The Iraq War Was Unjustified

June 29, 2017 International Relations

The Iraq War was Unjustified University of Phoenix MU11COM09 September 9, 2011 Comm/215 Essentials of College writing The Iraq War was Unjustified There are many reasons why the war Iraq was unjustified. Until today, Iraq has not been found to have weapons of mass destruction. There are beliefs that former President George W. Bush simply waged war on Iraq because of their oil. Iraq as a country and the former President Saddam Hussein had no link to al-Qaeda terrorist group.

The United States congress, based on wrong intelligence from the Bush’s administration agreed unanimously to go to war with Iraq, despite the fact that the Unites Nations disagreed with the decision. Because of the decision to wage war on Iraq, The United States lost most of its allies. “A war on Iraq for the purpose of “regime change” would not be a legal war under international law.

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Article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter states: “All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the purpose of the United Nations. ” (Miller, 2003). On September 11, 2001, two planes crashed into the World Trade Center. Many Americans died because of the deadly attack. It was one of the deadliest attacks on U. S soil. One plane crashed into part of the pentagon, and the another plane crashed into an open field.

Based on these attacks by the al-Qaeda terrorist group, President Bush declared war on the Taliban in Afghanistan in an attempt to capture the 9/11 master-mind Osama Bin Laden. Approximately two years later, Bush also declared war on Iraq because of misleading information that Saddam Hussein harbored weapons of mass destruction. The 2003 Iraq War lasted less than three weeks. It began in the early morning hours of March 20, when American missiles struck Baghdad. By April 9, U. S. forces had advanced into Baghdad. By April 15 Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had vanished, and U.

S. and allied officials pronounced the end of major combat operations. Although the war itself was short, arguments over whether it was justified had been made for months and years prior to the attack, and still continue today. Going to war in Iraq was unjustified on many levels (Farley, 2004, p. 27). After the 9/11 attacks, I was outraged and decided I needed to play my part to help the nation. I enlisted in the Marine Corps and I was deployed to Iraq. After serving the call of duty and fighting in the war, I now believe that the war was not justified.

With the help of these allies that we have lost, some thought that the United States military could easily accomplish disarming Saddam Hussein easily without any loss of soldiers or too much money while others predicted the costs would run high. War naysayers dreaded that the war would put the United States further into debt. Thus far, the United States has spent more than 700 billion dollars on the war, which is 700 billion that the government does not have (“Cost of war”, 2011). Not only did the United States go further into debt, but they have lost many soldiers. About 16,000 American soldiers have been injured, and about 5,000 killed.

Innocent Iraqi civilians are worse off. The latest body count reported about 102,000 Iraq civilians killed (“Iraq body count”, 2011). The truth of the matter is, if the justification to attack Iraq was that Saddam Hussein was running an undemocratic regime, then the United States should go to war with many countries in Africa, Asia, North America and South America and Europe. The Unites States is not an international police. The point here is, there are more than 60 brutal dictatorship governments in the world, some of them even have nuclear missiles, or close to getting them.

If President Bush focused on eliminating the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, instead of attacking Iraq, Bush would have been praised. While the war in Iraq got intense, the United States military took their attention away from the main focus, which was Afghanistan. The Taliban were able to re-emerge and gain much more power. In conclusion, war is only acceptable if is an act of self-defense, or if authorized by the United Nations Security Council. The invasion of Iraq fulfilled neither criteria and was therefore illegal according to the United Nations. During the war, there were many breaches of the Geneva Convention.

Think about how many military personnel and innocent civilians that died. The war could have been avoided at all cost. References Cost of war to the United States. (September, 2011). Cost of war. Retrieved from http://www. costofwar. com Farley, J. E. (February, 2004). An American attack on Iraq is Not Justified. Opposing viewpoints, 45. Retrieved from http://www. coursework. info/social_studies/politics/international relations Iraq body count. (September, 2011). Retrieved from http://www. iraqbodycount. org Miller, A. (January, 2003). 101 reasons Not to Go to War with Iraq. Retrieved from http://work. colm. edu/~amiller/pp012103

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