The Environmental Impacts of the Kuwait Invasion - Term Paper Example

The Environmental Impacts of the Kuwait Invasion The invasion of Kuwait refers to an Iraqi invasion of Kuwaitthat took place in the year 1990. Iraq had decided on the invasion after accusing Kuwait of having stolen petroleum that belonged to them through slant drilling. During this invasion approximately 100,000 troops from Iraq invaded Kuwait. The troops made sue of trucks, helicopters, and tanks. Due to the big number of troops Iraq eventually overwhelmed the Kuwait army and the soldiers that remained took off to Saudi Arabia. Some of the remaining soldiers also fled to Bahrain. Through this invasion they Iraq were able to control a higher percentage the global oil reserves (Brauer 78). However, this invasion did not become without negative impact, especially to the local civilians. Some of the outcomes of the Kuwait invasion were environmental. The long term effect includes climatic, vegetation, and biological changes in Kuwait. They experienced high penetration of sun rays due to global warming, poor vegetation, and poor health. The invasion had some effect on air, water, and land. This paper aims at discussing the environmental impacts of the Kuwait invasion. Air After the United States of America had come to the aid of Kuwait, Sadam Hussein, the then Iraqi president orders his troops to undertake a scorched earth policy which would see to it that all the oil wells in Kuwait were lit on fire before the soldiers retreated from Kuwait (Wilcox 177). The main aim of using the scorched earth policy was aimed at giving them a military advantage by slowing down the USA troops. The scorched earth policy led to the burning of 700 wells in. The Kuwait atmosphere was one of the most affected by the scorched earth policy. When oil is burned in the presence of air there is always the production of carbon dioxide smoke (Austin 101). Carbon dioxide usually has negative effects to the atmosphere. One thing that is obvious is that the massive production of carbon dioxide, smoke led to climatic changes in the region. This means that the ozone layer was highly interfered with lead to an increase in the rate of global warming in Kuwait. During the burning there is definitely some oil that was not completely burnt and found its way to the atmosphere. Such oil led to the formation of invisible droplets in the air. Such droplets led to the formation of oil mist and fog which is believed to have led to the death of many animals and plants. This is because air, with such composition would definitely find themselves in the animals and human lungs whenever it is inhaled (Ṣādiq and MacCain 189). This will mean that there are allot of respiratory problems that must have resulted from the accumulation of oil droplets in the atmosphere in Kuwait and its environs. Some oil from the well also spilt to the ground leading to the formation of oils lakes. The oil lakes which varied in depth formed organic vapors which were released to the environment in large quantities (Westing201). The presence of the oil vapor in the organic vapor in the atmosphere means that the air that human beings and other animals will be inhaling will be having some organic content that are believed to lead to respiratory health complications and cancer in human beings. Water The releasing of carbon dioxide, smoke into the atmosphere is believed to have led the occurrence of acidic rains. Acidic rain occurs as a result of accumulation of acidic compound in the compound. The problem is that when it rain, the rain waters absorbs the acidic content in the air. When water absorbs the acidic content their PH is lowered, thus turning into acidic water. When this water gets to the other water masses, they change the nature of the water content of the water masses. The sad thing is that it is the same water from water masses that human beings and animals use in their daily lives. Human beings also use the same water on their plants (Husain 92). This also affects the animals that live in those water masses because it makes their inhabitant less favorable. Some of the sunburnt oil can also find its ways to the water masses. This simply implies that the animals and plants that depend on the water masses for their survival will find it very hard to survive when such contaminations takes place. It is well known that oil is always less dense than water. This means that if oil ends up in the water masses, they will in a way interfere with the supply of oxygen to the animals and plants that exist in the water masses (Casey, Thackeray, and Findling 199). This led to massive deaths of water creatures such as fish. This would definitely affect those people who depend on such water masses for their livelihood. Water that contains contain oil is also not healthy for consumption. Land Kuwait is basically a desert. As a desert there is always a protective layer that is meant to prevent the sand from being blown away leading to the formation of dunes. In a number places where the scorched earth policy was effected, there was oiled that was spilt from the burning wells which was soaked by the desert’s surface. This led to the hardening of the desert surface. The hardened surface combined with pebbles leading to the formation of substances known as “tarcrete” (Hughes 155). Tarcrete are as hard as rocks. There is also some oil that was spilt from the burning wells that ended up in the soil, leading to the formation of a subsurface layer of tarcrete deep in the soil. The subsurface layers of tarcrete went as deep as nine feet from the ground level (Chalk 117). The formation of such a layer has really affected the growth of vegetation in such areas. This is because plants have it hard in penetrating this hard layer as they grow. As a result, much of the vegetation ends up being dead on this particular stage. Thai has even worsened the vegetation cover of Kuwait given the fact that it was already a desert land by the time the Kuwait invasion was taking place. The sad thing is that most scientists suggest that the tarcrete and tarcrete layers should not be removed. This is because their removal will definitely expose the underlying sand to the desert wind, which will definitely blow it away (Hassan 132). This will lead to the formation of dunes in Kuwait. Work cited Austin, Jay. The Environmental Consequences of War: Legal, Economic, and Scientific Perspectives. Cambridge [u.a.: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2000. Print. Brauer, Jurgen. War and Nature: The Environmental Consequences of War in a Globalized World. Lanham: AltaMira Press, 2009. Print. Casey, Michael S, Frank W. Thackeray, and John E. Findling. The History of Kuwait. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 2007. Print. Chalk, Nigel A. Kuwait, from Reconstruction to Accumulation for Future Generations. Washington, D.C: International Monetary Fund, 1997. Print. Hassan, Hamdi A. The Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait: Religion, Identity and Otherness in the Analysis of War and Conflict. London: Pluto, 1999. Print. Hughes, J D. The Mediterranean: An Environmental History. Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC-CLIO, 2005. Print. Husain, Tahir. Kuwaiti Oil Fires: Regional Environmental Perspectives. Oxford: Pergamon, 1995. Internet resource. Ṣādiq, Muḥammad, and John C. MacCain. The Gulf War Aftermath: An Environmental Tragedy. Dordrecht u.a: Kluwer, 1993. Print. Westing, Arthur : Pioneer on the Environmental Impact of War. Berlin: Springer, 2013. Internet resource. Wilcox, William A. The Modern Military and the Environment: The Laws of Peace and War. Lanham, MD: Government Institutes, 2007. Internet resource. Read More