U.S. Policy in the Persian Gulf
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This paper will be concerned with the policy of the United States in the Persian Gulf. U.S. policy-makers see the Persian Gulf as being a strategically important area. In particular, the area is seen as being important because of the oil resources which are located there. By maintaining a presence in the Persian Gulf, the United States is not only protecting its own oil interests, but is protecting those of its Western allies as well. Prior to the United States adopting this role, Great Britain was the major Western force to be found in the Persian Gulf. Oil was first discovered in the region at the turn of the twentieth century. At about the same time, the British government began obtaining oil concessions there. These concessions gave Britain powerful control over the local politics of the Persian Gulf. However, after the Second World War, Britain began "abandoning much of [this] role . . . to the United States" (Mansfield, 1988, p. 475). By the early 1950's, the British government was finding it too costly to maintain its imperial designs in the Middle East. The United States became directly involved in Gulf policy during the Suez War in the mid-1950's. At that time, U.S. intervention helped stop a crisis when Britain and France became involved in a war with Egypt over the control of the Suez Canal. Soon after the Suez War, the United States government passed the Eisenhower Doctrine, which declared that American troops would be used to stop the spread of Soviet
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thus be contained. Since that time, of course, the arming of Iraq has come to be seen as a policy error on the part of the U.S. government. In particular, it gave Iraq's leader, Saddam Hussein, the military power that he needed in order to feel confident about invading Kuwait and making a stand against the nations of the West. Even before Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, American commentators were making note of the foolishness in treating Iraq as an ally. For example, one writer claimed: "Toward Iraq, our policy is merely fatuous, being built on the notion that a friendly face turned toward Baghdad, where the U.S. has virtually no serious interests at all, will somehow put Tehran at a disadvantage" (Simes and Koch, 1988, p. 113).
During the Iran-Iraq War, the United States became directly involved in the defense of the tiny nation of Kuwait. Kuwait is seen as being strategically important to U.S. interests because it is "the region where two thirds of the world's known petroleum is located (Cook, 1991, p. 53). Since the liberation of Kuwait from British rule in 1961, Iraq has exhibited the desire to take over the nation. U.S. policy, by contrast, is focused on the need to keep Kuwait free from Iraq's ambitious d
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Persian Gulf, Saddam Hussein, Iran-Iraq War, Middle East, Eisenhower Doctrine, Gulf United, Gulf War, persian gulf, Gulf Gup, United Nations, Gulf Specifically, middle east, saddam hussein, gulf war, oil supplies, iran-iraq war, gulf region, presence persian gulf, arabic nations, presence persian, war united, policy persian gulf, persian gulf region, threat soviet expansion, persian gulf united,
Approximate Word count = 2982
Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page)
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