The True Connections that lead to the 2003 Invasion of Iraq

The reasons for launching the U.S. invasion of Iraq have been cloaked in suspicion, conspiracy and misread intelligence. The most patriotic of Americans choose the misread intelligence theory while championing the byproduct goals of removing Saddam Hussein from power.

Thanks for Bin Laden

The most skeptical usually lean on the war for oil theory. In a strange sense there is a possibility that both have some truth within them yet neither adequately puts all the pieces together because they leave out one major component: 9/11 and the political strategy for avoiding further attacks. For the first time we put all the facts together in their proper sequence to help explain and understand the real reason for the invasion of Iraq.

One-time Reagan administration appointee and longtime G.W. Bush critic Paul Craig Roberts wrote in 2007: "That Bush persists with a war for which he can provide no legitimate reason indicates that there is a secret agenda that has not been shared with the American people." While Craig tends to believe in a more nefarious "secret agenda" we can actually piece together the facts to reveal that there was, in fact, an agenda not revealed to the public; that there were significant political reasons for not revealing this agenda; and most importantly, that the Bush administration believed they had no option but to invade Iraq.

There are potentially hundreds of starting points for this connection but for brevity purposes Saddam's 1990 invasion of Kuwait is a convenient place to begin. Saddam's reasons for launching his invasion of Kuwait appear to stem from his costly 8 year war of attrition with Iran, the large debt owed to Kuwait, and Saddam's belief that Kuwaiti leaders only half-heartedly supported his efforts. It also seems pretty clear that Saddam did not expect the West to react as it did. Within days of the invasion American President G.H.W. Bush started marshaling support for a coalition to oust the Iraqi army from Kuwait. President Bush was adamant about the United States leading but not acting alone to remove the Iraqis. A coalition of some form would be required from a strategic point because the armies had to have a place to mobilize and launch a ground offensive. President Bush mustered an impressive number of participants including the United Nations but the coalition was very thinly held together. The primary fear prior to launch of air and ground attacks was that Saddam would partially pull out of Kuwait and sap the will of the coalition. This would have left the Iraqi army with it full strength poised to reinvade as soon as the coalition broke apart and the armies dispersed. For reasons only known to the warped mind of Saddam Hussein, he didn't do this, instead inviting the coalition to attack, which it did.

As is well known, the American lead coalition tore through the Iraqi army and was poised to march on to Baghdad and remove Saddam from power. As is also well known, 100 hours into the invasion President Bush called a halt to further action. That this was a mistake in retrospect seems pretty clear but at the time Bush had a number of reasons for ending the war. He feared that removing Saddam's Ba'ath Party would create a power vacuum that might be filled by the Iranian backed Shiites. He also feared the continued killing of the fleeing army would cause a backlash among the surrounding Arab populations. Finally, he believed that a better outcome would be for the Iraqis themselves to rid themselves of the tyrant. Unfortunately, he did little to assist them and may, in fact, have contributed to the slaughter of many trying to depose Saddam. The consequences of this decision would prove disastrous.

The first result was that stories rapidly circulated that American forces would not assist Shiite militias. These included stories of Americans destroying weapons rather than hand them over to Shiites fighting Saddam. The second result, and one with far-reaching consequences, was that no one knew if and when the rebels would be successful deposing Saddam so the American forces had to basically sit and wait.

When it became obvious that Saddam would use any means, including chemical weapons, to suppress the rebels, the "sitting and waiting" began to take on a more permanent structure. By April, 1991, less than a month after the uprisings began, they were crushed. This meant that Saddam Hussein would continue to hold power and the American forces would have to continue a presence in order to prevent any further belligerent moves. In early April, 1991 the United Nations passed Resolution 688 which condemned the repression of Kurds, Shiites, and other Iraqi civilians. As a means for enforcing the resolution, the United States, Great Britain, and France established a no-fly zone and enforced it from a newly constructed base in Northern Saudi Arabia.

This lead to a more permanent presence for the U.S. military in northern Saudi Arabia. The Prince Sultan Air Base near Riyadh would house approximately 4500 U.S. troops throughout the decade of 1990s and became a point of resentment for fundamentalist Muslims. One of the most outspoken opponents of this American presence was Osama bin Laden. On numerous occasions throughout the 1990s bin Laden assailed the Americans for their "occupation of the land of the holy places." In a 1997 interview he flatly stated that his attacks against Americans in the Middle East were directly motivated by this presence and that his primary goal was to remove them from Saudi soil.

Throughout the 1990s the Clinton administration for forced to deal with four issues that intensified the International situation in the region. First; Saddam was becoming increasingly belligerent, challenging the no-fly zone as well as the various efforts to keep him from re-arming and hide this rearmament from international inspectors. This made the U.S. military presence more important as they had to contend with this increased belligerence. Second; bin Laden raised the stakes on his opposition with attacks on U.S. troops stationed in the Middle East. These include an attack on U.S. Marines housed in Yemen, the training of Somalis who killed American soldiers (an alleged but unproven claim), bombings in Nairobi, Kenya, Dar es Salaam, and the U.S.S. Cole attack in October 2000. While it is unclear whether bin Laden was the mastermind behind all of these attacks they were motivated by the most visible American symbol in the region (besides Israel), the troop deployment in Saudi Arabia.

The third of the central issues was largely of President Clinton's own making but certainly played a role in the actions (or inaction) he took. The Monica Lewinsky sex scandal was playing out at the same time as Clinton was dealing with Iraq's muscle flexing and bin Laden's activities. This kept him both preoccupied and hesitant to take actions for fear of the perception that he was trying to deflect attention away from the investigations. The Republicans in Congress were highly skeptical of the timing of Clinton responses to Saddam Hussein and also questioned the effectiveness of the attacks. It is clear they did not want Clinton gathering public support with a "rally-around-the-flag" response that frequently occurs with military action. Their opposition, coupled with the impeachment trial limited what President Clinton could do and even the options he did have at his disposal.

Finally, international opinion, which had been fairly unified in 1991, was anything but later in the decade. There was a growing international debate over the Iraq isolation strategy, blockades, embargoes, the oil for food policy and the U.S. air strike responses. Unfortunately, this opposition to the existing policy didn't put forward any reasonable alternatives.

All of these factors together meant that by 2001 the troop situation in Saudi Arabia was much the same as it had been in 1991 but the political environment had deteriorated significantly. The turning point would come with the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the rapid identification of Osama bin Laden as the likely perpetrator. The fact that most of the terrorists were Saudis was also significant and the connection between the New York attacks and the troop presence in Saudi Arabia was clearly made by the Bush administration. It is at this point that the Bush administration faced a dilemma. Killing or capturing bin Laden would be significant if it could be accomplished but still wouldn't resolve the primary issue at hand. Since the motivation for the attacks was the U.S. troop presence the only way to significantly reduce the threat of future terrorists attacks was to remove those troops. However; they really couldn't do this because Saddam's provocations made this impossible. The Bush administration had really only one alternative if they wanted to eliminate the American military presence in Saudi Arabia. They had to remove Saddam.

There have now been hundreds of books, articles, and websites publishing materials about the link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11. Because bin Laden was identified as the culprit and Saddam's hatred of Shiites including bin Laden was well known, these links simply could not be found. The reason they could not be found is that the link was not in any direct action, communications, logistics, or planning. The link was in the motivation! Saddam was tied to 9/11 not in any way that evidence would demonstrate. He was tied to 9/11 because he forced the United States to be in a situation that provoked the attacks.

In the year-and-a-half following September 11, the Bush administration searched for a reason to justify removing Saddam. Because so little was said about the existing U.S. military presence it seems clear the truth would not be an adequate justification. This is the blunder they made and it was most likely politically motivated. They simply found no way to "sell" this reason to the American public without it looking like they were appeasing the terrorists by giving them what they wanted. Their alternative was to fabricate evidence and motivations in order to justify the war. This is obvious from the Downing Street letters and the subsequent disintegration of all the justifications they proposed. It also seems clear that British Prime Minister Tony Blair was in agreement with this assessment since he had read the Downing memos and knew the justification evidence did not exist. He continued to support the war for the same reason as the Bush Administration. They really had no other alternative.

It can now be understood that G.W. Bush's belief was sincere when he stated that the terrorist threat was reduced because of the removal of Saddam Hussein. That he continues to make this proclamation does not hold the same validity or sincerity. The Iraq invasion began on March 20, 2003. By April 9 Baghdad and Saddam had fallen. On April 29 U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced that the Prince Sultan Air Base would be turned over to Saudi control and the U.S. would be pulling off of Saudi soil. The problems for President Bush and Tony Blair arose because of all the extraneous motivations that began to be attached to the invasion between September 11, 2001 and March 20, 2003. Had they simply gone in, removed Hussein, and allowed a coalition of Arab states to assume the responsibility of stabilizing the Iraqi government, they could very well have gotten out with their reputations intact and terrorism diminished. Unfortunately, oil greed and global geopolitical influences intervened. As soon as the invasion plans began to include securing the oil fields and allowing U.S. and British contractors to reap profits within Iraq, the war planning and ultimate outcome turned bad. The war evolved from its original motivation into a profit center. All the post April 2003 activities simply compounded upon each other to render the original motivation for the war useless. They wanted the troops out of Saudi Arabia. Now they have them stuck in Iraq. They wanted to reduce terrorist motives for further attacks but instead gave fundamentalist Muslims a new cause. They wanted to diffuse the anti-Western sentiment within the Islamic world but instead antagonized it.

Ultimately, the Iraq war has to be considered a disaster for American policy. This is thanks, not to the original goal; but rather, everything that followed subsequently. Because of the manner in which post-war Iraq has been managed America and Britain have made themselves less safe, more hated, and thousands upon thousands of lives have been lost in the process. It now seems ironic that George W. Bush and Tony Blair have their reputations in tatters even though the they believed they possessed the key to long term stability in the region. All of the reasons for opposing the invasion have been magnified by the post-war activities while the original objectives have been lost in a sea of profit-taking and dreams of oil flowing like honey.

Please see PoliticalBull.net for further analysis and an assessment of blame.