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John Major & War with Iraq
In 1991 the Second* Gulf War was fought. Iraq had invaded Kuwait the previous summer and the United Nations passed a resolution to eject Iraq. A UN coalition of forces was assembled and in January, the bombing of Iraq started in Operation Desert Storm. This was the first, so-called, hi-tech war, with precision bombing although the effect on the Iraqi all-powerful ground forces was less devastating than appeared on television pictures. Within a month, the war was over. Iraqi forces retreated from Kuwait. The coalition forces had no UN mandate to do any more than restore Kuwait to its government and in spite of some popular opinion, there was no diplomatic machinery and little military chance of following the Iraqis deep into their own territory and certainly no mandate to attempt to depose Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi leader.
In England John Major was facing his first year as Prime Minister. He replaced the dreaded "Poll Tax" with an tiered council tax. He set out to persuade the Europe Union that Britain was whole-heartedly behind the EEC and wanted to be central in decision making.
Elsewhere, Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated, Helen Sharman became the first British women in spoace when she flew in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, The Silence of the Lambs was a run away box office success; civil war broke out in Jugoslavia; Soviet deputies agree to dissolve the USSR; Gorbachev was overthrown and, John Major claimed a treaty signed at Maastricht was a triumph for Britain's cautious relationship with the rest of Europe.
* The Iraq-Iran is often described as the First Gulf War
Saddam Hussein (born 1937) - Saddam Hussein was born just outside Baghdad.
- His parents were peasants.
- He was educated in Baghdad and joined the Arab Ba'ath Socialist Party.
- In 1959 he was sentenced to death for the attempted assassination of the head of state.
- Hussein escaped to Syria and Egypt.
- He returned to Iraq in 1963 but was imprisoned for trying to overthrow the new regime.
- He was released in 1966 and took a leading part in the revolution of 1968.
- In 1979 he became state president and since then has, often with his own people, the Tikriti, has held the country in an iron and often bloody grip.
Dame Margot Fonteyn, the ballerina who died at the age of 71 in 1991, was born, Peggy Hookham.
Maastricht - an assessment by Lord Blake
(from The Conservative Party - from Peel to Major)
....Major continued in speech after speech to declare that Britain should be at the heart of Europe.
He made this point at a meeting on the eleventh of March in Bonn where he addressed an Anglo-German audience.
However, he also made it clear that being at the heart of Europe did not mean participating in a European federal super-state: "Europe is made of nation states: their vitality and diversity are sources of strength.
The important thing is to strike the right balance between closer co-operation and a proper respect for national institutions and traditions".
Major never deviated from this line and, though less abrasive than Margaret Thatcher, he made no concessions to the federalists.
He would have no truck with the so-called Social Chapter nor with the minimum wage, both strongly endorsed by Labour.
He secured opt-out clauses on these two crucial matters as well as on another no less important: Britain's right to refuse to join European Monetary Union, EMU.
The Maastricht Summit of December 1991 had been a formidable hurdle but the Prime Minister had got most of what he wanted.
 
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| 1981 | Prince Charles marries Lady Diana Spencer
Ronald Reagan President of the USA
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| 1982 | Britain wins the Falklands War
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| 1983 | Margaret Thatcher wins landslide victory
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| 1984 | Indira Gandhi of India assassinated
Death of poet, John Betjeman
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| 1985 | Mikhail Gorbachev succeeds Chernenko as Soviet leader
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| 1986 | Elizabeth II first British monarch to visit China
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| 1987 | Worst storm of the century rages over Great Britain
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| 1988 | George Bush wins US Presidential election
Bruges speech
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| 1989 | Tiananmen Square massacre
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| 1990 | Tories oust Margaret Thatcher
John Major new leader
Iraqi invasion of Kuwait
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| 1991 | The Second Gulf War
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| 1993 | The Maastricht Treaty comes into force
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| 1994 | Channel Tunnel inaugurated
Mandela President of South Africa
Death of Labour leader, John Smith
Bosnians reject Owen-Vance peace plan
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| 1995 | Tony Blair drops Clause IV from Party Manifesto
UN 50th anniversary
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| 1996 | Prince and Princess of Wales divorce
IRA Docklands and Manchester bombings
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