The history of the development and use of the Iraqi armed forces during the rule of the Baath Party and Saddam Hussein, including in the Iran-Iraq war, the complex of political, economic, social reasons and prerequisites for the transformation of Iraq into a contender for military and political hegemony in the Persian Gulf region are related to the topic of military construction, the creation of a system of measures for civil and military spheres, aimed at improving the material and technical base of the Armed Forces, increasing the mobilization potential and ideological training of the masses.

Keywords: army, military construction, Middle East, Iraq, Saddam Hussein's regime, Iran-Iraq war.

Mao Zedong's truism "a rifle gives birth to power" has never lost its relevance, especially in the Middle East (BV). It is common knowledge that all Middle Eastern Arab regimes - republican and monarchical-seek to use the armed forces not only to ensure national security, but also as a pillar of power and a political tool. This forms the image of the armed forces and approaches to their creation, functioning and use in the BW countries. The involvement of Arab countries in the geopolitical game, their relations with world powers, the choice of suppliers of weapons and military equipment (IWT), and most importantly, military experience and knowledge - the United States or the USSR - until the early 1990s, gave this topic a special urgency. Young nation-states sought to create their own armies, and the pretenders to hegemony also had to frighten their neighbors with military power in order to make them take account of themselves - this was the "plague" that swept the entire region in the 1960s and 1980s. Depending on the political situation of the country, the BW was either part of the NATO or Soviet technological and military-technical areas.

This fully applies to Iraq under the rule of the Ba'ath Party and Saddam Hussein. Now the country is involved in the zone of the NATO bloc, which actualizes the task of adapting the Western experience of military construction, since Iraq is forced to design its armed forces from scratch, creating bizarre and eclectic regular structures and weapons and military equipment systems under the supervision of a new overlord.

The experience of military construction in Iraq on the eve and during the Iran-Iraq war, as well as in the post-war period, is described and analyzed in foreign and domestic literature, usually in the context of conflicts in which Iraq participated under Saddam Hussein. A common place in the works devoted to this topic is that the appearance of the Iraqi Armed Forces was due to the peculiarities of its political structure, the influence of the USSR, and in general, it fit into the "standard" for third world countries.

To identify the specifics of the development and use of the Iraqi Armed Forces, due to the military-technical partnership with the USSR, the peculiarities of the regime of S. Hussein and the socio-economic foundation on which the military machine of Iraq was built, it is necessary to consider the "Middle Eastern method of military construction" .-

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historical, political and social background of the construction of the Iraqi military machine; history of the development of Iraq's military potential in 1968-1980; features and features of the regime that influenced the formation of the Iraqi armed forces; lessons learned by Iraq from the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-1988.

SPECIFICS OF MILITARY CONSTRUCTION IN THE MIDDLE EAST

The oil-rich Arab countries of BW and North Africa are sparing no expense in military spending and are creating fancy armies that are armed in the latest fashion and organized according to modern models, but do not know how to fight. Over the past decades, these armies have not got rid of the standard set of "childhood diseases", such as formalism in matters of professional training and motivation of personnel, low staff culture, disregard for charters and staff structures, inability and unwillingness to maintain logistics at the proper level.

In addition, it should be noted the unusually high rates of failure of military equipment for non-combat reasons, which is typical for third world countries, where this indicator in different years went through the roof to 70% for aircraft and 60% for ground equipment (with normal indicators in combat operation of 10 and 5%, respectively) [Kennedy, 1974, p. 261]. This is due to several reasons: special operating conditions, such as heat, dust, sand, neglect of repairs, low qualifications and lack of maintenance personnel. Often, crews abandoned their cars because of breakdowns that could be repaired "from the wheels". This was partly a consequence of the uncritically perceived Soviet doctrine, which implied a bet on firepower at the expense of mobility and replacement of equipment at the expense of repair. The inability to repair equipment, especially in combat conditions, was the scourge of all Middle Eastern armies. For this reason, the Iraqi military leadership during the Iran-Iraq war could not conduct large-scale mechanized operations, even if it were able to do so.

DEVELOPMENT AND STRENGTHENING OF THE IRAQI ARMED FORCES DURING THE BA'ath PARTY RULE

In the decade between 1958-1968, there were no major changes in the structure and organization of the Iraqi Armed Forces. Two divisions were formed in addition to the four available, almost exclusively Soviet military products were purchased, and military specialists were trained in the USSR.

In 1963, when the Ba'athists were purging the country of its ideological opponents, Soviet supplies stopped for a while. Shortly before the 1963 coup, the Iraqi Air Force received six disassembled MiG-21s, but immediately after the coup, all instructors and technicians were recalled, so the military aviation was replenished with two ready-made new combat aircraft, on which none of the Iraqi pilots could fly [Sada, 2006, p. 55]. The situation was repeated in 1970, when Baghdad once again sent an army to pacify the Kurds. Then S. Hussein went to Moscow to negotiate the termination of support for the Kurds and the resumption of cooperation.

In terms of military construction, only the Ba'athist coup of 1968 and the subsequent purge and "Ba'athization" of the army brought something new: having received an effective control tool in the form of an army party organization, the ruling regime began to systematically increase the army. By the beginning of the war with Iran, it included 12 divisions, including four tank divisions. The party has gone through a harsh school of coups, and the regime, as Kanan Makiya aptly put it, has developed "coup stability" (Makiya, 1998, p.XX). Key civilian posts were occupied by Ba'athists, then an alternative Soviet - style hierarchy was created in the army-the institute of political commissars. The commissioners-proven Ba'athists-reported directly to the PA-

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edited by S. Hussein. Now the orders of higher-ranking officers who were not part of the party could be canceled. The officer corps was purged of disloyal and suspicious individuals, and the road to high ranks and positions was open only to Ba'ath members. Regular purges and education of military personnel in the spirit of loyalty to the ideas of Ba'athism have effectively eliminated corporate solidarity in the army. The officer corps has lost the ability to organize itself into clubs of coup lovers. The "leading and guiding role of the party" was not questioned, and apostates and doubters were severely punished.

However, despite its success in personnel policy, the party itself was unstable, and S. Hussein, as head of the internal security apparatus, had to concentrate on clearing the party's top leadership of political rivals. Thus, in 1970, he eliminated Chief of Staff Hardan Tikriti, who was accused of inaction and betrayal of Palestinian interests, and in 1971, he removed Interior Minister Salih Mahdi Ammash, a close ally of President Bakr. By getting rid of the "old Bolsheviks" in the government, in the high command and in the revolutionary command Council, S. Hussein protected himself from the slightest threat of a military coup. In the mid-1970s, after gaining power over the entire wealth of the country, with the support of a cohort of close relatives assigned to control the economy, politics, and defense capabilities of the country, he was able to realize his dream of hegemony.

POLITICS AND IDEOLOGY DURING THE RULE OF THE BA'ATH PARTY AND SADDAM HUSSEIN

The 1971 Charter of National Action consolidated Iraq's socialist orientation and outlined its foreign policy priorities. In 1972, after the official visit of S. Hussein, who was then still the second secretary of the party, the Soviet-Iraqi Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation was signed, which finalized the already established military-technical, economic and political partnership. Suffice it to mention that Iraqi air bases became accessible to Soviet aviation, and hundreds of Iraqi cadets went to study at military educational institutions of the USSR. S. Hussein's anti-communism was not an obstacle to the realization of the chance to threaten the Americans in the Gulf with the help of Soviet aircraft.

In addition, Iraq received guarantees from the USSR and France not to participate in any sanctions against Iraq and immediately nationalized the Iraqi Oil Company. Full control of oil finally untied the hands of the ruling regime, which began extensive military construction. Military products were purchased on a large scale, infrastructure was built, new units were formed and reservists of the People's Army were trained.

In the documents attached to the National Declaration presented at the People's National Conference on August 8, 1980 in Baghdad, S. Hussein fiercely criticized the falsity of slogans, expansionism and sectarianism of the new Iranian regime, but spoke favorably about the Iranian people, with whom one should live in peace [For the Independence..., 1981, p. 30]. In an address to the commander of the fourth corps, located at the front, on March 29, 1982, he already called all Persians expansionists, enslavers and oppressors of the Iraqi people, enemies of their ancient civilization [President Saddam Hussein's Message..., 1982, p. 23].

Ba'athist ideology constructed reality in accordance with its main slogan "Unity. Freedom. Socialism", which was interpreted as the need to transform a potential "Arab nation" into a real one through the total mobilization of all its progressive and young forces. The struggle against imperialism and Zionism was declared the main task. Children and young people gathered in structures controlled by the party, identical to the pioneer organization and the Komsomol. Working with young people and developing a revolutionary consciousness in them has become a priority

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for party bodies and the Ministry of Education, since young people accounted for more than half of the total population.

The Iraqi regime followed the well-trodden path and willingly used the Soviet experience: ensuring universal literacy, coupled with full control over the media. Huge efforts were made to weaken the "backward" systems of tribal and clan loyalty, to eliminate inequality between the sexes. The new laws restricted patriarchal power in the extended family and encouraged the separation of the nuclear family. The state needed people who were consciously loyal to the ruling regime and personally to the leader of the nation. Since the early 1970s, new enemies of the Iraqi people - Persians, Jews, and Kurds - have been created and denounced under the guise of workers, merchants, and teachers who infiltrated Iraq and formed a "fifth column". The revolution chose its own enemies.

Ten years of Ba'ath rule transformed Iraq from an agricultural and raw material colony into a rentier state that could develop in the direction indicated by its political leadership. The Iraqi leadership chose the path of military hegemony and followed it to the very end. Even the wars-with Iran and the international coalition-have not changed the political elite's understanding of what Iraq is and how it should be on the world stage. Through the efforts of the leadership, Iraq became like a military camp, where everything was subordinated to a higher goal and a war to achieve it. The State supervised and punished, instructed and trained. Therefore, citizens who are not involved in the educational system of the army - the "university of the nation" - and the People's Army - the "college of the nation"have become targets of the internal security forces and special services. According to Kanan Makiya's rough estimates, by 1980, one-fifth of the 3.4 million economically active population of Iraq-677,000 people-were doing this task (Makiya, 1998, p. 38). For comparison, the army numbered 242 thousand people, the People's Army - 175 thousand, the police - 260 thousand.

THE ECONOMY OF IRAQ IN THE SECOND HALF OF THE 20TH CENTURY

The monarchist Development Committee, assisted by the World Bank and consultants Arthur D. Little Inc., developed plans for the country's economic development in the 1950s that included major industrial projects in the energy, chemical, construction, and infrastructure sectors. Priority, however, was given to light industry, petrochemicals, and energy, which made it possible to increase the production of consumer goods and improve the quality of life of the population. Complex and long-term large-scale industrial projects involving the creation of interconnected production facilities and extensive technological chains were evaluated primarily by their potential profitability, so they were never implemented. The Planning Committee established in 1959 gave rise to even more ambitious plans that took into account the growth of oil export revenues. If you add to this the Soviet economic assistance program, then the Iraqi economy should have developed at a fantastic pace. A total of six five-year development plans were developed by the planning authorities between 1951 and 1965, but none of them was fully implemented. However, each plan projected 8-12 percent economic growth.

Financial support for military expenditures under the first five-year plan of 1961-1965 was provided under the articles "Transport and Communications" and "Civil and housing construction". A third of the expenses under these items were spent on providing the army and police. The war with the Kurds required additional funds to be raised, and as a result, many projects were canceled as economically unfounded.

The second five-year plan already included in the budget a special item of military expenditures, which was called " Industrial Construction of the Ministry of Defense."

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In 1964, major industrial and infrastructure facilities, as well as financial institutions, were nationalized. All foreign trade under the 1970 law was controlled by the State. Many of the industrial facilities were planned by the Development Committee and the Ministry of Economy under the King. But if during the monarchy and under Prime Minister Abdel Karim Qassem (1958-1963), the government was guided by economic considerations, then under Presidents Abdel Rahman Aref (1966-1968) and Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr (1968-1979), the industrialization program took on political meaning. The narrowness of the domestic market, the lack of qualified personnel, the lack of own raw materials, and other considerations that hindered the development of heavy industry in the 1950s and 1960s were hardly taken into account. Incompetence, poor management and, as a result, low returns on investment did not bother the country's leadership.

After 1968, the Baath began to industrialize with an iron fist. Despite anti-communism in politics, the party adhered to an essentially Marxist-Leninist approach to the economy, focusing on the development of heavy industry. The Government focused on strengthening and improving the state sector in industry and agriculture, began to create large state-owned industrial enterprises and farms, encourage cooperation in the agricultural sector, mechanization, chemicalization, and the use of modern agricultural methods. The Soviet model of mechanization was used - the creation of state-owned car rolling stations.

S. Hussein himself, coming from a peasant background, took the agrarian problem seriously. The post-revolution land reform threatened agriculture in Mesopotamia, as small farms and farms were forced to squeeze everything they could out of the land. Depletion of water resources during the annual operation of fields led to salinization of soils. Under S. Hussein, modern drainage systems were built; electricity, refrigerators and televisions were supplied to the village for symbolic money. The collective farms that had been targeted in the early 1970s were canceled because they did not correspond to the special Iraqi way and were unpopular. The Ba'athist program of agrarian reforms meant, in addition to general measures to improve agricultural efficiency, limiting migration to cities and creating conditions for the return movement.

Since the late 1960s, enterprises planned by the five-year plan were put into operation, producing almost everything necessary for the functioning of a military vehicle-machine components , spare parts, electrical equipment, fuel and lubricants, medicines, chemical products of all kinds. In the early 1970s, the country did not even have its own production of ammunition and components for small arms. Technological chains had to be built from scratch. Full self-sufficiency in low-tech military products was achieved already during the war.

In 1971, with the help of the USSR and Czechoslovakia, an agricultural machinery factory was launched - the very beginning of any military construction. Major industrial centers, such as Baghdad and Basra, have been set up to repair machinery. An artificial fertilizer plant was built at Abu Flus near Basra, which operated entirely on Iraqi raw materials. In 1971, a factory for the production of medicines built with the help of the USSR was launched in Samarra. In the late 1970s, West German companies (Karl Kolb, Fritz Werner, Water Engeneering GmbH) also organized the production of pesticides and chemical products. The American company Pfaudler and the British Imperial Chemical Industries, which were approached for help by Iraq, were more scrupulous and did not take up contracts for the production of dual-use products [Cordesman, Wagner..., 1990]. Samarra became the center of Iraqi high-tech, producing everything related to the chemical industry, including chemical weapons. At Salman Pak near Baghdad

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German contractors built an enterprise that produced medicines and medical products, as well as, presumably, engaged in the development of bacteriological weapons [Bulloch and Morris, 1991, p. 91]. In 1970, with the help of the USSR, a cotton mill was put into operation in the city of Kut, producing cellulose necessary for the manufacture of pyroxylin powder.

Almost all of Iraq's industry was concentrated around Baghdad, Basra, and Mosul. All this industrial splendor was created thanks to the personal interest of S. Hussein, who, even before his presidency, headed the strategic planning committee that he had invented, which included his most loyal relatives-his brother Barzan at-Tikriti, who was also involved in the supply of weapons, and his cousin Adnan Kheirallah. They supervised the most important ministries - industry and planning.

All the" childhood diseases " of industrialization: lack of engineering and technical personnel, low qualification of employees, poorly functioning logistics, neglect of infrastructure, lack of quality control and specifically Middle Eastern administrative vices-seriously reduced the efficiency of the industrial base and led to incomplete loading of enterprises, poor product quality. However, the government supported the unprofitable industry to maintain the level of employment and technological level in general.

EDUCATION AND HUMAN CAPITAL

Widespread illiteracy, especially among rural residents, called into question all the advanced initiatives in the country. In pursuit of Iraq's greatness and his own, Saddam Hussein raised the educational level of the population. State and party bodies and public organizations, starting with the Revolutionary Command Council and ending with trade unions, were involved in the program of eliminating illiteracy [Makiya, 1998, p.86]. Even the dictator's enemies and most ardent critics recognized his achievements in this field, especially in raising the educational level of women and involving them in social production. In this endeavor, S. Hussein was faithful to his policy of encouragement, threats and coercion: for refusing to participate in the educational program, an ignoramus was threatened with imprisonment [Aburish, 2000, p. 114].

The 1970 Constitution declared free education at all levels. Special attention was paid to vocational and higher technical education. To five higher educational institutions: Baghdad University (1958), Al-Mustansiriyah University (Baghdad, 1963), Basra University (1964), Mosul University (1966), Salah al-Din University (Erbil, 1968) - added the Association of Technical Institutes (1972) and the Baghdad University of Technology (1975The number of colleges of various profiles has increased from several dozen to more than two hundred. The number of students in the vocational education system grew from several tens of thousands in the late 1960s to almost two hundred thousand in the late 1980s, and the number of students in higher education institutions increased from one hundred to a little over one hundred and fifty thousand in 1978-1988. Especially noticeable was the threefold increase in the number of students in technical institutes during the war period, which can be explained by the growing need for technicians and engineers for the army that has increased fourfold [Fadhil, 1991, p.18-21]. Extensive cooperation was carried out with the USSR in the training of personnel, both civilian and military. Training centers were created at enterprises and separate industry-specific training and professional training centers. Thousands of Iraqis passed through Soviet educational institutions.

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In education policy, Hussein was as opportunistic as in any other public sphere - in the late eighties, as part of the "new economic policy" of encouraging private capital, it was allowed to create private universities.

In Iraq itself, in addition to the existing 1929 Officer's College (Staff college), a military college (War college) and a National Defense college (National Defense College) were formed. General of the Iraqi Air Force under Saddam Hussein George Sada in his work "Saddam's secrets" states that the standards of education in these educational institutions were recognized even by the Americans and the British [Sada, 2006].

Economic growth and industrialization have caused widespread shortages of qualified engineering personnel. Experts from all over the world, especially Arabs, were invited to Iraq. The country's leadership "imported" engineers and scientists, offering them high salaries and promising areas in science and production. Preferences were given to energy, chemistry, biology, and medicine. Under the personal control of Hussein, the nuclear program was carried out. Nuclear energy specialists from Egypt, who lost their jobs after the closure of the Egyptian nuclear program, were invited to Iraq. All this made it possible to create in Iraq its own training base for qualified scientific and technical personnel.

The 1977 law regulated women's military service. Since women by this time, thanks to the efforts of the state, made up the majority of all medical workers in the country, their service was necessary both in the regular and in the People's Army [Makiya, 1998, p. 91].

MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX. MINISTRY OF MILITARY INDUSTRY

Shortly before and during the war with Iran, the beginnings of the military industry were created in Iraq - the production of small arms and ammunition, spare parts and components of military equipment, even such technologically complex and labor-intensive ones as gun barrels and ballistic missile control systems, was mastered.

The largest objects of the military industry were a factory for the production of licensed howitzers (built with the help of Yugoslavia) in El-Yusefiya, a plant for the production of small arms (Kalashnikov assault rifles and machine guns, with a capacity of 300 thousand units per year), a complex for the production of ammunition in Elskanderia, and a tank factory in Taji (Yurchenko, 2007).

The plant assembled T-72 tanks called Babil from spare parts. Self-propelled artillery units were also produced under Czechoslovak and Yugoslav licenses. In 1990, an agreement was signed with the USSR on the construction of an aircraft factory in Mosul [Yurchenko, 2007].

With. Hussein wanted to reach all his neighbors, especially Israel, with his missiles and planes, so the Iraqi engineers had to improvise. So, during the 1991 war, with the help of Egypt, Iraq began production of Soviet R-17 tactical medium-range missiles, known as SCUD. But their range did not reach Israel, and then the Iraqis increased the capacity of the fuel tanks of the missiles to the detriment of accuracy. As a result, most of the rockets fired at Israel in 1991 hit anywhere but the target. However, this improvisation played a different role - some missiles fell apart when entering the atmosphere, and their debris created a lot of marks on the radars of Patriot anti-aircraft missile systems (SAMs), so to be correct, the calculations of missile systems had to shoot dozens of missiles at a pile of scrap metal flying to the ground.

It is possible to characterize S. Hussein and his close associates, in particular Defense Minister Adnan Kheirallah, as naive technocrats - for some reason they believed that the very presence of a large number of modern weapons and military equipment could be the key to victory over any enemy. In the aforementioned book "Saddam's secrets"

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The author writes that in 1991, Hussein dreamed of sinking an American aircraft carrier. At the same time, the C-4I command, control, communications and intelligence system practically did not exist [Sada, 2006].

With. Hussein diversified the sources of arms and equipment supplies in order to reduce his dependence on the USSR. The second most important supplier was France. While the western and eastern bloc countries were fighting for influence in the Persian Gulf, Iraq had no serious difficulties in getting what it wanted. Iraqi sales representatives traveled all over the world in search of various PVN, they did not spare money on bribing, contractors received generous commissions - every effort was made to purchase the best. Thousands of units of military equipment - cars, tank tractors, light and heavy armored vehicles, cannon and rocket artillery, mobile air defense systems, and tens of thousands of missiles of all kinds-were purchased in Italy, Germany, Brazil, Argentina, and China. Western companies built military and civilian airfields in Iraq, equipped with the latest means of air space control. The" motley " arsenal of weapons and military equipment and the problem of its unification did not bother the Iraqi leadership - the neglect of maintaining combat readiness and repairing equipment is generally inherent in Middle Eastern armies to this day.

By 1975, Iraq had acquired two more divisions — tank and mechanized - in addition to the six that were available in 1968.The share of military expenditures in Iraq's GDP was steadily increasing [Yurchenko, 2007]. By the beginning of the war with Iran, the Iraqi fleet of ground vehicles consisted mainly of Soviet models (and their Chinese counterparts) of different generations: hundreds of BMP-1, BTR-60 and BTR-70 tanks, T-55, T-62 tanks, and even 50 units of modern T-72 received in 1979. [armstrade.sipri.org...].

It is worth noting that in the 1970s, Iraq did not manage to get what all arms buyers are usually interested in in the West - the latest aircraft. Only France was willing to sell its new Mirages. In the 1970s and 1980s, just over a hundred Mirage F1 family fighters and five Super Etandard carrier-based attack aircraft were sold to Iraq, which were used in the tanker war and for attacks on Iranian oil terminals. Hussein planned to buy the latest Jaguar attack aircraft in the UK. In 1976, his emissaries even managed to agree on training aircraft pilots in England and the United States, but the deal did not take place. The Iraqi Air Force consisted of Soviet aircraft that were mass-produced in the 1970s and 1980s and delivered to Iraq after several years of operation in the USSR.

Special relations with France and S. Hussein's friendship with J. The Chiracs allowed Iraq to acquire the Osirak research reactor in Thwaite in 1975, which produced plutonium potentially suitable for the production of nuclear weapons. It was bombed by Israeli aircraft on December 7, 1981. Despite this strike, Iraq continued uranium enrichment and nuclear fuel production research at ten facilities in Rashidiyah, Tuwait, al-Furat and other locations. During the 1991 war, these facilities were destroyed or severely damaged by coalition airstrikes, putting an end to Iraq's nuclear and quasi-nuclear weapons projects [globalsecurity.org/...].

ESTABLISHMENT OF THE IRAQI ARMED FORCES

The army is a system with a special ethic. In many Third World countries, it is the only tool for maintaining stability and order unaffected by the private interests of competing groups of elites. There, the army essentially cements the nation and is, in the words of General Renton, the head of the British mission of military Advisers in Iraq in the 1940s , the university of the nation. In addition, the army protects regimes from internal opposition. Usually, the ruling elite tries to use the army as a political tool, trying to prevent its politicization.-

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Of course, it's a good idea. This ambivalence leads to the fact that armies in most third world countries become a privileged club of officers who play the role of gendarmes and law enforcement officers. They are under the control of special services. All this reduces the role of the army as a means of protecting the country's sovereignty and security.

The Ba'athist doctrine set out in the 1976 charter of the National Patriotic Progressive Front proclaimed the army to be an integral part of the people, the vanguard of progressive revolutionary forces. The same document also refers to the creation of its own military industry and military education system [Charter and principles... 1976, p. 18].

Unification in the Middle Eastern armies is a rare phenomenon not only in the field of military equipment, but also in relation to the moral and strong-willed qualities of soldiers and officers. Since the regulations and instructions in most of these armies are not dogma, the personal bravery and professionalism of officers become the only resource that makes sense to take into account in the analysis. In the Middle Eastern armies, a kind of model of a medieval irregular army is reproduced, in which the weak training of personnel is compensated by the presence of good officers and the units they command. In the case of Iraq, one should take into account political control - the saturation of the army with intelligence agents and the regular rotations and purges arranged by Hussein for his own peace of mind. Micromanagement from Baghdad and crackdowns on officers blamed for defeats during the Iran-Iraq war did not add to morale. The golden rain that poured down on loyal officers did not compensate for the stifling atmosphere of fear and uncertainty in the favor of the supreme commander. Offensive operations require a large number of competent, proactive and aggressive commanders, which Hussein feared most. This explains the inefficiency of the Iraqi armed Forces, which were technologically superior to the Iranian ones during the war, and the rapid defeat of the coalition forces in 1991 and 2003. Against this background, the Republican Guard looked better, in which most of the officers came from Tikrit and were related to S. Hussein. Guards units were considered the most reliable, better armed and more autonomous in their actions. Nevertheless, the Guard "ate" the best personnel, and regular units were deprived of a valuable resource-competent junior and middle-level officers.

The Iraqi Air Force, equipped in 1970-1980 with Soviet and French aircraft, did not prove to be an effective branch of the military, although the pilots were professionals. During the war with Iran, the Iraqi air force made a negligible number of sorties. After all, aviation is not only a tool for air attack and defense, but also a means to quickly and reliably get rid of unwanted people, so for illegitimate rulers, combat aviation is a threat. If the potential danger of a military coup can be offset by the creation of a loyal guard and pervasive intelligence services, then against aviation, which at any time can strike from the air, such an "antidote" is an extensive network of government bunkers that can withstand any air strike. Another way to protect yourself from aviation is to keep it on the ground, which was done by the regime in 1991 after the anti-Saddam conspiracy of Air Force generals was uncovered.

The Iraqi air defense system was designed on the Soviet model with the help of Soviet specialists, but included technical means and weapons of different countries. The air defense system included three components: 1) S-75 and S-125 anti-aircraft missile systems, capable of hitting high-altitude and medium-altitude targets at ranges up to 40 km and covering important industrial, administrative and infrastructure facilities; 2) the Republican Guard, consisting of French Roland, Crotale short-range anti-aircraft missile systems and anti-aircraft guns; 3) army units, intended for-

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designed to cover the ground forces and armed with Soviet air defense systems "Kub", "Osa", "Strela-1", "Strela-10", self-propelled anti-aircraft guns.

The" hybrid " nature of the Iraqi air defense system, equipped with radars, weapons and electronic warfare, on the one hand, made it virtually disposable, since it required a huge number of spare parts of different nomenclature and from different manufacturers to repair and maintain combat readiness, on the other hand, such a system was less vulnerable to analysis and suppression.

The National Security Service (Maktab al-amn al-qaumiy), which was completely subordinate only to S. Hussein, was created in 1974 with the active assistance of the KGB on the Soviet model. It controlled other intelligence agencies and had an extensive network of agents inside the country. No expense was spared on security. Saeed Abourish, a Western journalist and business consultant to the Iraqi government in the 1970s, in his book Saddam Hussein: the Politics of Revenge, reports on a five-million-dollar contract with the American company Karkar electronics for the supply of mobile phones that were distributed to high-ranking Ba'athist functionaries in case any threat to the regime arose [Aburish, 2000, p. 137]. Counterintelligence and Party Security (mukhabarat) and Foreign intelligence (istikhbarat) were established.

The main foreign intelligence document, the forty-page "Strategic Work Plan", signed by the head of Istikhbarat, Khalil al-Azzawi, aimed to penetrate the secrets of the military-industrial complex, science and diplomacy of Western countries, and reveal the plans and structures of NATO [Makiya, 1998, p. 13].

The paramilitary organization People's Army (NA), the brainchild of S. Hussein, was subordinated to the Mukhabarat. Unlike its predecessor, the National Guard, which stormed the Ministry of Defense in 1963 to dislodge Qasem, the People's Army did not participate in the 1968 coup. Since the early 1970s, it has become a kind of personnel reserve for the army: young people who passed through NA and initial military and political training under the supervision of the party received a "start in life" through military service.

LESSONS FROM THE IRAN-IRAQ WAR

A common phenomenon for Iraq and Iran in terms of using their human and military-technical capabilities was their inability to effectively use technologically complex weapons systems, which is explained by the low level of education and technological base, as well as the lack of a detailed and realistic strategy. This explains both the "trench" nature of the war and the high losses in manpower on both sides. Sanitary and civilian casualties were also disproportionately high for a conflict of such intensity. The multiplication of paramilitary structures - the Basij in Iran and the NA in Iraq-served political purposes, not military necessities. Below is a comparison of the potentials of both countries.

In Iran, there was the doctrine of the "army of twenty million" - an original improvisation of Ayatollah Khomeini, following which Iran called up several million people to the armed forces and was able to compensate for the main shortcomings that limited the country's military potential. These included political and economic isolation after the Islamic revolution; the inability to effectively use, replenish and increase the vast arsenal inherited from the Shah's regime; the lack of its own military industry and the weak material and technical base of the armed forces; the bet on "large battalions"-using the demographic advantage (in Iran - 422 thousand people). conscripts per year, in Iraq - 161 thousand) [Hiro, 1991].

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Iran has tried to compensate for its logistical shortcomings with high morale and the use of the Shiite tradition of martyrdom for the faith. The political leadership was inclined to use the tactics of mass attacks and overestimate the effectiveness of these tactics. Iran has created the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the Basij, a highly motivated revolutionary force that is ill — equipped and unable to defeat the Iraqi equivalent of a modern army, but has borne the brunt of the war.

The picture was completely different in Iraq. The Soviet model of military construction was adapted to local conditions, including the creation of a modern-style army, its own material and technical base for servicing purchased weapons and a developed logistics system, relying on fire support; control of the army through party structures and micromanagement of troops from Baghdad; mobilization of the bulk of the conscription contingent during the escalation of the conflict and the creation of it served as a tool for controlling regional tribal structures.

So, Iraq, among the" young militarists " of the Middle East, was distinguished by its special experience in military construction. The history of Iraq since 1968 has largely depended on the will of a small group of people. Personal ambition and a thirst for power, coupled with nationalism and hegemony, have created a reference model of a militarized Middle Eastern state in Iraq. The political leadership, fascinated by the magic of numbers and the achievements of science, sought to construct a new regional order based on military and technical superiority over all its neighbors. The Ba'athist coup of 1968 relieved the army of the unnecessary burden of political power. Profound social changes affecting all sectors of society, especially the program to improve the educational level and train national technical personnel, economic growth and the transformation of the political system - from revolutionary to legitimate-could change the armed forces of Iraq, making it a real military and political hegemon in the region. Industrialization and extensive military construction 1970-1980 As well as the war with Iran could have become a kind of crucible in which the unity of the Iraqi nation was tempered, but the vicious system of political control of the Armed Forces, the paranoid nature of the regime of S. Hussein and its incomplete legitimacy did not allow the army, through which a significant part of the adult male population of the country passed, to

The Soviet experience in designing the Armed Forces and the Soviet military doctrine, based on the psychology of superiority, the bet on firepower and the rapid replacement of declining units with new ones, played a bad joke with Iraq, which did not have such industrial, military and human potential. Nurturing the spirit of superiority turned into empty propaganda and self-deception, relying on firepower and rotation of units-creating a huge number of poorly controlled and understaffed units and formations that only on paper had serious strength. Training of personnel, especially officers, in whom the political leadership valued loyalty rather than competence, turned out to be inadequate for the huge and technologically "motley" Iraqi arsenal, and the arsenal itself turned out to be completely inadequate for the management of the armed forces.

During his thirty years at the top of power, Saddam Hussein feared that sooner or later some military man would enter Baghdad in a tank and overthrow it. As a result, huge efforts in the military sphere were spent on inflating the cult of Hussein's personality within the country and constructing his image on the world stage.

During the war with Iran, unleashed by S. Hussein, only the regular army increased fivefold - from two hundred thousand to almost a million. All the "growth diseases" that accompany such an increase in the Armed Forces were repeatedly reinforced by the low competence of the military command and the total incompetence of the political one

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the leadership that controlled the course of hostilities from a bunker in Baghdad. The Iraqi army showed some success at the end of the war with Iran, as S. Hussein somewhat "loosened the leash". The longest and bloodiest conflict in the third world was essentially a repetition of the scenario of the First World War by the forces of provincial amateur actors: the audience was presented with the spectacle of trench warfare, from time to time interrupted by fierce, fleeting battles on certain sections of the front. Unfortunately for the peoples of both countries, the directors of this action turned out to be even more amateurs than the performers - they completely did not know the canon of scenography created by the great war playwright Sun Tzu decades ago.

The geopolitical ambitions of the Iraqi dictator, who fancied himself a mini-Stalin, extended beyond the Persian Gulf region, but his love of power prevented the emergence of a military elite comparable to Stalin's general corps. All of this ultimately resulted in the defeat of Kuwait in 1991 and the rapid collapse of the regime in 2003.

list of literature

Fadhil S. S. Statisticheskiy analiz urovnya obrazovaniya i podgotovki kadrov v Irak v 70-80 gody [Statistical analysis of the level of education and training in Iraq in the 70-80 years].
Charter and principles of action of the Patriotic and National Progressive Front in Iraq: Charter of National Action. Helsinki, 1976.

Shakhbazyan G. S. Gosudarstvennyy sektor v ekonomiki Irak [The State Sector in the economy of Iraq]. Moscow, 1974.

Yurchsnko V. P. Voennaya politika i voennoe stroitelstvo v stranakh Arabskogo Vostoka (kontsa XX - nachalo XXI veka) [Military Policy and Military Construction in the Arab East (late XX-early XXI centuries)]. [Electronic resource: RTF]

Aburish S.K. Saddam Hussein: the politics of revenge. L., 2000.

armstradc.sipri.org/armstradc/page/trade_rcgistcr.php

Bulloch J., Morris Harvey. Saddam's War: The Origins of the Kuwait Conflict and the International Response. L., 1991.

Cordesman A.H., Wagner A.R. The Lessons of the Modern War. Vol. 2. Boulder, 1990 [electronic resource. PDF].

For the independence and unity of the Arabs: The national declaration of President Saddam Hussein and the documents of the Arab popular national conference on 8 February 1980. Baghdad, 1981.

globalsccurity.org/wmd/world/iraq/tuwaitha.htm

Hiro Dilip. The longest War: The Iran-Iraq conflict. N.Y., 1991 [electronic resource. PDF].

Kennedy G. Military in the Third World. N.Y., 1974.

Makiya Kanan. Republic of Fear: The Politics of Modern Iraq. Univ. of California press, 1998.

President Saddam Hussein's message to the fourth corps commander. Baghdad, 1982.

Sada G. Saddam's secrets. Brentwood, 2006.

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