The UN inspectors who began arriving in Iraq in May 1991 worked for two
agencies. The United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) had the task of
locating and destroying Iraq’s presumably large arsenal of chemical weapons (some
of which Iraq had used during the 1980–1988 war with Iran), biological weapons,
and missiles that exceeded a ninety-mile range. Inspectors from the International
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) were responsible for monitoring compliance with the
Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), which barred Iraq from possessing nuclear
weapons.
Initial inspections in 1991 quickly uncovered evidence that Iraq’s arsenal of chem-
ical weapons was much larger than UN officials and Western intelligence experts had
believed. More startling was evidence that Iraq’s work to build nuclear weapons had
advanced much further than was generally assumed; some experts later suggested that
in 1991 Iraq had been only a few years short of completing work on a rudimentary
nuclear bomb. These findings—that the Iraqi government had successfully concealed
its weapons work from U.S. spy satellites and other espionage—would color interna-
tional perceptions for years and lead the United States to claim that Iraq continued
to build banned weapons.
Despite successes in documenting Iraqi weapons and programs, the UN inspec-
tors repeatedly reported to the Security Council on refusals by the Iraqi government
to cooperate with them in their work. The Security Council responded to these com-
plaints by passing additional resolutions, beginning with Resolution 715, adopted on
October 11, 1991, demanding that Iraq cooperate with the inspectors “uncondition-
ally.” The United States twice bombed Iraqi targets in 1993 in part because of Bagh-
dad’s refusal to cooperate with the inspectors but for other reasons as well. The first
bombing occurred on January 13, 1993, by order of President George H. W. Bush,
when Iraq appeared to threaten Kuwait. Five months later, on June 26, President Bill
Clinton, Bush’s successor, ordered missile attacks against Iraqi intelligence services in
Baghdad to retaliate for a failed assassination attempt—attributed to Iraq—against for-
mer president Bush during a visit to Kuwait that April. In both cases, the presidents
also cited complaints by UNSCOM that Iraq had blocked its inspection work.
On November 26, 1993, Iraq finally accepted Resolution 715, demanding that it
cooperate with the weapons inspectors. The decision appeared to be part of a cam-
paign, futile at the time, to win international support for weakening economic sanc-
tions against it. Instead, Iraqi acceptance of the resolution cleared the way for more
intrusive inspections than Baghdad had previously allowed.
On July 11, 1994, UNSCOM chairman Rolf Ekeus reported to the Security
Council that all of the prohibited weapons acknowledged by Iraq had been destroyed
and that a long-term system for monitoring its weapons programs was being put in
place. Even so, Ekeus said he could not be certain that Iraq was not still hiding
weapons or facilities to make them. The report by Ekeus marked a turning point in
the struggle over Iraq’s weapons because it appeared that Iraq finally was complying
with UN resolutions. Even so, Baghdad quickly reverted to its policy of resisting UN
inspections, thus hardening international skepticism about its claims. Another con-
frontation took place in October 1994, when Iraq again appeared to threaten Kuwait
by moving army units to the border. President Clinton responded by sending some
36,000 troops to the Persian Gulf, forcing Iraq to back down and formally recognize
the international border with Kuwait.
474 IRAQ AND THE GULF WARS