ABSTRACT
Introduction After Bush presented his case against Iraq to the UN, the White House was keen to secure a new UNSC resolution. The months after the speech saw senior administration officials escalate their rhetoric against Saddam Hussein and the severity of the threat he represented, supported by Washington’s conservative think-tanks. The administration insisted that the world had changed and that the containment of Iraq was no longer feasible or acceptable. The position of Iraq at the centre of a deadly nexus of WMD, terrorist organisations and rogue states hostile to the US was reinforced. The administration was adamant that a firm relationship existed between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida, and that it was inevitable that Iraq would eventually supply WMD to al-Qaida to be used against the United States. Furthermore, this threat could materialise in the form of a nuclear weapon if it was not dealt with immediately. The threat from Saddam Hussein was therefore portrayed as urgent and unique. With containment and deterrence no longer applicable, a pre-emptive attack was presented as the only reliable way of reducing the threat – a threat that had shifted in the administration’s rhetoric from a possibility to a probability to a categorical certainty.
