50 Dinars 25th National Day

Kuwait's 25th National Day in 1986 marked a quarter-century since independence from Britain in June 1961 — an independence that came just days before Iraq's Abdul Karim Qassim publicly claimed Kuwait as Iraqi territory, nearly triggering an immediate military conflict. British troops returned within weeks at Kuwait's request, and the crisis was only defused through Arab League intervention. This commemorative was struck against that complicated backdrop of hard-won sovereignty, four years before the Iraqi invasion of 1990 would make the founding moment feel even more freighted.