During the 1980s, in the war between Iran and Iraq; the Iraqis found that their Soviet made SCUD B missiles could not reach the Iranian capital of Tehran. The Iraqis needed a missile with more range, and so Saddam Hussein set his best engineers to work on a longer range missile. After several failed attempts to crate their own missile, the Iraqi engineers began a program of reverse engineering, taking apart the Soviet SCUDs, and trying to duplicate them, and re-engineer a missile to suit Iraqi needs. The result with the most success was the AL-HUSSEIN SCUD variant.

The Al-Hussein was made by cannibalizing 1 out of every 3 Soviet SCUD-B missiles and using them to create 2 lengthened variations. The AL-HUSSEIN used a warhead lightened from the 800K weight, to only about 190K; and larger fuel capacity. The UDMH fuel was a combination of the actual fuel-kerosene, and an oxidizer-red fuming Nitric acid. The oxidizer tank was lengthened by 85cms, and the fuel tank by 45cms. The new overall length was 12,46meters and it had a range of 600kms, vs. the normal SCUD range of 280kms. Since it used the same guidance system as on the original Scuds, it had a decreased effective radius at longer ranges, varying from 1.6km to 3.3 kilometers for a strike zone. Often the missile was so unstable upon re-entry that it often broke apart before reaching its intended target. It was still considered a success, and was launched successfully against Tehran, and began what was known as the War of the Cities.