Developers are Crabgrass : Kerry's prompt visit showed Washington was worried the disagreements would undermine U.S. policy elsewhere in the Middle East, even though its main interests on safeguarding oil supplies and fighting al Qaeda remain unaffected. He promised to confront aggression directed at Gulf partners "as we did for Kuwait in the Gulf War". But while the U.S. forces led the expulsion of Iraq from Kuwait in 1991, times have changed. A Reuters/Ipsos survey last month showed only 13 percent of Americans backed U.S. intervention in Syria.