The International Political Economy of the Iran-Iraq War

Abstract

And with that final prelude began a war which even before its conclusion has earned the infamy of being one of the costliest regional wars in history.¹ Soon thereafter, rhetorical pronouncements gave way to accelerated action and, finally, full-scale war erupted on 22 September 1980 when Iraqi planes bombed and strafed several military and civilian targets deep inside Iran. Iran’s response was in kind, if not in severity. Its retaliatory raids the following day included aerial attacks on Iraqi oil and industrial centers as well as military complexes. In the first weeks of the war, Iraq scores some bona fide military victories by capturing Iran’s major port city of Khorramshahr, encircling the oil city of Abadan and setting its refinery, the world’s largest, on fire. The Iraqi army was also able to drive as much as 70 miles inside Iranian territory, and, at one point, reached within artillery range of the provincial capital of Ahvaz.

Iran’s failure to implement its agreement to withdraw its forces from Iraqi frontier territories has obliged Iraq to recover them by force … I am, therefore, declaring the 1975 Algiers Agreement between the two countries null and void.… Shatt al-Arab is, henceforth, totally Iraqi and totally Arab. President,Saddam Hussein of Iraq in a televised speech before the Iraqi National Assembly on 17 September 1980.

President Saddam Hussein of Iraq in a televised speech before the Iraqi National Assembly on 17 September 1980.