The Struggle for Persian Gulf Supremacy • 383and help their Iraqi liberators. Iran, by the same logic, hoped to weaken Iraq
by appealing to its Shi'i Muslim majority. Neither ploy worked. Each side
tried using its air power to destroy the other's oil pipelines and refineries
and to demoralize civilians. Iraq invaded the Iranian provinces of Kurdistan
and Khuzistan, took Khorramshahr, and surrounded Abadan, whose oil
refinery was nearly destroyed. Military and civilian casualties were high,
higher than in any other modern Middle Eastern war, and the Iran-Iraq
War lasted much longer than the Iraqis had anticipated. They had counted
on Iran's internal instability, on its inability to buy spare parts for its inher¬
ited arsenal of US weapons, and on Western support to help thwart Iran
during the American hostage crisis.
Carter's administration backed neither side at first, fearing that an Iran¬
ian defeat would enhance Soviet power. The USSR sold its arms to both
sides. Iraq got help from Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and even Egypt, whereas
Iran had the support of Syria and Libya. In other words, the status quo
states gravitated toward Baghdad and the revolutionary ones toward
Tehran. Iran had many trained officers and soldiers, US tanks and aircraft,
and three times as many people as Iraq. The two sides settled into a stale¬
mate for more than a year. In 1982 Iran made a comeback. Roused by the
ayatollah's religious appeals, Iran's army (augmented by teenaged volun¬
teers) retook nearly all the lands Iraq had won earlier. Tehran demanded
that Iraq admit to having started the war, pay an indemnity, and oust Sad¬
dam Husayn.
The Soviets veered toward Iran; Iraq, without renouncing its ties with
Moscow, made overtures to the Reagan administration. Israel, too, entered
the picture by bombing Iraq's French-built nuclear reactor in 1981 just be¬
fore it was to go into operation and by selling arms and spare parts to Iran,
despite Tehran's fierce anti-Zionist rhetoric, because it feared that an Iraqi
victory would unleash Arab militants against the Jewish state. The US pub¬
licly condemned this policy, but in 1986 it became known that the Reagan
administration had covertly promoted the sale of missiles and spare parts
to Iran in the hope of securing the release of Americans held hostage by
Shi'i militants in Lebanon. The proceeds of the sales were funneled through
secret Swiss bank accounts to aid Contra rebels who were trying to oust the
Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Some reports revealed that Reagan's
National Security Council had even urged Saudi Arabia and Egypt to help
supply spare parts to Iran. To placate Iraq, Washington provided Baghdad
with intelligence information, not wholly accurate, about Iran.
As the war continued, the US and Israel hoped to prevent a decisive
victory by either side. But the prolonged war threatened to impoverish
both Iran and Iraq, to draw their backers into the fray, to endanger anyone