ABSTRACT
Rarely in the annals of history has it been so difficult to determine casus belli as it is in the case of America's 2003 invasion of Iraq. The war to overthrow Saddam Hussein's regime will be remembered as one that appeared necessary in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks (to most Americans and to lawmakers on both sides of the aisle), but which seemed less and less justifiable as its costs mounted and the public's expectations about the war were, little by little, disappointed. Even
today, almost seven years after the initial invasion, no single account of what really led the Bush Administration to invade a country halfway around the world can claim widespread acceptance. Concerns about Saddam Hussein's Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), Islam-inspired terrorism, and democracy promotion all figured importantly, but the relationship between these rationales was never perfectly clear. To be sure, the dangers associated with Saddam Hussein's WMD program were publically emphasized as a legitimate, sufficient, and indeed the primary, justification for invasion and regime change in the months leading up to the invasion, and understandably so. Americans' tolerance for the species of risk presented by "the crossroads of radicalism and technology" was lower than ever in the wake of 9111 (The White House, 2002, p.l2). It was widely believed Saddam Hussein could not be trusted (he had made every effort to evade U.N. sanctions and weapons inspections for more than a decade), and every national intelligence service of consequence was under the impression Iraq possessed significant WMD production capacity and stockpiles (largely because Saddam Hussein and his lieutenants actively perpetuated that myth for strategic reasons of their own).
