ABSTRACT
For Marxists the 2003 Iraq War was initiated for rational reasons but for gain rather than fear. The idea that it was the economic spoils to be had from implementing ‘regime change’ in one of the world’s most significant oil producing countries that prompted the war was, in fact, cited as an explanation by many beyond the confines of the far left. Unlike Realism, however, the Marxist/Structuralist approach considers economic gain to be the underlying cause of most wars. Lenin famously argued that the First World War was a war of imperialism with the rival factions from Europe and the USA seeking to achieve mastery of each other’s colonial possessions. In this view it is the inherent expansionist tendency of capitalism that prompted European imperial expansion and then US-led anti-Communist aggression and economic ‘neoimperialism’ in the twentieth century. Contemporary neo-Marxists put particular emphasis on the influence of the military-industrial complex in pushing states towards the use of force to secure economic gains. Wars can be a profitable exercise and it is in the interests of the armed forces and arms industry, two highly influential government lobbies, that war remains a foreign policy option. Hence, in this analysis there were twin economic motivations behind the 2003 Iraq War. Unexpected support for this proposition can be found in the words of US Republican President Eisenhower at the height of the Cold War:
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
