This book aims to demonstrate that the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait on 2nd August 1990 was the logical conclusion to 20 years of diplomatic duplicity, greed and corruption, particularly on the part of Britain, France and the USA. While world leaders greeted Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait with astonished outrage, displaying a spirit of unity seldom seen in international politics, only a few days earlier top advisers in London, Cairo and Jerusalem had played down intelligence reports of just such an attack, it is claimed. The pursuit of short-sighted and relentlessly self-interested foreign policies led the West to arm Iraq with an arsenal of weapons capable of destruction, while Iraq's appalling record on human rights and the implications for the security of neighbouring states was ignored. Further, it is claimed that a powerful lobby of arms manufacturers, politicians and journalists were behind a deliberate campaign of misinformation which hid the truth about the Iraqi regime and misrepresented the nature of its ambitions. The book also reveals details of: the links between the pro-Iraq lobby of MPs at Westminster and the international arms trade; the rivalry between the CIA and MI6 which led to a crucial breakdown in communications over the spread of missile technology in the Middle East; the British and European companies which illegally supplied arms to Iraq with the knowledge of the government and the intelligence services; and the secret deal between London and Iraq over terrorist attacks in Britain.