What If Iraq Win the Iraq-Iran War (Part 1)

The Iraq-Iran War ended with stalemate. This war are occurred from 22 September 1980 - 20 August 1988. Iraq-Iran War was triggered by Iraqi invasion to Iran via air and ground. But, just short of that, the Iraq invasion can be repelled from Iranian land and after that the Iraq become the defensive belligerence. So, what if Iraq can defeated Iran?

Top oil producers.

1. Iraq Become the Regional Power
After Iran defeats, virtually the Iraq controlled whatever things in Iran. The Iraq will have great economy, because of large number of oil resources in both countries (for comparison, Iran ranks fourth in the world, with 150 billion barrels oil reserves. The Iraq itself ranks fifth, with 140 billion oil reserves. If both countries are combined, they have 290 billion barrels reserves, which rank second in the world, after Venezuela) The Iraq will be large countries, with area of 2,085,267 km², which place them in 13th place. Iraq also have high number of human resources, that ranks 12th in the world (115,698,369 people). With all of that factor, the Iraq will have high position in the world. But, this treasure have a curse, very bad curse. I will talk about that from 2nd point.

Comparation of Iraq and Iran military strength at beginning of war

2. Insurgency
Iraq, in the time of Iraq Iran war was lead by the infamous Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein was a Sunni Muslim. Here the things start complicated. The Muslims in Iraq are composed by 65% Shia and 35% Sunni. So the Saddam Hussein, who is Sunni Muslim, the minority, was in power. Things get more complicated after Iran integration. Iran, the Shia country, which 95% of Iran population was Shia.

The Saddam Hussein itself, was in doubt for killing and suppressing Shia and Kurdish, who struggle to getting down Saddam and/or getting independence. You can expect, the Shia and Kurdi people that under the Saddam regime want independence. The Shia and Kurdish will start an insurgency, against Saddam and Sunni Muslim. This can cause many things happens. The Saddam government who knows this start to suppress the insurgency, which in some cases counted as brutal, like maybe using chemical weapons against Shia and Kurdish, or shooting of innocent Shia and Kurdish civilians. This will be the Iraq Iran Civil War, which comparable to Iraq Civil War, but includes Iran.

Operation Desert Storm (attack of Kuwait by Coalition and Arabian countries)

3. Iraq Will Not Invading Kuwait
As the Iraqi borrow so many money and buying many weapons to US and its allies, the Iraq will not able to borrow any other money. Iraq military, who has been weakened in Iraq Iran War will not have enough power to attack the Kuwait. For Iraq, the invasion of Kuwait is worthless, as they has control many oil fields in Iran, that mined much more oils than the Kuwait do. The Iraqi also don't want to losses his relations to US, by attacking US allies.

Even if they military and financially able to attack Kuwait, and the Iraq-US relations wasn't important to Iraq, the Iraq will have to repair many of its infrastructure that has damaged during Iraq Iran War, like oil fields, cities, military base, and other things. If Saddam doesn't want to be resisted by his own citizens and allies, he wouldn't attack Kuwait (still, the Saddam hate Kuwait, just little bit). Or, if the Saddam is obsessed to invade Kuwait, few years after the Iraqi win in Iraq-Iran War, his army are able to defeated by Kuwait and US forces in Kuwait (after Iraqi win, the US obviously want to make sure that Saddam don't invade Kuwait (the real reason why US support Saddam is just to make sure the oil on Iraq don't fell into Iranian hand, so the Iraq are only tools to achieve it, not US real friends)).

Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003)

4. US Will Invade Iraq (and Iran)
Like in Iraqi Freedom, but with little bit different. The US want to attack Iraq, because US feared that Iraqi become too strong and then attacked Kuwait or Saudi Arabia. Because Iraq has controlled whole Iran, the Iran become the part of the plan. If US has conquered whole Iraqi or at least Baghdad, the Iraqi government will be changed, like the US do IRL, and for Iran, US government will sent Reza Pahlevi, Mohammad Reza Pahlevi son's, to ruling the Iran. So, the Iraq, has been controlled by pro-American president, and Iran controlled by US best friend's son.

The condition in battlefield is still same. The US Marine, with help from coalition countries (UK, Australia, Poland), and Pesmerga will attack Iraq, the coalition will entered Iraq from Kuwait, the Peshmerga itself helped coalition from Iraqi Kurdistan. After entered Iraq, the main attacking force will attack then Karbala, then Al-Fallujah, and finally Baghdad. The supporting force crossed the Eufrat River and attack An-Nasiriyah, then together with main force, attack Baghdad. The UK force, attacking Basrah after entering Iraq. But, there's a little twist here. Instead of stopped in Baghdad, the coalition will attack Iran, and conquer Tehran, then return the Pahlavi regime to power. That's for this episode, thank you for reading!