Middle Eastern Politics and Conflicts

Running head: MIDDLE EASTERN POLITICS AND CONFLICTS
MIDDLE EASTERN POLITICS AND CONFLICTS
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MIDDLE EASTERN POLITICS AND CONFLICTS
8. The war of Iraq in the year 2003 was purely aprotractedarmed conflict which began
with the invasionof Iraq by a multinational force of United States, United Kingdom, Australia,
Spain and Poland. This coalition of these states basically aimed to take a punitive measure
against Iraq. This is due to the fact that the leading countries like USA and UK had submitted a
draft resolution which was breached by Iraq. In support of UK and USA, France, Russia and
Germany had submitted rival proposal to intensify the weapon inspections in Iraq as the
alternative to a military action (Schwartz2016).This coalitionof states had doubted that Iraq
possessed some seriouslyharmful weapons and referred to be associated with terrorist
connection.
The background of studies reveals that this rivalry dates back to the incidents after the
first Gulf War in 1991 when Iraq was gratified by the United Nations to submit any types of
biological as well as toxic weapons.However, after this first Gulf War both US president George
Bush and UK prime minister Tony Blair administration expected that due to economic sanction
in the country, military containment along with no-flight zones in the northern as well as
southern Iraq will be resulting in a military coup in Iraq (Guo et al. 2015). however, this was not
a United Nation policy but America’s own unilateral effort forchanging the regime
inBaghdad.Therefore, it can be sad that the intention to capture the country’s wealth and
freedom, the US and UK started launching shock and awe bombing that started the conflict.
Another reason of Iraq conflict 2003 was the dictatorship of the president Saddam
Hussain. Heofficially rose to power in the year 1979, before that he had already become the de
factohead of the country since several years when he curbed numerous movements, especially
the Shia and the Kurdish movement. This conflict pursued to take over the government and gain
freedom and maintain supremacy during this Iran and Iraq War along with the Gulf War.

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MIDDLE EASTERN POLITICS AND CONFLICTS
Hussain waslauded some part of the Arab world for opposing the US and attacking Israel but
some people widely condemned him for the brutality due to his dictatorship. Moreover, this
dictator was the reason of various purgesand genocides in Iraq and Iran. His invasions
of Iran and Kuwaitalso caused in thousands of deaths and this president acquired the title the
Butcher of Baghdad (Dieterich, Hummeland Marschall 2015). This phenomenon attracted the
powerful nations to the politics of Iraq who wanted to examine the depth and source of power of
this particular country. This is the reason why UN had issued a draft for disarming Iraq and most
importantly curbing the power of Saddam Hussain. He was obliged to submit before the UN
committee but he fled toescape the consequences which added fuel to the Iraq conflict of 2003.
9. The Syrian Conflict began seven years ago in 2011 and has claimed around 400,000
lives including 106,000 innocent civilians (Bbc.com 2018). The conflict took a more devastating
form in the recent few years after the inclusion of other revolting parties. In addition, the vested
interests of countries like Iran, Turkey, Russia and the United States have also escalated the
conflict rather than ending it. Prior to discussing that, it is important to understand the root cause
of the conflict.
In 2011, a peaceful protest commenced against the dictatorial regime of President Bashar
al-Assad. The pro-democracy protests exploded in the Deraa city, inspired significantly by the
“Arab Spring” (term used to describe the period when Arab and African nations raged war
against dictatorial regimes). The president then used violent force to suppress the demands,
which ultimately led to intensified crackdown and unrest across the nation.
The conflict that began as an internal demonstration of protest against the ruling
government soon turned into a large-scale civil war with many countries and groups involved