💯 percent false. Al Qaeda’s existence and that of other Islamist terror groups—to include its lodestar, the Muslim Brotherhood—predate not only the First Gulf War, but US military involvement in the region.Prominent MB members were railing against the US long before
US troops set foot on the Middle East. (Exempting our actions against the Barbary Pirates, of course).
Apart from World War II and our landings in North Africa to confront the fascist menace, the US was not truly active in the region until later FDR/Truman. And not militarily until Eisenhower—decades after the MB was founded. And much of our early actions were to push for
Independence for Syria, Lebanon and other countries and to push back against Western imperialism of our allies like Britain and France. For this we were rewarded with enmity and hate.
The likes of which existed in certain quarters and at certain levels since our nation’s founding & the demands of Barbary Pirates to pay tribute, convert or be held hostage/die.
I’d also add that, in fact, the founder of Saudi Arabia invited US engineers to prospect for oil bc he 1. Lacked the means 2. Purposefully chose the US over other nations on account of our *not* being imperialists
This is to say: We were not only invited, but lobbied. Just as, btw, the Brits were lobbied to enter the Middle East by Ottoman rulers in the 19th century to quash a rebellion by Mohammad Ali of Egypt—a founder of modern Egypt who was himself Albanian.
Indeed many Arab nationalists who fought for independence were taught at schools like the American University of Beirut which was founded and funded by American missionaries. Individual Americans even participated in independence movements in the 1860s in what is today Syria &
early 20th century Persia. Former US military officers after the Civil War were recruited and brought over by Egyptian rulers to train their military w an eye towards independence from Ottomans,Brits, etc.
