Kuwaiti War Wound Still Fresh

KUWAIT -- It took Iraqi tanks just a few hours to overrun small, oil-rich Kuwait 10 years ago. Since then, determination by Kuwait and its neighbors to never again be so vulnerable has changed the political landscape in the Gulf.


Shortly after a U.S.-led coalition liberated Kuwait in the 1991 Gulf War, the country signed a 10-year defense pact with Washington. Similar agreements followed with Britain, France, and Russia as well as a defense agreement with other Gulf states.


"I feel that Kuwait is one of the safest countries in the world," said lawmaker Abdul-Mohsen Jamal a decade after the day Kuwaitis call "Black Thursday" f Aug. 2, 1990.


Thanks to billions of dollars Kuwait had stashed away from oil earnings, physical scars of the invasion have been removed. Blazes in oil wells that were set afire by retreating Iraqis were extinguished and equipment looted from government offices, the university, and hospitals has been replaced.


However, people in this state of 2.3 million people, the majority of whom are guest workers, are still shocked that an Arab country would take over another overnight.


"Our wounds have not healed," said the editorial of a special issue of Al-Anba daily to mark the anniversary. "On the contrary they hurt with every new dawn and whenever we close our eyes."


Kuwait and other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council f Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Bahrain and Qatar f established a nucleus of a common army in a mutual defense pact. But it's clear they believe their real defense lies in their relationship with the United States.


Iraq's aggression led neighboring Saudi Arabia to allow into the country some 500,000 foreign troops, most of them American.


The legacy of that decision is still felt politically and economically in the kingdom.


The $60 billion bill helped drain the Saudi kingdom's reserves, and the presence of foreign troops in the area gave birth to a fundamentalist Saudi opposition.


In Kuwait, political scientist Abdullah al-Shayeji said his government is spending 25 percent of its annual budget on security, in addition to some $12 billion earmarked for defense after Kuwait's liberation. Lawmaker and former union leader Muslam al-Barrak counted additional costs: He expected his country would continue to be under U.S political pressure to support the Mideast peace process.


But "at the end of the day, we will never forget what America did for us, regardless of how much it benefitted," al-Barrak said.


As for Iraq, Kuwaitis say enmity between neighbors cannot go on forever. Some predict a day when the two nations will reconcile and perhaps join economic forces.


Yet, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein is still in power, and Iraq has not accounted for 605 Kuwaitis and citizens of other countries who disappeared during the occupation.


Baghdad says it has released all war prisoners, and in recent years has accused Kuwait of withholding information on the fate of 1,150 of its citizens who disappeared during the crisis.


Kuwait says it cannot be held responsible for them at the time when Iraqi authorities ran the country.


Mariam al-Jassem, her husband and two sons were imprisoned in Iraq for five months during the occupation until the Iraqi opposition stormed their prison after the Gulf War and set them free.


She would always remember the hospitality Iraqi opposition extended to the freed prisoners, putting them up in their homes for three days before they drove them to the safety of the border.


"The people of Iraq are innocent victims," she said. "It's their government that is to blame."