“Seeing the carnage outside beamed instantly into my living room via satellite TV really drove home the realisation that I was indeed witnessing the first fully mediatised war.”
In special episode marking 30 years since the end of the 1990-91 Gulf War, Dr Carool Kersten, Reader in the Study of Islam and the Muslim World at King’s College London, who was based in Saudi Arabia during the conflict, joins us to share his unique perspective on the events.
We discuss how this largely “forgotten war”, revolutionised warfare for the 21st century, re-set Persian gulf politics and enthralled a group of obscure French philosophers. We look at their how their uncannily prophetic observations at the time, almost anticipated the growing anti-western sentiments in the Islamic world, 9/11 and the rise of global terrorism, extremism and Jihad we've witnessed in the last 30 years.