1974–75 Shatt al-Arab conflict
1974–1975 Shatt al-Arab conflict | |||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Part of the Shatt al-Arab dispute and the Second Iraqi–Kurdish War | |||||||||
| |||||||||
Belligerents | |||||||||
Iran United States[1][2] Israel KDP |
Iraq Soviet Union | ||||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (Shah of Iran) |
Saddam Hussein (Vice President of Iraq) | ||||||||
Strength | |||||||||
| |||||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||||
1,000+ killed or wounded (total)[9] |
The 1974–1975 Shatt al-Arab conflict consisted of armed cross-border clashes between Iran and Iraq. It was a major escalation of the Shatt al-Arab dispute, which had begun in 1936 due to opposing territorial claims by both countries over the Shatt al-Arab, a transboundary river that runs partly along the Iran–Iraq border. The conflict took place between April 1974 and March 1975, and resulted in over 1,000 total casualties for both sides combined, though the Iranians eventually came to hold a strategic advantage over the Iraqis. Open hostilities formally came to an end with the 1975 Algiers Agreement, in which Iraq ceded around half of the border area containing the waterway in exchange for Iran's cessation of support for Iraqi Kurdish rebels.
Background
Qajar Iran had repudiated the demarcation line established in the Persian Gulf by the Anglo-Ottoman Convention of 1913, and argued that the Iran–Iraq border in the Shatt al-Arab should be demarcated according to the thalweg principle. In 1934, the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq, encouraged by the United Kingdom, took Pahlavi Iran to the League of Nations, but the dispute was not resolved. In 1937, Iran and Iraq signed their first official boundary treaty, which established the waterway border on the eastern bank of the river and excluded a four-mile anchorage zone near Abadan—which was allotted to Iran—where the border ran along the thalweg. In 1958, Iraq's Hashemite monarchy was overthrown in a coup d'état known as the 14 July Revolution, which established the First Iraqi Republic. In 1968, another coup d'état—staged by the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party and known as the 17 July Revolution—deposed the First Iraqi Republic and firmly established a Ba'athist regime in Iraq. Shortly afterwards, Iran sent a delegation of diplomats to Iraq in 1969, and when the erstwhile Iraqi government refused to proceed with negotiations over a new treaty, Iran withdrew the treaty of 1937. The Iranian abrogation of the 1937 treaty marked the beginning of a period of acute tension in Iran–Iraq relations that lasted until the 1975 Algiers Agreement.[10]
Events
From March 1974 to March 1975,
Consequently, Iraq decided against continuing the conflict, and chose instead to make concessions to Tehran to end the Kurdish rebellion.[11][12] In the 1975 Algiers Agreement, Iraq made territorial concessions—including the Shatt al-Arab waterway—in exchange for normalized bilateral relations.[11] In return for Iraq recognizing that the frontier on the waterway ran along the entire thalweg as per Iran's argument, the latter ended its support for Iraqi Kurdish guerrillas.[11][15][16]
Aftermath
On 17 September 1980, Iraq abrogated the
See also
- Shatt al-Arab dispute
- Second Iraqi–Kurdish War
- Iran–Iraq War
- Iran–Iraq relations
- Arab League–Iran relations
Notes
References
- ^ "Foreign Relations, 1969-1972, Volume E-4, Iran and Iraq". 2001-2009.state.gov. Retrieved 14 December 2023.
- ISBN 9780226989297.
- ISBN 978-1-349-23147-8.
- ^ C. R., Jonathan (11 April 1980). "Iraq Expelling 20,000 Iranians Following Border Clashes". The Washington Post. Retrieved 9 September 2023.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-349-23147-8.
- ^ J. Schofield, Militarization and War, p. 122
- ^ Kutchera, Chris (1979). Le Mouvement national Kurde. Paris. pp. 322–323.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - ^ ISBN 978-0-415-40078-7.
- ^ "CSP - Major Episodes of Political Violence, 1946-2013". 17 July 2019. Archived from the original on 17 July 2019. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
- ^ Karsh, Efraim The Iran-Iraq War 1980–1988, London: Osprey, 2002 page 8
- ^ ISBN 978-1-84176-371-2.
- ^ a b Ranard, Donald A. (ed.). "History". Iraqis and Their Culture. Archived from the original on 10 January 2011.
- ISBN 978-1-78096-221-4.
- ^ "CSP - Major Episodes of Political Violence, 1946-2013". Systemicpeace.org. Retrieved 24 September 2018.
- ^ "Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume XXVII, Iran; Iraq, 1973–1976 - Office of the Historian". history.state.gov. Retrieved 23 November 2020.
- ^ Abadan Archived 2009-08-08 at the Wayback Machine, Sajed Archived 7 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine, Retrieved on March 16, 2009.
- ^ "Iran-Iraq War | Causes, Summary, Casualties, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 23 February 2021.
- ^ "IRAQ vii. IRAN-IRAQ WAR". Encyclopædia Iranica. 15 December 2006. Archived from the original on 13 September 2017.