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> In 1991, as the coalition forces were approaching Baghdad, so the story > goes, the were met by a large contingent of Russian military, thus they > decided to avoid Baghdad. Is there any truth in this, & were > Russian forces > ever participants in the so-called First Gulf War? Could there, on this > issue, have been a cover-up? Thanks Bert. I have not heard this claimed before, but wonder whether it draws upon the Russian - NATO jostling in Yugoslavia after the Kosovo war. It seems to me that the existing explanations as to why US forces did not take Baghdad are sufficient: 1. the administration had already spent too much time on Iraq, and needed to get back to other issues. As it was, they were not able to do so in time, and lost the 1992 elections. 2. the military chiefs had concluded from their war in Vietnam that it was disastrous to get involved in a war without a clear exit strategy. Thus, their war was to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait, after which they were going back home. 3. Saddam Hussein was going to fall even without US forces in Baghdad. Best, Colin Rowat work | Room 406, Department of Economics | The University of Birmingham | Birmingham, B15 2TT, UK | web.bham.ac.uk/c.rowat | (+44/0) 121 414 3754 | (+44/0) 121 414 7377 (fax) | c.rowat@bham.ac.uk personal | (+44/0) 7768 056 984 (mobile) | (+44/0) 7092 378 517 (fax) | (707) 221 3672 (US fax) | c.rowat@espero.org.uk _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk