This is exactly correct. In 1991, Saddam deterred Bush 41 from taking him out with his biological weapons. Saddam had Scud warheads and aerial bombs filled with anthrax and botulinum toxin ready to launch on the civilian population of Israel and Saudi Arabia if we took it to the brink. We had no choice: he had us out-maneuvered. This was a "bad truth," so we were spoon-fed a bunch of crapola cover stories that said that we didn't go in because we wanted to keep within the UN mandate, we didn't want to offend our Arab allies, we were afraid of taking many military casualties, we were worried about Iraqi civilian casualties, we were concerned about the stability of the Middle East. Whenever you hear a whole lot of loud talk which somehow avoids some very obvious point, some elephant in the middle of the room, you know you're being bullsh*tted.
The real story of the Gulf War was documented by a distinguished military strategist, Avigdor Haselkorn, in his 1999 book The Continuing Storm. Of course, now the Gulf War ancient history it's safe to talk about, to tell the truth in a closed circle of academics. Only, we're not supposed to make the connection to the current situation. But the situation today is inextricably linked with the denoument to the Gulf War. The Gulf War never really ended. That was only our conceit.