War in Iraq: Reasons and Causes - Essay Example

? War In Iraq War In Iraq Introduction During the era of 2003, Iraq war took place and ended within the first three weeks, with US being victorious. The war took off during the daylight of March 30th when US military forces launched a missile attack on Baghdad. Nine days later US and allied forces had made its way into the city of Baghdad and after fifteen days Saddam Hussein went off the grid and on that very day the allied forces announced end of war. The war was fought for a very precise tenure, but after the war and before the war several arguments were raised about whether the war was justified or not and these arguments still continue to revolve around the world. This war gained heavy criticism and the critics have established that US was wrong in conducting this war. War on Iraq was not justified due to several reasons including: it had no weapons of mass destruction, it was a weak nation, Iraq did not participate in the attack on the World Trade center, led to increase in terrorists, war was ethically wrong, led to loss of allies, higher cost lower benefits, war was fought for self interest over the interest of the community and led to the destruction of the global economy. Body The main official reason due to which US attacked Iraq was that Iraq and Saddam was in control of weapons of mass destructions and these weapons even were expected to include nukes. US might have made a just decision of going to war on this particular reason but later it was figured out that intelligence regarding weapons of mass destruction was misleading and no weapons of mass destruction were identified in the nation (O’Neill, 2012). The basis on which this war took place was that Iraq has previous used weapons that were dangerous in nature during the period of 1980s, but all those weapons were either utilized or recognized as unusable during the 1990s (Zinn, 2002). This clearly represents that US attacked Iraq on the basis of obsolete intelligence and the decision of going to war made by the administration of Bush was not justified. The intelligence gathered during the 1990s clearly showed that Iraq was not in possession of weapons of mass destruction and was not a plausible threat either to US or its allied nations. Even Saddam Hussein never had threatened US and neither to its allied force of attacking them. Neither Saddam nor Iraq poised a threat to the neighboring countries and neither the neighboring countries feared Iraq. Iraq had never attacked any of its neighbors since the end of the Gulf War as it had become quite weak and could not afford any war (O’Neill, 2012). US suspected that Iraq and Saddam had close ties with the terrorist group Taliban and its leader Osama Bin Laden and the US even suspected that he might have contributed to the attacks of 9/11 (Zinn, 2002). Since 9/11 US has been at a war against terrorism and has been at war with Afghanistan and Al-Qaeda and its leader Osama Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda had openly accepted the responsibility of the 9/11 attacks and even threatened US to attack US and allied nations in future due to which US launched an attack at Afghanistan and stood victorious. But Saddam Hussein had never conducted such threatening activities and should not have been attacked on the basis of terrorism. Instead of wasting resources in Iraq and causing damage throughout the world US should have focused on its war against terrorism in Afghanistan where the real terrorists exist and who continue to not only disturb the US society, but societies all over the world. Attack on Iraq did not lead to decrease in attack conducted by terrorist groups; rather terrorist groups have become much stronger due to this war. Individuals living in Iraq and other countries have started raising their voices against US and there are even those who do not appreciate what US did to Iraq, due to this the terrorist groups have gained more men and more personnel to dismantle US as these terrorist groups use the hatred against US to cause destruction in US. Instead of US distributing its resources in various Arabic nations such as Afghanistan and Iraq, US should have focused on the root of terrorism which is said to be Afghanistan and Al-Qaeda. The war on Iraq was wrong in accordance to the ethics and morals of going to a war and fighting a war. Civilized nations throughout the world are not expected to attack another nation until and unless that nation have caused harm to the civilized one or to its allies, this means that simply on the basis of speculations of being attacked, it is not justified to attack another nation (Zinn, 2002). The attack on Iraq issued by the administration of Bush was done on the basis that Iraq threatened the peace of its neighboring nations and the people living in Iraq were treated very badly by under the tyranny of Saddam (Hall, 2012, p.60). All the intelligence gathered by the Bush Administration was merely speculation and going to war on the basis of speculation have been considered wrong and unethical throughout the history. US were considered as a strong nation due to its wealth and the most important reason was its allies. None of its allies except the Great Britain was in favor of an attack on Iraq, after the attack and after the end of the war, US lost its major allies including Arab nations, Chine, Germany and France. US and the entire world experienced the unpleasant side effects of war in Iraq, the war in Iraq last for a very small period of time but its negative impacts were far greater than its positive impacts. The purpose of ensuring that the rights of the Iraqi nationals were safe and they were living in a democratic nation was correct but the war never served this purpose as this was not the main purpose of the war. Currently and right after the war on terrorism and war on Iraq, US has experienced a set back and its economy is falling day after day and the unemployment rate is quite high in the nation. Under such circumstances it is impossible for US to aid the Iraqis in helping them rebuild their nation and restoring democracy within the nation. The war led to mass destruction of the Iraqi society and the war cost heavy loss of assets and life to the Iraqi population. This has led to depression and stress among the Iraqi citizens and they are finding it very hard to even satisfy their basic necessities. The war in Iraq was against the ethical rule of utilitarianism, according to the rule of utilitarianism, an action is only considered correct if it benefits the whole society. The war in Iraq benefited a few of the individuals and destroyed the entire society. It is believed that Bush launched an attack on Iraq due to personal benefits, the main aim of Bush was to gain control over the huge reserves of oil that Iraq controlled (Rutledge, 2005, p.xix). Bush administration wanted to control the oil reserves in order to gain strength and to become the power that owned and controlled the largest energy resources of the world, the attack on Iraq can never be justified by the reason of gaining power over energy resources. The decision of United States of countering terrorism and attacking Iraq has caused menace throughout the world, the downfall of the US economy caused due to increase in spending on military has not only negative impacted US, it has even negatively impacted those nations who were trading with US and who were backed by the US dollar. The war and slow down of US economy has given rise to new powerful nations, China and India who used to be dependant on the US for their success have transformed into world powers and China being the most powerful nation is dictating terms to US. The attack on Iraq is considered today as a terrorist attack conducted by US not only by different researchers around the world, but even by citizens and media located throughout the world including US. The attack on Iraq and the fight against terrorist activities is compared with 9/11, those against the attack on Iraq believe that the number of lives lost in Iraq wars does not justify the 9/11 attack. The war in Iraq led to the mass murder of civil population of Iraq and neighboring nations. These individuals had nothing to do with the 9/11 attack and neither these individuals had intention of attacking US and its allies (Zinn, 2002). Conclusion There have been several reasons due to which Iraq was attacked by US, but none of these reasons are able to justify the war and none of the purposes were served by the war. The purposes are said to be a cover up for self interest that Bush and his administration had for fighting war in Iraq and fighting war on terrorism. References Hall, Burt. (2012). The Right-wing Threat to Democracy: The Undoing of America's Exceptionalism. Iuniverse Inc. O’Neill, J. (n.d.). John O'Neill. History Commons. Retrieved September 20, 2012, from http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=john_o_neill Rutledge, I. (2005). Addicted to oil: America's relentless drive for energy security. London: I.B. Tauris. Zinn, H. (2002, August 19). The Case Against War on Iraq. Home | Common Dreams. Retrieved September 20, 2012, from http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0819-01.htm Read More