of Iraq might have backfired politically in the 

United States and triggered major political opposition to the President. 

Halting at the border left the United States and the Bush Administration 

with ultra-high approval ratings. Keeping the U.S. military in the theater 

would have been unpopular with the troops and at home. 

U.S. Deterrence of Iraqi Chemical and Biological 

Weapons Use 

On the other hand, the United States and its coalition partners were 

trying to compel the retreat of Iraqi forces from Kuwait short of war in the 

months from August 1990 until January 1991. Failing to deter war, 

President Bush, at least, was intent on deterring Saddam Hussein from 

ordering chemical and biological attacks on Coalition forces and from 

burning the Kuwaiti oil fields. He warned the Iraqi dictator in clear and 

forceful terms that this would be a catastrophic step if enacted. 

Note the January 5, 1991, letter addressed to Saddam Hussein that 

President Bush wrote and had Secretary of State James Baker deliver to 

the Iraqi Government via the Iraqi Foreign Minister, Tariq Aziz, in midJanuary, 1991: 

Let me state, too that the United States will not tolerate the 

use of chemical or biological weapons or the destruction of 

Kuwait‟s oil fields and installations. Further, you will be 

held directly responsible for terrorist actions against any 

member of the coalition. The American people would 

demand the strongest possible response. You and your 

country will pay a terrible price if you order 

unconscionable acts of this sort.40

To augment Bush‟s warning letter, James Baker restated to Iraqi 

Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz the consequences for Iraq if they were not to 

leave Kuwait: 

Our objective is for you to leave Kuwait. That‟s the only 

solution we will accept. And if you do not do that, then 

we‟ll find ourselves at war, and if you do go war with the 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .25

coalition, you will surely lose. This will not be a war of 

attrition like you fought with Iran. It will be fought with 

the means and weapons that play to our strengths, not to 

yours. We have the means to define how the battle will be 

fought, and yours do not. 

This is not to threaten but to inform. You may choose to 

reject it, or not to believe what we say, but we have the 

responsibility to tell you that we have tremendous 

technological advantages in forces, and our view is that if 

conflict comes, your forces will face devastatingly superior 

firepower. In our view – and you may reject this and 

disagree – our forces will really destroy your ability to 

command your own forces. 

We owe it to you to tell you there will be no stalemate, no 

UN ceasefire or breathing space for negotiations. If 

conflict begins, it will be decisive. This will not be another 

Vietnam. Should war begin, God forbid, it will be fought 

to a swift, decisive conclusion. 

If the conflict involves your use of chemical or biological 

weapons against our forces, the American people will 

demand vengeance. We have the means to exact it. With 

regard to this part of my presentation, this is not a threat, it 

is a promise. If there is any use of weapons like that, an 

objective won‟t just be the liberation of Kuwait, but the 

liberation of the current Iraqi regime and anyone 

responsible for using those weapons will be held 

accountable.41

To reinforce the idea that WMD might be met with WMD, Secretary 

of Defense Dick Cheney also stated publicly that “Were Saddam Hussein 

foolish enough to use weapons of mass destruction, the U.S. response 

would be absolutely overwhelming and it would be devastating.”42

In cases like the Gulf War, there are certain possible advantages in 

dealing with an enemy leader like Saddam Hussein, who has seldom 

hesitated to use maximum violence to achieve his aims and solve his 

problems. Such a leader, in his own mind, may project his own 
26. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

ruthlessness upon his opponent, in this case the President of the United 

States. 

If a Saddam-type of killer would not hesitate to use all his available 

weapons against a previous foe, he might expect a stronger adversary to 

do the same against him if he escalated to WMD use against it. 43

 In such 

cases the very ruthlessness of a rogue chief might become the ally of U.S. 

ability to deter his chemical or biological weapons employment against the 

United States or its allies. 

Since Saddam Hussein did not use chemical or biological weapons in 

the subsequent fighting in Kuwait, despite the fact that he had previously 

shown no hesitation about using them against Iran in their eight-year war, 

or against his own Kurdish populations when they opposed him, it might 

fairly be concluded that U.S. threats deterred his chemical and biological 

use. Of course, with deterrence one can never prove one hundred percent 

that it worked. Saddam might not have wanted to use them for other 

reasons.44

 Clearly, the U.S. threat of retaliation did not stop him from 

setting fire to Kuwait‟s oil fields as his forces evacuated that country. That 

U.S. deterrent message obviously did not work. 

In 1998, seven years after Operation Desert Storm, ex-President George 

H.W. Bush and his former National Security Adviser, Brent Scowcroft, 

published a memoir of their times in power titled A World Transformed. 

Although Saddam Hussein was still in power in Iraq at the time of the 

memoir and was still considered a threat to U.S. and regional allies, 

Scowcroft nevertheless wrote that the Bush Administration had only been 

bluffing about using nuclear weapons should Saddam Hussein order the Iraqi 

Army to use chemical or biological weapons. Indeed, Scowcroft wrote that: 

No one advanced the notion of using nuclear weapons, and 

the President rejected it even in retaliation for chemical and 

biological attacks. We deliberately avoided spoken or 

unspoken threats to use them on the grounds that it is bad 

practice to threaten something you have no intention of 

carrying out. Publicly, we left the matter ambiguous. 

There was no point in undermining the deterrence it might 

be offering.45

James Baker‟s memoir tells the same story: 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .27

The President had decided, at Camp David in December 

that the best deterrent of the use of weapons of mass 

destruction by Iraq would be a threat to go after the Ba‟ath 

regime itself. He had also decided that U.S. forces would 

not retaliate with chemical or nuclear weapons if the Iraqis 

attacked with chemical munitions, there was obviously no 

reason to inform the Iraqis of this. In hopes of persuading 

them to consider more soberly the folly of war, I purposely 

left the impression that the use of chemical or biological 

agents by Iraq could invite tactical nuclear retaliations.46

Saddam might have believed this threat simply because he was not a 

person given to moral limits and had previously always used all weapons at 

his command, witness the merciless Iraqi chemical attacks during the IranIraq War against both military and civilian personnel. He might have viewed 

President Bush as like himself, willing to use everything for victory.47

However, it could not have helped subsequent deterrence efforts to 

publicize that the United States had been bluffing, and never seriously 

considered using its nuclear advantages in the 1990-1991 Gulf War. After 

all, when the various memoirs of Bush, Scowcroft, Baker, and Powell 

were being published, Saddam Hussein was still in power in Iraq and 

might have needed to be deterred from future adventures by succeeding 

U.S. Presidents. Also, it should be noted that other adversary leaders in 

other states like North Korea, Syria, and Iran can also read, and, as a 

result, might conclude in future crises that they, too, were relatively safe 

from any U.S. nuclear retaliations. 

In any case, it is not clear that Saddam Hussein believed that his 

biological weapons in particular would be effective, because it later became 

clear, in the mid-1990s, that Iraq had not made great progress at the time of 

the 1990-91 Gulf campaign, in mating their experimental biological 

weapons program to an effective delivery system. However, chemical 

weapons were another thing entirely. His regime had manufactured tens of 

thousands of chemical weapons and had used them to deadly and strategic 

effect against Iran. As the CIA later concluded, 

In Saddam‟s view, WMD helped save the regime multiple 

times, He believed that during the Iran-Iraq War chemical 

weapons had halted Iranian ground offensives and that 
28. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

ballistic missile attacks on Tehran had broken its political 

will. Similarly during Desert Storm, Saddam believed 

WMD had deterred Coalition Forces from pressing their 

attack beyond the goal of freeing Kuwait.48

Indeed, Iraq‟s military had the most experience delivering chemical 

weapons in actual battle conditions of any military in the world at the time 

of the 1990-1991 Gulf War. On the other hand, it is not clear that Saddam 

and his commanders believed his forces were superior to U.S. forces on a 

toxic battlefield where U.S. forces, unlike most of his Iraqi military, were 

well trained and relatively better equipped than the Iraqi forces to fight in 

a chemical environment. U.S. and NATO preparations against the 

possible onslaught of the Warsaw Pact chemical threat had equipped the 

U.S. forces to fight better than the Iraq Army in this realm. Thus, it might 

have been that U.S. forces passive defenses played a major part in Iraq‟s 

decision not to use chemical arms, perhaps as great a role as President 

Bush‟s implied nuclear threat.

At any rate, it is likely that the combination of the implied U.S. nuclear 

retaliatory threat and the superiority of U.S. training and better protective 

gear against chemical effects combined to keep the Iraqi chemical weapons 

out of play. 

Iraqi Chemical and Biological Capability: 

Deterrent to U.S. Nuclear Weapons? 

What confidence did Saddam Hussein have that the United States 

would not use its superiority in nuclear arms to destroy his army in Kuwait? 

First, the Iraqi dictator hoped to deter President Bush and other 

coalition leaders from attacking because he believed that the Iraqi military, 

at the time the fourth largest in the world in terms of numbers in uniform, 

could inflict substantial casualties on what he perceived as a casualtyadverse opponent. 

Second, even President Bush‟s direct warning letter communicated to 

Saddam Hussein via Secretary Baker in a meeting with Tariq Aziz on 

January 5, 1991, could be read that the United States would not use its 

nuclear superiority so long as Iraqi chemical and biological weapons were 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .29

not used. (See Appendix B of this paper) Thus, there is the question of 

“who was deterring whom?” Was George Bush deterring Saddam 

Hussein‟s use of chemical and biological weapons? Or was he also 

indicating that Iraqi chemical and biological warfare capabilities would 

deter U.S. use of nuclear weapons on Iraq?49 

Saddam Hussein clearly put out warnings that Iraqi chemical and 

biological weapons would be used in the contingency of a U.S. or U.K. 

use of nuclear arms. For example, in a meeting with former British Prime 

Minister Edward Heath in October 1990, Saddam said “If the going gets 

hard then the British and Americans will use atomic weapons against me, 

and the chances are that Israel will as well, and the only thing I‟ve got are 

chemical and biological weapons, and I shall have to use them. I have no 

alternative.”50

 President Bush also was under no illusions on this as he 

had noted on more than one occasion that Saddam “has never possessed a 

weapon he did not use.”51

Saddam possibly felt that his biological and chemical weapons were 

his ace in the hole. Saddam‟s poison gases had played a key role in 

holding the stronger Iranian military at bay and had brought the Iranians to 

the peace table. According to one Middle East analyst, “Saddam took the 

experience of the war with Iran, in which gas eventually caused the 

Iranian military to lose its most potent weapon – its will to fight – to mean 

that Iraq possessed an absolute weapon capable of stopping modernized 

armies as well.”52

Clearly, the U.S. leadership had serious concerns about such chemical 

and biological weapons use or the President would not have made it such a 

central issue in his warning letter to Saddam Hussein. Further, the 

Combatant Commander, General Schwarzkopf, was especially concerned 

that the Iraqi Army might ruin the “Left Hook” flanking movement by his 

ground forces with a devastating chemical barrage. General Colin Powell, 

then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was particularly focused on the 

potential casualties that might come from an Iraqi biological warfare strike. 

James Baker also admitted that the casualties that might flow from 

urban warfare and from Iraqis‟ who would fight harder to protect their 

homeland would cause many more American deaths. Thus, it is plausible 

that the chemical and biological threats and anything that had the potential 

to greatly escalate U.S. casualties impacted U.S. thinking and helped serve 

as an Iraqi deterrent to an invasion of Iraq.53

 Thus, it is possible that 
30. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

Saddam‟s WMD threat, in the form of chemical and biological weapons, 

might have been responsible for saving his regime. 

U.S. and Israeli Failure to Deter Iraq from attacking 

Israel 

The coalition air campaign began on January 17, 1991. The next day, 

Saddam Hussein ordered the first of 48 Scud missile attacks on Israel as 

well as the first of 41 such attacks against the coalition forces in Saudi 

Arabia. Apparently, the threat of possible Israeli nuclear retaliation did 

not deter such a decision. This was risky for, clearly, Israel had enough 

nuclear firepower to utterly destroy Iraq. Saddam was playing a very 

dangerous game with them. 

On the other hand, Saddam was attempting to split the coalition by 

attacking Israel. Would the coalition Arab allies fight on the same side as 

Israel against another Arab state? This was considered highly unlikely in 

Washington, D.C.54

 For this reason United States leaders were concerned 

that an Israeli counter-attack would undermine the support of the Arab 

partners in the U.S. coalition against Iraq. 

Thus, U.S. leaders rushed Patriot theater missile defenses to help 

defend Israel from Iraqi missiles, and devoted over 2,000 air sorties against 

the Iraqi SCUD missile launchers in an attempt to protect Israel and keep 

them out of the fight. Ultimately, the swift and decisive air-land-sea war 

unleashed by the coalition made short work of the Iraqi military forces, and 

the combination of theater missile defenses and U.S. diplomacy all helped 

dissuade Israel from participating with its armed forces. 

Conclusions and Lessons Learned 

Lesson 1: What deterred the Soviet Union in the Cold War will not apply 

to all cases. 

Deterrence is a rational strategy and theory of how to prevent war or 

escalation of a war. However, the evidence of history is that deterrence 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .31

often fails. Deterrence is inexact, an art not a science. What works 

perfectly in one case may fail wholly in another. Indeed, it is the weaker 

party that attacks the stronger party in, about one of every five wars. So 

deterrence is not a given even when your government or coalition has 

overwhelming military superiority over an opposing state. 

The Cold War strategy that the West adopted to deter a Soviet nuclear 

or conventional attack seems to have worked, although one can never be 

absolutely sure what kept the peace. Was it because the West had a 

retaliatory capability to destroy the USSR and Warsaw Pact? Was it 

because in crises, Soviet leaders believed the U.S. leaders had the will to use 

their nuclear weapons if necessary? Was it because the United States and 

its allies had a second strike force, one not vulnerable to a surprise 

disarming attack? Or was it because the West faced rational leaders in 

Moscow who understood the logic of mutual assured destruction? Or were 

we simply lucky? Would war have occurred if all these factors had not 

been put in place? Or would both sides have maintained the peace anyway? 

And how much retaliatory force was enough to deter a war with the USSR? 

Did we need thousands of nuclear weapons or just a few? How much was 

enough to deter war and the escalation of crises?55

 We can never know for 

sure. We are only certain that we did not have a central nuclear war with 

the Soviet Union and its Warsaw pact and other allies. 

One thing that is clear from the Gulf War example is that despite all the 

destructive power in the United States, U.K. and French nuclear arsenals, 

and for all the coalition‟s conventional might, they could not deter Saddam 

Hussein from seizing Kuwait, and they could not compel him to withdraw 

his forces without first resorting to war. One reason for this is that the U.S. 

and coalition did not develop a firm response to Iraq prior to Saddam‟s 

decision to invade Kuwait. Had the United States delivered a strong 

warning and deployed forces to back this up prior to Saddam final decision 

to invade Kuwait, he might have been deterred. The tardiness of the 

deterrence signals ruined the chances for their success. 

This calls into question whether the Cold War calculus of what it takes 

to deter a conflict was working in the Gulf War. Apparently, the possession 

of nuclear weapons by his opponents did not deter Saddam Hussein or 

compel him to leave Kuwait or end the conflict until his forces were routed 

in Kuwait. He was willing to strike U.S., U.K., French, and Israeli targets, 
32. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

risking possible nuclear annihilation. He was willing to fight a coalition of 

over 30 states in Kuwait rather than withdraw peacefully. 

Lesson 2: States that possess WMD or other extraordinary military 

power may feel that they can afford to start a conflict and keep it within 

tolerable levels of escalation where they can achieve their aims. 

Perhaps Saddam Hussein believed that the threat of his chemical and 

biological (CB) weapons would deter any nuclear use by the coalition 

forces, and perhaps he even believed that, under his chemical and 

biological deterrent umbrella, his forces in Kuwait were, formidable 

enough to deter a coalition attack or to prevent a complete and utter defeat. 

Saddam Hussein may have relied on his CB capability first to deter 

any coalition attack on his forces in Kuwait. This failed on January 17, 

1991, when the coalition air attack began. Second, he may have relied on 

his CB threat to prevent U.S., U.K., French and Israeli nuclear attacks. 

There is no evidence that such weapons use had ever been seriously 

considered by any of the four states. Indeed, memoirs of U.S. decisionmakers Bush, Scowcroft, Baker, and Powell, indicate this was never 

seriously considered, although Secretary of Defense Cheney asked the 

Joint Chiefs to look into the utility of nuclear strikes if the President ever 

changed his mind later. 

Finally Saddam Hussein may have assumed that his CB arsenal would 

have made it too costly for the coalition to march to Baghdad, occupy 

Iraqi territory, and replace his regime. Clearly, he might have been 

tempted to use such weapons, and risk further coalition escalation to 

nuclear weapons, as his situation became more and more desperate. Even 

if he resisted the impulse to use CB weapons as the invasion of Iraq began, 

it is likely that if it became clear to him that his regime was about to fall, 

the CB gloves quite likely would have come off, and the coalition might 

have been struck with last minute chemical and biological revenge 

strikes.56

 Saddam Hussein probably realized that coalition leaders would 

also understand the perils from Iraq‟s CB weapons of trying to achieve a 

total defeat of his regime. It is likely he is correct that this possibility 

weighed heavily in the U.S. and coalition decision not to press for a total 

defeat of his forces and regime in Iraq. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .33

Lesson 3: Saddam felt that he was willing to sustain deeper casualties 

than the United States and this would give him a political if not military 

victory. States willing to suffer more than their opponents may count on 

their adversary halting the war effort when causalities reach a certain 

painful threshold that tempers their war aims. 

It appears that Saddam was willing to gamble that the United States 

was so casualty averse that we would halt our military operations after 

suffering the first 5,000 deaths from the clash with Iraq. Of course, he was 

badly mistaken in how his forces matched up with the coalition. Since his 

forces were able to kill only 148 U.S. fighters in the battles that ensued, not 

5,000, his theory of deterrence of U.S. and coalition escalation, estimated at 

a threshold of 5,000 killed in action, was never tested. 

It should be noted that President Bush and his field commander, 

General Schwarzkopf, were preparing for possible heavy coalition 

causalities. Note that the United States and the coalition had transported 

sixty-three mobile field hospitals to the region before launching Operation 

Desert Storm, as well as two hospital ships and eighteen thousand hospital 

beds.57

On the other hand, while Saddam Hussein thought the United States 

leaders were very averse to suffering casualties, nevertheless, he still 

perhaps underestimated President Bush‟s regard for human life – Iraq lives 

as well as those of Americans and the rest of the coalition. Indeed, unlike 

Bush, it may never have occurred to Saddam Hussein to limit his military 

actions in order to prevent enemy combatant deaths as well as those of his 

own forces. 

Lesson 4: If the rival leadership does not understand when they face 

extreme military disadvantages, deterrence of the weaker by the stronger 

side is more likely to fail. Situational awareness and rationality must be 

joined together in the rival leadership for the deterrent effect to work. 

The Cold War deterrence requirement of having a situationally aware 

and rational opponent was not met fully in the Gulf War. Saddam Hussein 

may have been logical in his thinking but ignorant of important facts. He 

was not situationally aware of the magnitude of military forces arrayed 

against him, nor was he cognizant of much of the movement on the 
34. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

battlefield due to faulty intelligence. For example, he did not have 

satellites for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance of the coalition 

forces, and much of the Iraqi air force had fled by the time the coalition 

ground forces attacked. Saddam never detected the “Left Hook” flanking 

attack that General Schwarzkopf put into motion at the beginning of the 

land battle. 

Lesson 5: Dictators who kill the messenger seldom get good intelligence, 

and are far less effective in countering adverse possibilities. 

Saddam Hussein had a decision style that produced “yes men” only, 

robbing him of much important information on which to inform his 

decisions. To disagree with him was literally to risk your life if you were 

in his circle. His extreme brutality gave him unrivaled power. It also gave 

him information that conformed only to what his advisers thought he 

wanted to hear. Saddam did not welcome negative news or views and thus 

became the prisoner of his own perceptions of reality and rarely had those 

views challenged or informed by facts or interpretations that went counter 

to his preconceptions such as: (1) the view that the United States would 

not respond to an attack on Kuwait, or (2) that the coalition would not 

attack him in Kuwait because he had chemical and biological weapons, or 

(3) that the Iraqi force could hold its own with that of the coalition, or (4) 

that his forces could at least inflict 5,000 U.S. casualties and save him 

from absolute defeat. 

Lesson 6: Many variables go into whether deterrence will work: time, 

place, culture, politics, leadership, and the personalities that make the 

decisions. The greater the divergence between the personalities, world 

views of the adversary leaders, and the leadership stakes in the outcome, 

the greater the chances for deterrence to fail. 

In this 1990-1991 Gulf War there were two kinds of deterrence to 

consider: (1) deterrence of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, (2) deterrence of 

an escalation of that war once it had begun. This was a war with many 

players but it is fair to begin with the two key players in this drama, 

President Saddam Hussein and President George H.W. Bush. On the Iraqi 

side, the unquestioned chief decision-maker was Saddam Hussein. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .35

Saddam was Iraq and Iraq was Saddam in this case. He was the unrivaled 

Iraqi decision-maker in foreign and defense policy.58

Things were a bit more complicated in the U.S. and coalition side. 

Clearly President George H.W. Bush was the ultimate decision-maker.59 

The United States was the key state in the formation of the coalition since it 

was and is the world‟s military superpower. However, others like U.K. 

Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher were influential in collaborating with the 

United States leadership. Mrs. Thatcher was considered particularly 

instrumental in advising President Bush to take an uncompromising policy 

requiring Iraq to abandon Kuwait or face war. And clearly, the instruments 

of power were provided by all the coalition members as they mobilized for 

war, send their armed forces to Saudi Arabia and participated in Operation 

Desert Storm that succeeded brilliantly in routing the Iraqi Army in Kuwait. 

The frequent insensitivity of enemies to each other‟s stakes and 

signals, and the all-too-often misperceptions they have of each other‟s 

aims and motives is at the core of why deterrence theory so often fails to 

explain interstate behavior in conflict situations. 

Lesson 7: Deterrence fails frequently and what works in one case will 

fail in another. Governments run largely by a single dominant 

individual are rare and thus deterring Saddam Hussein and Iraq will be 

different from most cases where power is shared. Lessons learned from 

this case study should be applied very cautiously to other cases. 

One must also be careful in drawing deterrence lessons from a 

particular case. In the 1990-1991 Gulf War, Saddam Hussein ruled Iraq 

with an iron fist and did not have to negotiate with others in forming his 

decisions. Thus, Iraq was a unitary actor. This will not always be the 

case. In most states power and decisions are shared by a group at the top. 

Power is often dispersed. Deterrence becomes a group affair. One must 

persuade a group of decision-makers and power holders before deterrence 

can succeed. Thus, on the Iraqi side at least this is a special case where 

one man, Saddam Hussein, could speak for the entire country and his will 

became Iraq‟s path. 

On the opposing side, although he was by far the most influential 

decision-maker on his side of the conflict, President Bush could not have 

acted nearly as freely as Saddam Hussein did in Iraq. Bush and his able 
36. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

team first had to mobilize diverse coalition of allied states, secure the 

backing of the U.S. Congress, seek the support of the United Nations, and 

mobilize U.S. public support prior to kicking off the January 1991 

counterattack against Iraq. Even so, once such efforts to mobilize support 

had succeeded, it took additional time to deploy and equip a sufficient 

military force in the region to repel the Iraqi invaders from Kuwait. Nearly 

six months elapsed before the coalition was ready to go to war to reclaim 

Kuwait. 

In other cases where a government is attempting to deter a war or 

launch one, the power to make such decisions may be shared, and policy 

may be a product of multiple factors that combine to take the decision or 

policy in a certain direction. This becomes even more complicated the 

more power is shared on both sides. Thus, the 1990-1991 Gulf War may 

be special case and one must be careful about drawing general conclusions 

about deterrence from it. 

Lesson 8: When dealing with an adversary bent on achieving a fait 

accompli, quick reaction time is absolutely required. Be alert and ready 

to act at the outset or fail to deter leaders like Saddam Hussein. When 

still considering the opening move, a rival leadership can be more easily 

turned away from an act of aggression. After a decision has been made 

and a plan set in motion, deterrence can be far more difficult or 

impossible. 

Timing of the U.S. and coalition deterrence campaign was too late 

against Saddam to prevent Iraq‟s invasion of Kuwait. Right from the start, 

the U.S. leadership needed to use unambiguous language with a violenceprone leader like Saddam Hussein. All he respected was superior force 

and will. Anything less was not going to keep him from seizing his prize, 

particularly since it represented, in his mind, the path to financial solvency 

and subsequent physical security. It would be wise for the United States 

and other allies to first inventory their absolute vital interests, things like 

preventing the Middle East‟s oil reserves from falling under the control of 

a hostile dictator whose interests were opposed to peace and security in the 

region and whose grip on world energy supplies could not be trusted. 

After that, a continuous defense and deterrence policy and posture would 

be needed in the region to keep these vital interests secure. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .37

Where these types of leaders and regimes are positioned to adversely 

impact U.S. and allied vital interests, particular high level attention needs 

to be paid to them. When such a potential challenger is positioned to 

threaten a vital interest or vital ally, contingency plans need to be preformulated for deterring them from any power grabs or hostile 

interventions. These plans need to have forces attached to them so that 

once a crisis begins; these forces can be rapidly mobilized and sent to the 

region to signal the seriousness of U.S. and allied intentions, and to 

undergird the tough talk and warnings that U.S. and allied leaders must be 

prepared to give potential aggressors. 

Beyond that, it would be wise to profile and pay extra close attention 

to all foreign leaders like Saddam Hussein that have a track record of 

violence and aggression, and who have shown repeated lawless behavior 

against domestic rivals and their international neighbors. Interdisciplinary 

teams of profilers who have read every word and observed every action of 

that aggressive leadership should help inform U.S. decision-makers about 

the motives, situation, and operational codes of these potential trouble 

makers. Such teams of profilers should stay with the observation of these 

particular leaders over years and decades rather than be rotated into other 

assignments and succeeded by uninformed and inexperienced intelligence 

officers. Moreover, it would be wise to have at least two parallel teams of 

profilers to compete in their assessments and provide decision-makers 

with alternative evaluations. It would also be useful if representative of 

these competitive “Red Team” groups would give their interpretations of 

likely next moves and motives of that particular rival leader or leadership 

team. 

Lesson 9: Beware of the enemy whose modus operandi is to attack 

preemptively and who has a track record of extreme violence and bold 

risk taking. 

Saddam Hussein believed in careful plotting and swift and violent 

preemptive moves against his domestic and foreign foes. He came from a 

background that made him see enemies everywhere and he may have been 

seen as, or even actually been, paranoid. However, as the saying goes, just 

because he was paranoid does not mean people were not out to get him, 

especially after he had killed his way to the top of the Iraqi political 
38. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

system. He had actually made so many thousands of enemies by that time 

that it was probably completely rational to act like a paranoid ruler. First 

he had killed the enemies of the Ba‟ath Party in Iraq and anyone that stood 

in their way to power.60 After that was secure, he killed anyone who he 

thought might become a rival, even if that was not yet the case. He killed 

anyone who was growing in popularity like some of the more successful 

Iraqi generals who fought well in the Iran-Iraq War. 

He killed to maintain Sunni power over the majority Shia sect in Iraq. 

He killed Kurdish leaders who represented an independent power source. 

Once at the pinnacle of power after 1978, he launched wars against his 

neighbors in Iran61 and Kuwait and sent his forces to the doorstep of Saudi 

Arabia. Tens of thousands of Iraqis, Iranians, and Kuwaitis therefore died 

as a result of his aggressions. 

Hussein constantly analyzed who might possibly become his rivals 

inside Iraq and planned brutal elimination campaigns to remove them by 

lethal means. In the summer of 1979, Saddam admitted to a colleague that 

“I know that there are scores of people plotting to kill me, and this is not 

difficult to understand. After all, did we not seize power by plotting 

against our predecessors? However, I am far cleverer than they are. I 

know they are conspiring to kill me long before they actually start 

planning to do it. This enables me to do it before they have the faintest 

chance of striking at me.”

62

 

Saddam‟s violent and ceaseless domestic purges follow the pattern of 

the terror campaigns of Stalin‟s rule in the Soviet Union, a leader whose 

bloody methods deeply impressed him. Saddam‟s endless warring foreign 

policy also reminds one of Adolph Hitler‟s ceaseless wars against all 

neighbors and all other ethnic groups. 

Saddam Hussein never felt secure and his prophylactic arrests and 

executions no doubt kept him in power longer than previous Iraqi leaders 

who were all removed by coups. Indeed, the five previous rulers of Iraq 

all lost power in this way. Hussein also felt that the Islamic Republic of 

Iran posed a potential lethal threat to his rule. Not only were they hostile, 

they were Shiite Muslims like nearly 60 percent of his Iraqi countrymen. 

Their revolution had targeted him. He felt that he had to preemptively 

destroy them or see his regime destroyed by them, hence his decision to 

attack Iran in 1979 while they were still getting organized. Like his 

domestic purges, he struck before his enemies realized his lethal intent. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .39

Lesson 10: Understand the situation and perspective of adversary 

leaders to anticipate when and where they might decide to initiate 

hostilities. Plan to deter and counter them with contingency plans and 

quick reaction forces in anticipation of such contingencies.

After the Iran-Iraq war ended in a ceasefire in 1988, Saddam was 

desperate to rebuild his armed forces and security forces before Iran 

regrouped and attacked again. Iran had come dangerously close to 

defeating him in the previous conflict and was a country with three times 

the population of Iraq, and four times the land area. Yet, his forces were 

spent, and because of his adventures, he was out of credit and deeply in 

debt. This led him to attack Kuwait as a means of recouping his fortunes 

and preparing for what he feared was the inevitable Iranian resumption of 

the war. The Bush Administration in 1990 did not have its focus on the 

Iraq-Kuwait dispute, nor did it appreciate Saddam Hussein‟s dilemma and 

his modus operandi enough to anticipate his attack and occupation of 

Kuwait. Bush and his advisers were surprised and unprepared for the 

event although the threat could have been anticipated with better 

intelligence and forethought. 

Lesson 11: Understand what motivates the adversary leadership in terms 

of retention of their personal power and survival in order to predict your 

chances of success or failure in attempts to deter further acts of war or 

escalation. Put yourselves in their shoes. See the world from their 

perspective when planning to counter them. 

Saddam Hussein may have felt that a retreat from Kuwait would have 

weakened him in the eyes of the Iraqi military and people, and made him 

more vulnerable to overthrow. Already he was in a weakened position. 

He had just concluded a disastrous eight year war with Iran costing 

hundreds of thousands of lives, and billions of dollars worth of funds. He 

may have reasoned that this, coupled with forced humiliating retreat from 

Kuwait, might, in have given strong encouragement to his domestic and 

international rivals to try to remove him from power. Better, he might 

have thought, to take on a foreign force, rally the Iraqi people once more 

behind his rule against an external enemy, than to slink back to Iraq in 
40. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

defeat without putting up a fight. That posture could get him deposed and 

killed. 

Saddam likely reasoned that it was better to fight in Kuwait, try to get 

a compromise peace, keep some of the fruits of his invasion, and stay in 

power and alive. Thus, Saddam appears to have concluded that what was 

best for him personally was to put his people and his military through yet 

another war, however painful. He was willing to lose thousands more of 

Iraqis in order to preserve his own regime and his own life. Thus, Saddam 

was not to be compelled to leave Kuwait without a fight. 

Lesson 12: While it certainly helps if you are trying to deter a rational 

opponent rather than an irrational one, rational leaders without 

situation awareness can still fail to understand the likely consequences 

of their actions, and may fail to be deterred. 

Deterrence can be especially difficult when the opponent is severely 

lacking in situational awareness. Saddam Hussein was unfamiliar with the 

United States and its leadership. He had only a weak grasp of our political 

system. 

Nor did Saddam Hussein appear to keep track of who President Bush 

and his key advisers were meeting with the day he launched the invasion 

of Kuwait. On August 2, 1990, President Bush was meeting with British 

Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, the “Iron Lady of Britain.” It would 

not have taken much analysis to ascertain the kind of strong action she 

was likely to and did recommend to President Bush in response to the 

Iraqi invasion. Further, other top U.S. leaders were meeting in Moscow 

with top Soviet leaders. Thus, it was far easier to begin to mobilize the 

United States and its allies with its leaders in such close proximity. This 

does not seem to have occurred to Saddam Hussein and his advisers. 

Moreover, the Iraqi dictator was an untutored military leader who 

appears not to have grasped the power and capability of the U.S. and 

coalition forces arrayed against him once they were mobilized and 

deployed to the region. Saddam did not trust his own military. He 

launched the invasion of Iran division by division through personal calls to 

his commanders because he did not trust them to coordinate operations in 

a joint fashion. Allowing them to meet and plan operations jointly might 

have also given them an opportunity to conspire against him. He separated 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .41

his commander and forced them to communicate only through him. As a 

result, when that war began, there was a day or two before some of his 

military leaders even were informed that they were at war with Iran.63

General Chuck Horner, the Joint Forces Air Commander during 

Operation Desert Storm observed that it was probably not the wisest 

coalition strategy to try to target Saddam Hussein during the war. He 

noted that, had it occurred: 

[K]illing Saddam may have turned out to be as serious 

mistake...In his paranoia; Saddam often had his top 

generals executed. The threat of execution sometimes 

concentrates the mind, but more often it leads to paralysis. 

This weakening of his military leadership could only 

benefit the coalition. And finally, as general Schwarzkopf 

pointed out after the war, Saddam was a lousy strategist, 

and thus a good man to have in charge of Iraqi armed 

forces, under the circumstances.64

In retrospect, it is difficult to imagine how Saddam Hussein expected to 

fight a war effectively against the coalition when his air forces were swept 

from the skies, when his armor and artillery were out-ranged, when he did 

not have any air and space intelligence, surveillance, or reconnaissance 

capabilities, when his forces were poorly trained and when he lacked 

adequate command and control of his own forces. Saddam Hussein clearly 

did not appreciate the caliber of U.S. and allied forces he was facing and 

assumed his large army could inflict thousands of casualties on the 

coalition, This, he planned, would win him a compromise peace and the 

chance to survive and fight another day after the immediate conflict had 

ended. He was lucky to have survived, and did not do so because his forces 

executed his plan or because his strategy worked. 

Saddam Hussein‟s leadership and lack of situational awareness led the 

Iraqi military into a catastrophic defeat. According to one summary of the 

war, “Iraqi military casualties, killed or wounded, totaled an estimated 

25,000 to 65,000 and the United Nations destroyed some 3,200 Iraqi 

tanks, over 900 other armored vehicles, and over 2,000 artillery weapons. 

Some 86,000 Iraqi soldiers surrendered. In contrast, the U.N. forces 

suffered combat losses of some 200 from hostile fire, plus losses of 4 

tanks, 9 other armored vehicles, and 1 artillery weapon...Although 
42. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

coalition aircraft flew a total of 109,876 sorties, the allies lost only 38 

aircraft versus over 300 for Iraq...The terms of the cease-fire were 

designed to enable U.N. inspectors to destroy most of Iraq‟s remaining 

missiles, chemical weapons and nuclear weapons facilities.”65

Lesson 13: Beware of situations where a potential adversary sees great 

immediate and easy gains to be achieved by taking military action, and 

where his risks are seen as remote, abstract and distant. It will be 

important to try to reverse these perceptions of limited and distant risk, 

and to do so emphatically early in a crisis situation, to improve the 

chances for deterrence to work. 

Saddam Hussein saw an immediate prize in Kuwait where he could 

add 8 percent of the world‟s oil supply to his resources, find a way out of 

his massive debt situation, gain the purchasing power to re-equip his 

armed forces and police to protect his regime and his life, and fund future 

extensions of his power and influence. He got a mild disclaimer from the 

United States that it had no particular interest in the outcome of his dispute 

with Kuwait over the Rumailia oil fields. There appeared to be no 

immediate strong opposition to his unspoken aspiration to add Kuwait to 

his realm. This could have been foreseen if the United States and other 

interested regional powers had been more alert and perceived the danger 

sooner. Clearly, in mid-1990 a violent and ambitious Saddam Hussein was 

considering seizing a rich trophy, one that it appeared could to be had for 

the taking, without any immediate or significant costs. 

Richard Ned Lebow and Janet Gross Stein have examined over 

twenty cases of deterrence failures and conclude that their studies “support 

the conclusion that policy makers who risk or actually start wars pay more 

attention to their own strategic and domestic political interests than they 

do to the interests and military capabilities of their adversaries.”66

 Indeed, 

such aggressors “may discount an adversary‟s resolve even when the state 

in question has gone to considerable lengths to demonstrate that resolve 

and to develop the military capabilities needed to defend its 

commitment.”67

 Thus, a government can do everything right to deter an 

adversary and still fail because the rival does not estimate the outcome the 

same way. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .43

Lesson 14: Until a sizeable deterrent force can be sent to a region of 

potential conflict, it is a useful stopgap to send a tripwire force to signal 

U.S. intent to fight any attempt at aggression from the beginning. 

Such a U.S. tripwire force was sent early to Saudi Arabia in the fall of 

1990 to show Saddam Hussein that an attack on Saudi Arabia would spill 

U.S. blood and draw the United States into a conflict with Iraq. This 

action may have saved Saudi Arabia from an invasion in the period 

between the August 1990 invasion and occupation of Kuwait and the 

initiation of the coalition air war in January 1991 and the ground war in 

February 1991. Like the U.S. army forces stationed in Berlin, Germany, 

during the Cold War, these tripwire forces would not have been able to 

stop the enemy forces from seizing that territory immediately, but it would 

have been a down payment on a future U.S. military escalation and 

counterattack. Being drawn into a war with the world‟s military 

superpower should serve as a considerable reason for rethinking an 

aggressive move. 

Lesson 15: In cases where both sides possess some form of mass 

casualty weapons, deterrence can work in both directions. Both can be 

deterred from use of the chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear 

(CBRN) weapons by the threat of the other. On the other hand, both 

may still feel free to prosecute a limited conventional war, feeling secure 

that their CBRN deterrent will shield them from a similar enemy attack. 

Saddam Hussein attacked the forces of the coalition that included 

three nuclear weapons states: The United States, United Kingdom, and 

France. Moreover, he ordered his force to launch ballistic missile attacks 

against Israel, reputed to be another nuclear weapons state. This probably 

would not have happened if Saddam Hussein had not possessed chemical 

or biological weapons that he thought could deter possible nuclear 

responses. 

Further, it is reasonable to assume that Iraq‟s possession of chemical 

and biological weapons may have been one of several factors that 

persuaded President Bush and other coalition members not to follow up 

their rout of Iraqi forces in Kuwait with a march all the way to Baghdad. 

Clearly, the U.S. military and political leaders were fully aware of the 
44. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

potential harm that might have come to U.S. and coalition personnel from 

a massive chemical or biological attack by Iraq. Indeed, it is possible that 

massive medical problems were simply generated by allied bombing of 

chemical weapons storage and production facilities. Some 183,000 U.S. 

military personnel were victims of symptoms referred to as Gulf War 

syndrome, more than a quarter of the U.S. men and women sent to fight in 

the war were declared permanently disabled, and some speculate these 

casualties were resulted from coalition air attacks on Iraqi CW facilities 

that caused downwind fallout and contamination.68

 

In summary, it is not possible to prove without doubt that deterrence 

works since it is not feasible to prove war would have occurred in the 

absence of deterrence signals. On the other hand, it is clear when 

deterrence actions fail. War and conflict escalation are clear signals of a 

degree of deterrence failure. Even here, it is not possible to know how 

much further up the escalation ladder the conflict would have climbed if 

deterrent actions been taken and signals had not been sent. 

In the 1990-1991 Gulf War, no one successfully deterred the Iraqi 

invasion of Kuwait or successfully compelled the Iraqi Army to leave 

peacefully. U.S. deterrent signals were too weak at the beginning and too 

late to stop him. U.S. tripwire forces sent to early to Saudi Arabia in the 

late summer and fall of 1990 possibly deterred Saddam Hussein from 

sending his army through Kuwait and into Saudi Arabia, although it is not 

clear whether he was willing to risk such a gamble had U.S. 

reinforcements not been sent to assist the Saudi Kingdom. 

It seems likely that Saddam Hussein was deterred from using 

chemical and biological weapons in the stern warning communicated to 

the Iraqi leadership by President Bush and the nuclear forces at his 

command. Saddam could not be sure that the United States would not use 

nuclear weapons in response to a CB attack, especially if the United States 

and its allies suffered mass casualties from such attacks. 

We now know that there was no serious consideration of employing 

U.S. or allied nuclear weapons during the conflict. The Bush policy team 

felt that U.S. nuclear superiority should deter Iraqi chemical and biological 

weapons use and that coalition conventional superiority was so 

pronounced as to make victory very likely. 

Saddam Hussein was willing to let his forces and population bled to 

whatever degree to inflict the level of losses that might make his 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .45

opponents limit their war aims. Indeed, Saddam might have been correct. 

The potential threat of mass casualties may partly account for President 

Bush‟s decision to end the war 100 hours after the ground campaign had 

routed the Iraqi army in Kuwait. Saddam may have considered Bush‟s 

actions as an exercise in “snatching defeat from the jaws of victory” since 

he survived and retained power after the ceasefire took place. 

The 5,000 death threshold that Saddam Hussein predicted would 

cause the coalition leaders to sue for peace talks never was reached, and 

his theory of deterrence was therefore untested. However, it appears that 

the coalition forces were prepared to suffer large losses to achieve their 

war aims, but, since this threshold was never even approached, it is 

impossible to say when the allies would have considered discussing peace 

terms due to mounting casualties. Clearly, the Iraqi dictator took risks far 

beyond what Soviet leaders were willing to risk in the Cold War when 

confronted with overwhelming U.S. military power and a dedicated 

deterrent posture. The risk-taking and violent personality of the Iraqi 

leader, coupled with the mild deterrent signals that the U.S. sent at the 

beginning of the Iraq-Kuwait confrontation, led Saddam Hussein to 

gamble on seizing an oil rich treasure that could bail him out of the 

financial problems caused by the huge costs of the Iran-Iraq war. He 

sought to recoup his losses in Kuwait. 

Thus, every crisis and conflict has different elements and players, 

Deterrence lessons from one case study may or may not apply to another. 

Deterrence is clearly an art and can fail despite the best practices of the state 

attempting it, since it takes two sides stepping to the same tune to have it 

work. Unfortunately, deterrence is a two-sided affair. Ultimately, it will 

work only if the potential aggressor concludes that the outcome will likely 

result in a price they are unwilling to risk. Those attempting to deter them 

can do everything possible to signal why a war would be too costly, but the 

ultimate decision is up to the Saddam Husseins of the world. 
46. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

Appendix A 

Desert Shield/Desert Storm Timeline69

August 1990 

2 Iraq invades Kuwait. 

6 U.S. forces gain permission to base operations in Saudi Arabia. 

7 F-15s depart for Persian Gulf. 

7 USS Independence battle group arrives in south of Persian Gulf. 

8 First TFW and 82nd Airborne arrive in Persian Gulf. 

November 1990 

8 200,000 additional troops are sent from the United States. 

29 United Nations authorizes force against Iraq. 

January 1991 

9 Baker delivers Bush warning letter to Saddam via Aziz. 

12 Congress approves offensive use of U.S. troops. 

15 United Nations withdrawal deadline passes. 

17 D day. Coalition launches airborne assault. 

18 Iraq launches Scud missiles at Israel and Saudi Arabia. 

25 Air Force begins attacking Iraqi aircraft shelters. 

26 Iraqi aircraft begin fleeing to Iran. 

29 Battle of Khafji begins. Airpower destroys Iraqi force. 

February 1991 

24 Ground War begins. Start of 100 hour battle. 

26 Fleeing Iraqi forces destroyed along “Highway of Death.”

28 Cease-fire becomes effective at 0800 Kuwait time. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .47

Appendix B 

A Warning Letter to Saddam Hussein 

From President George H.W. Bush 

Mr. President, 

We stand today at the brink of war between Iraq and the world. This is a 

war that began with your invasion of Kuwait; this is a war that can be 

ended only by the Iraq‟s full and unconditional compliance with U.N. 

Security Council Resolution 678. 

I am writing you now, directly, because what is at stake demands that no 

opportunity be lost to avoid what would be a certain calamity for the 

people of Iraq. I am writing, as well, because it is said by some that you 

do not understand just how isolated Iraq is and what Iraq faces as a result. 

I am not in a position to judge whether this impression is correct: what I 

can do, though is try in this letter to reinforce what Secretary of State 

Baker told your Foreign Minister and eliminate any uncertainty or 

ambiguity that might exist in your mind about where we stand and what 

we are prepared to do. 

The international community is untied in its call for Iraq to leave all of 

Kuwait without condition and without further delay. This is not simply 

the policy of the United States: it is the position of the world community 

as expressed in no less than twelve Security Council resolutions. 

We prefer a peaceful outcome. However, anything less than full 

compliance with UN Security Council Resolution 678 and its predecessors 

are unacceptable. There can be no reward for aggression. Nor will there 

be any negotiation. Principle cannot be compromised. However, by its 

full compliance Iraq will gain the opportunity to rejoin the international 

community. More immediately, the Iraqi military establishment will 

escape destruction. But unless you withdraw from Kuwait completely and 

without condition, you will lose more than Kuwait. What is at issue here 
48. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

is not the future of Kuwait – it will be free, its government will be restored 

– but rather the future of Iraq. The choice is yours to make. 

The United States will not be separated from its coalition partners. 

Twelve Security Council resolutions, 28 countries providing military units 

to enforce them, more than one hundred governments complying with 

sanctions – all highlight the fact that it is not Iraq against the United States 

but Iraq against the world. That most Arab and Muslim countries are 

arrayed against you as well should reinforce what I am saying. Iraq 

cannot and will not be able to hold on to Kuwait or exact a price for 

leaving. 

You may be tempted to find solace in the diversity of opinion that is 

American democracy. You should resist any such temptation. Diversity 

ought not to be confused with division. Nor should you underestimate, as 

others have before you, America‟s will.

Iraq is already feeling the effects of the sanctions mandated by the United 

Nations. Should war come, it will be far greater tragedy for you and your 

country. Let me state, too that the United States will not tolerate the use of 

chemical or biological weapons or the destruction of Kuwait‟s oil fields and 

installations. Further, you will be held directly responsible for terrorist 

actions against any member of the coalition. The American people would 

demand the strongest possible response. You and your country will pay a 

terrible price if you order unconscionable acts of this sort. 

I write this letter not to threaten, but to inform. I do so with no sense of 

satisfaction, for the people of the United States have no quarrel with the 

people of Iraq. Mr. President, UN Security Council Resolution 678 

establishes the period before January 15 of this year as a “pause of good 

will” so that this crisis may end without further violence. Whether this 

pause is used as intended, or merely becomes a prelude to further violence, 

is in your hands, and yours alone, I hope you weigh your choice carefully 

and choose wisely, for much will depend upon it. 

George Bush70
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .49

Appendix C 

Iraq Launches Missile Strikes71

If Iraq was to be forced to obey UN resolutions, the Iraqi government 

made it no secret that it would respond by attacking Israel. Before the war 

started, Tariq Aziz, Iraqi Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, was 

asked, “If war starts...will you attack Israel?” His response was, “Yes, 

absolutely, yes.”72 The Iraqis hoped that attacking Israel would draw it into 

the war. It was expected that this would then lead to the withdrawal of the 

U.S. Arab allies, who would be reluctant to fight alongside Israel. Israel did 

not join the coalition, and all Arab states stayed in the coalition. The Scud 

missiles generally caused fairly light damage, although their potency was felt 

on February 25 when 28 U.S. soldiers were killed when a Scud destroyed 

their barracks in Dhahran. The Scuds targeting Israel were ineffective due to 

the fact that increasing the range of the Scud resulted in a dramatic reduction 

in accuracy and payload. Nevertheless, the total of 39 missiles that landed on 

Israel caused extensive property damage and two direct deaths, and caused 

the United States to deploy two Patriot missile battalions in Israel, and the 

Netherlands to send one Patriot Squadron, in an attempt to deflect the 

attacks. Allied air forces were also extensively exercised in “Scud hunts” in 

the Iraqi desert, trying to locate the camouflaged trucks before they fired 

their missiles at Israel or Saudi Arabia. Three Scud missiles, along with a 

coalition Patriot that malfunctioned, hit Ramat Gan in Israel on January 22, 

1991, injuring 96 people, and indirectly causing the deaths of three elderly 

people who died of heart attacks. Israeli policy for the previous forty years 

had always been retaliation, but at the urging of the U.S. and other 

commanders, the Israeli government decided that discretion was the better 

part of valour in this instance. After initial hits by Scud missiles, Israeli 

Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir hesitantly refused any retaliating measures 

against Iraq, due to increasing pressure from the United States to remain out 

of the conflict.73 The U.S. government was concerned that any Israeli action 

would cost them allies and escalate the conflict, and an air strike by the IAF 

would have required overflying hostile Jordan or Syria, which could have 

provoked them to enter the war on Iraq‟s side or to attack Israel.
50. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

Notes

1. Quoted in Admiral Michael G, Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 

“It‟s Time for a New Deterrence Model,” Joint Force Quarterly, 4th Quarter, 2008, 2.

2. See Barry Wolf, When the Weak Attack the Strong: Failures of Deterrence (Santa 

Monica, Calif.: Rand Report N 3262-A, 1991). 

3. Original source was Ernest R. Dupuy and Trevor N. Dupuy, The Encyclopedia of 

Military History (New York: Harper and Row, 1970), 910-911. See also, Barry R. 

Schneider, Future War and Counterproliferation (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1999), Chapter 4. 

4. See Wikipedia, Constitution and Founding Fathers, “What Ever Happened to the 

Founding Fathers?” This was their promise: “For the support of this declaration, with a 

firm reliance on the protection of the Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each 

other, our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.”

5. For another good discussion, see Richard Ned Lebow, “Conclusions,” in Robert 

Jervis, Richard Ned Lebow, and Janice Gross Stein, Psychology & Deterrence

(Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985, Chapter 9. 

6. Mutual Assured Destruction went by the acronym MAD. Dr. Warner Schilling 

later added another acronym for those who wanted to develop offensive nuclear options 

to disarm the other side with a counterforce strike in this heavily armed nuclear 

environment. He called this option Capable of Firing First If Necessary (COFFIN). 

7. Of course this still begs the question of how much U.S. and allied nuclear 

capability was enough to inflict that unacceptable level of damage and what did the 

adversary think was an unacceptable level of damage? Further, how could we know that 

for sure? What metrics could we use to determine this? This information or estimation of 

what was needed, of course, would be used to guide our deterrence strategy, our targeting 

policy (SIOP), our nuclear force composition, and our DOD and DOE acquisition and 

budget strategies. 

8. For example, during the year leading up to the Cuban Missile Crisis, it appears 

that Nikita Khrushchev, General Secretary of the Communist Party and leader of the 

Soviet Union, had come to the conclusion that President John F. Kennedy was a weak 

leader who would not act to thwart a Soviet fait accompli that put Soviet missiles into 

Cuba. Khrushchev had seen Kennedy‟s administration fail in the Bay of Pigs Crisis, fail 

to respond to a communist invasion of Laos, and fail to respond to Soviet pressure on 

Berlin. Khrushchev had also engaged in bullying Kennedy at a Paris summit conference 

where the young President seemed not to acquit himself very forcefully. The relative 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .51

youth and inexperience of Kennedy compared to Khrushchev may have also played a part 

in the Kremlin‟s risky decision to place missiles into Cuba. 

9. Herman Kahn, On Thermonuclear War (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University 

Press, 1960). 

10. Here is an example of the logical problem. If almost all war began in the spring 

of the year, and the U.S. baseball season starts in the spring, does this then mean that the 

inception of the baseball season triggers war? No, obviously not. Just because A 

precedes B, does not mean it causes B. Both might be caused by another factor C. 

Clearly correlation (e.g., A then B) is not causation. It is very likely that another factor 

leads to fewer wars starting in the winter – the weather (Factor C). Clearly, military 

campaigns are far easier to launch in moderate weather rather than in the dead of winter 

when roads are clogged with ice and snow and army movements are much more difficult. 

Spring is the opening of campaigning season (and baseball) in parts of the world with 

severe winters. 

11. Charles A. Duelfer, Special Adviser to the DCI on Iraq‟s WMD, See “Regime 

Strategic Intent,” Comprehensive Revised Report with Addendums on Iraq’s Weapons of 

Mass Destruction (Washington, D.C.: CIA, 2004), 1. 

12. See “Interrogator Shares Saddam‟s Confessions,” 60 Minutes, CBS Television, 

January 27, 2008. Diane Sawyer of ABC News interviewed Saddam on June 24, 1990, 

and discovered that he did not know there were no U.S. laws against joking about or 

criticizing the U.S. President. Nor did he fathom the working of checks and balances in 

the U.S. political system, where power is shared between the executive, legislative, and 

judicial systems. Saddam asked “Who, then, am I supposed to deal with?” See Karsh 

and Rautsi, Saddam Hussein, A Political Biography (New York: The Free Press, 1991), 

178-79.

13. Efraim Karsh and Inari Rautsi, Saddam Hussein: A Political Biography (New 

York: The Free Press, 1991), 2. 

14. See Paul K. Davis and John Arquilla, Deterring or Coercing Opponents in 

Crisis: Lessons from the War with Saddam Hussein (Santa Monica, CA; RAND, 1991), 

7. In 1990, Saddam was trying to re-arm Iraq before Iran could resume the war they had 

just fought to a draw. He was spending $5B per year on modernizing his military. As a 

result, Saddam Hussein had run out of credit and was facing a mounting financial crisis. 

He feared that this financial crisis would then result in a security crisis. To add injury, 

Kuwait and UAE were producing and selling more oil than the limits they had agreed 

upon at the previous OPEC meetings. This reduced the profit margins for Iraqi oil and 

infuriated Saddam, who saw these declining oil prices as frustrating his expansionist 

dreams and as putting his regime in jeopardy. Much like the Japanese who before Pearl 
52. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

Harbor were reacting to the U.S.-imposed oil embargo that threatened their aspirations 

for a Japanese co-prosperity sphere in Asia, Saddam had felt the financial noose closing 

on his dreams when he hit upon the idea of invading oil-rich Kuwait to solve his troubles. 

Thus, he was adamant about keeping the Kuwaiti prize he had just seized, the prize that 

was going to solve his financial and security dilemma. 

15. Ibid. 

16. Karsh and Rautsi, Op.cit. 78. 

17. Some analysts of previous deterrence failures conclude that “policy makers who 

risk or actually start wars pay more attention to their own strategic and domestic political 

interests than they do to the interests and military capabilities needed to defend its 

commitment. Their strategic and political needs appear to constitute the principal 

motivation for a resort to force.” This observation was based on 20 cases of failed 

deterrence. See Richard Ned Lebow, “Conclusions” in Jervis, Lebow, and Stein, 

Psychology and Deterrence (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 

1985), 216. 

18. John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, “Can Saddam Be Contained? 

History Says Yes,” New York Times, February 2, 2003. 

19. James A. Baker, III, The Politics of Diplomacy: Revolution, War and Peace, 

1989-1992 (New York: G.P. Putnam‟s Sons, 1995), 358-59.

20. James A. Baker, III, The Politics of Diplomacy: Revolution, War and Peace, 

1989-1992 (New York: G.P. Putnam‟s Sons, 1995), 276.

21. Ibid., 273. 

22. Ibid. 

23. Ibid., 273-74.

24. Ibid. 

25. Herman Kahn wrote about two kinds of escalation of a conflict, vertical and 

horizontal. Vertical escalation involved walking up the rungs of the escalation ladder to 

higher and higher levels of conflict. In a war between nuclear armed states, this might 

begin with low-level conventional conflict and escalate into higher-level nuclear 

exchanges. Horizontal escalation is where the theater of a conflict is widened, by 

involving adjacent territories or other countries in the conflict, perhaps even extending 

the conflict to a different theater or region of warfare altogether. See Herman Kahn, On 

Escalation: Metaphors and Scenarios (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1965). 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .53

26. From a speech given by Hussein at the fourth summit of the Arab Cooperation 

Council, Amman, Jordan, February 24, 1990. See FBIS NESAS, February 27, 1990, 1-5. 

Found by this author in Paul K. Davis and John Arquilla, Deterring or Coercing 

Opponents in Crisis: Lessons from the War with Saddam Hussein (Santa Monica, CA: 

RAND R-4111-JS, 1991), 56. 

27. Avigdor Haselkorn, The Continuing Storm, Iraq’s Poisonous Weapons and 

Deterrence (New Haven, CT; Yale University Press 1999) page 52. This estimate by the 

Iraqi dictator was made in an interview carried on German television and was released by 

INA, FBIS (NES), December 14, 1990, 22. 

28. Ibid. 

29. Baker, Op.Cit. 303-304. 

30. Ibid., 349. Ambassador April Glaspie “recounted a very telling story about 

being invited along with other diplomats to a dam construction site in Northern Iraq. 

Saddam had made disparaging remarks about the Vietnamese laborers who were building 

the dam, dismissing them as sub humans.” And these are the people who beat the 

Americans,” he marveled...Iraq‟s leader thought that Vietnam had so traumatized the 

American psyche that we would never fight again.” See Baker, Op.Cit. 355.

31. Ibid. Haselkorn‟s research lists as his source, an article in the Wall Street 

Journal, February 17, 1991, written by Rear Admiral Mike McConnell, then Director of 

Intelligence for the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, McConnell indicated that U.S. forces found 

such a written order in Kuwait. 

32. H. Norman Schwarzkopf with Peter Petre, Autobiography: It Doesn’t take a 

Hero (New York: Bantam Books, 1992), 439. 

33. Ibid. He wrote, “I was worried about the great empty area of southern Iraq 

where the (coalition) army would launch its attack. I kept asking myself, „what does 

Saddam know about that flank that I don‟t? Why doesn‟t he have any forces out there?‟ 

The intelligence people suggested offhandedly, „Maybe he plans to pop a nuke out there.‟ 

They then nicknamed the sector the „chemical killing sack.‟ I flinched every time I heard 

it.”

34. “Gulf War,” On-line, Internet, available from http://www.answers/cp,/topic/gulfwar, 39. 

35. Ibid. 

36. Ibid., The quote is from Barry Rubin, Cauldron of Turmoil; America in the 

Middle East (New York: Harcourt Brace Javanovich, 1992), 144. 
54. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

37. Colin Powell with Joseph Persico, My American Journey (New York: Ballantine 

Books, 1995), 490-491. He said that “The biological worried me, and the impact on the 

public the first time the first casualty keeled over to germ warfare would be terrifying.”

38. U.S. deaths among military personnel in Operation Iraqi Freedom as of April 

2009 were just over 4,200 killed over a period of six years of fighting. 

39. Baker, Op.Cit. 437. 

40. For the full text of this letter, see Appendix B of this paper. 

41. Ibid., 358-359.

42. Richard Cheney, Secretary of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War Final 

Report to Congress (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1992), 25.

43. On the other hand, if a rogue state leader always expects the strong to use all its 

weapons against him, why not use his NBC weapons first when they could inflict 

maximum damage? 

44. As James Baker concluded in his book, The Politics of Diplomacy, “We do not 

really know this was the reason there appears to have been no confirmed use by Iraq of 

chemical weapons during the war. My own view is that the calculated ambiguity 

regarding how we might respond has to be part of the reason,” 359. 

45. George Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World Transformed (New York: Alfred A. 

Knopf, 1998), 463. 

46. Baker, Op Cit., 359. 

47. On the other hand, it could be argued that Saddam may have believed earlier U.S. 

pledges not to use nuclear weapons, even in wartime, against those non-nuclear parties in 

good standing with the nuclear nonproliferation treaty (NPT) regime. Iraq was considered 

in compliance with the NPT by the IAEA at the time of the invasion of Kuwait. Only later, 

after the ceasefire in February 1991, did UN inspectors prove that Iraq had cheated 

massively on the treaty regime. In 1978, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance made a unilateral 

and nonbinding U.S. pledge prior to a NPT Review Conference in order to persuade more 

nonnuclear states to back the treaty extension. This was a policy statement of the Carter 

administration, but not a treaty or legally binding commitment. However, by 1990, the 

United States had adopted a legal interpretation and doctrine called “belligerent reprisal” 

that got the U.S. out of that legal box. It announced that the U.S. government interpreted its 

NPT pledge not to use nuclear arms against non-nuclear parties to the treaty as null and 

void if these states were to initiate the use of either chemical or biological weapons. It is 

more likely that Saddam did not believe the earlier U.S. pledge not to use nuclear weapons 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .55

if war began simply because he would not keep such a pledge himself if he were in the 

place of the U.S. President. 

48. Duelfer, Op.Cit, 1. 

49. Again, review President Bush‟s letter of warning to Saddam Hussein. See 

Appendix B. 

50. Haselkorn, Op.Cit. 57. The original citation is CNN, cited in AFMIC Weekly 

Wire 02-91 (u),” File 970613_mno2_91_0_txt_0001.txt (Washington, D.C.: DIA {?}, 

1991). This plan of strategic reciprocity was confirmed in 1995 by Tariq Aziz who said 

that the Iraqi military had been authorized to use their biological weapons in the event that 

Baghdad was attacked with nuclear weapons. See Haselkorn, 53. 

51. Ibid., 93. 

52. Ibid., 31. 

53. How seriously the U.S. leadership took the Iraqi CBW threat is testified to by 

the fact that during the run-up to the war, until its conclusion, President George H.W. 

Bush was accompanied by a military officer who carried a gas mask for emergency use. 

54. However, the Syrian Chief of Staff later stated in a Q&A session, when an Air 

War College group later visited Damascus, that Syria would have stayed in the coalition 

despite Israeli participation in order to remove Saddam Hussein‟s forces from Kuwait.

55. McGeorge Bundy, national security adviser to Presidents John Kennedy and 

Lyndon Johnson, has written that, “There has been literally no chance at all that any sane 

political authority, in either the United States or the Soviet Union, would consciously 

choose to start a nuclear war. This proposition is true for the past, the present and the 

foreseeable future... In the real world of real political leaders...a decision that would bring 

even one hydrogen bomb on one city of one's own country would be recognized in 

advance as a catastrophic blunder; ten bombs on ten cities would be a disaster beyond 

history; and a hundred bombs on a hundred cities are unthinkable.” Bundy‟s analysis 

would suggest that the United States and any other state should be content with a 

minimum deterrence posture. On the other hand, some U.S. strategists like former 

Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger, once enunciated a doctrine of essential 

equivalence saying that the United States would be safest if it matched the numbers of 

strategic weapons on the Soviet side no matter their number or overkill capability. This 

was at a time when both sides had tens of thousands of nuclear weapons. Still others have 

attempted to strike a balance between the retaliatory power needed and the level of 

damage that could be inflicted on the adversary, Two RAND analysts calculated the 

optimal U.S. retaliatory capability for destruction against Soviet population and industry 
56. . . Deterrence and Saddam Hussein

at a given time. They sought to find a posture that gave “the most bang for the defense 

buck,” yet suggested ways to put rational limits of the size of the nuclear forces 

required.” For example, see Alain Enthoven and K. Wayne Smith, How Much Is 

Enough? Shaping the Defense Program, 1961-1969 (New York: Harper and Row, 1971). 

A reading of their analysis would lead one to conclude that the optimal size of the U.S. 

nuclear retaliatory force was 400 equivalent megatons of explosive power. This, would, 

for example, give in 1971, the U.S. the capability to kill 39 percent of the Soviet 

population and 77 percent of Soviet industry. Their calculations also indicated that this 

would put U.S. destructive power on the “flat of the curve.” Even a doubling of the U.S. 

equivalent mega tonnage to 800 EMT would “only” kill 5 percent more of their 

population and only 1 percent more of their industry. Thus, some might conclude that the 

“optimal” solution would be to deploy enough nuclear weapons in such a fashion that, in 

all likely scenarios, 400 EMT worth of U.S. nuclear weapons would make it through 

Soviet attacks and defenses to hit their targets in the USSR were the Kremlin leaders ever 

to launch a nuclear attack. See Enthoven and Smith, 207. 

56. Note that Saddam Hussein plotted an assassination attempt against George 

H.W. Bush on April 13, 1993, when the retired U.S. President visited Kuwait. This 

revenge strike failed but revealed much about Iraqi dictator‟s predilections. He was 

unwilling to risk the wrath of the United States just to kill the U.S. leader that had so 

soundly defeated and humiliated him in the Gulf War of 1990-1991. If he was willing to 

risk a renewed war and his grip on power to exact revenge it is not hard to imagine how 

much more willing he would have been to use all means at hard to deal a last chemical or 

biological death blow if he thought his regime was about to be destroyed. 

57. Schwarzkopf, Op.cit., 439. 

58. See Charles A. Duelfer, Special Adviser to the DCI on Iraq‟s WMD, 

Comprehensive Revised Report with Addendums on Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction

(Washington, D.C.: CIA, 2004). 

59. Decisions may be influenced by key decision-makers, but these, in turn, may be 

influenced by allies, legal restrictions, political commitment and consideration and, 

bureaucratic politics, and standard operating procedures, psychological factors and group 

dynamics. Decision-makers seldom begin decisions on issues with a blank slate. See 

Allison Graham with Phillip Zelikow, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile 

Crisis (New York, Pearson Longman Publishers, 1999), 2nd Edition. 

60. Indeed, Saddam‟s earliest contribution to the Ba‟ath Party was to attempt an 

assassination of Iraqi President General Qassem in 1958, a bungled attempt that brought 

him fame in the Ba‟ath Party and exile in Syria and Egypt for three years. His later climb 

to the Presidency of Iraq is akin to Lee Harvey Oswald becoming President of the United 

States 19 years after assassinating John F. Kennedy. 
Deterrence and Saddam Hussein . . .57

61. Some estimate the total dead from the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War to have been in 

the neighborhood of 500,000 Iranians and Iraqis slain. 

62. Efraim Karsh and Inari Rautsi, Saddam Hussein: A Political Biography (New 

York: The Free Press, 1991), 2. 

63. Author‟s interview with an unnamed Iraqi General who was under contract with 

the CIA after leaving Iraq. 

64. Tom Clancy with General Chuck Horner (Ret.), Every Man a Tiger (New York: 

Putnam‟s Sons, 1999), 374-375. 

65. See “Gulf War,” On-line, Internet, available from 

http://www.answers.com/topic/gulf-war, page 6. Unfortunately, 183,000 U.S. veterans of 

the Gulf War, more that a quarter of all who participated in the war, have been declared 

permanently disabled by the U.S. Department of Veteran‟s Affairs as a result of “Gulf 

War Syndrome.” “About 30 percent of the 700,000 men and women who served in U.S. 

forces during the Gulf War still suffered an array of serious symptoms whose causes are 

not fully understood.”, 40.

66. Jervis, Lebow and Stein, Psychology & Deterrence (Baltimore, MD: The Johns 

Hopkins University Press, 1985), 216. 

67. Ibid. 

68. “Gulf War,” On-line, Internet, http://www.answers.com/topic/gulf-war. 

69. This chart is an adaptation of one found in Tom Clancy with General Chuck 

Horner, Every Man A Tiger (New York: G.P.Putnam‟s Sons, 1999), xii.

70. See George Bush, Public Papers of George Bush: Book 1, January 1 to June 30, 

1991, “Statement by Press Secretary Fitzwater on President Bush‟s letter to President 

Saddam Hussein of Iraq,” January 12, 1991. See also, Michael R. Gordon and General 

Bernard E. Trainor, The General’s War (Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1995), 

Chapter 9, “The Mailed Fist,” footnote 17.

71. “Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm,” Wikipedia, On-line, 

Internet, www.wikipedia.com. 

72. Lawrence Freedman and Efraim Karsh, The Gulf Conflict: Diplomacy and War 

in the New World Order, 1990-1991 (Princeton, 1993), 332. 

73. Ibid., 331-41.