War is Too Important to Be Left to Ideological Amateurs

Robert Gilpin, Princeton University

International Relations, Vol. 19, No. 1, 5-18 (2005)

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Abstract

The 2003 American attack against Iraq was engineered by two powerful groups within the Bush Administration, the ultra-nationalists and the neo-conservatives. The ultranationalists’ motive was to gain control of the oil reserves in the Middle East and elsewhere in the region in order to gain and sustain American global primacy. While the neo-conservatives shared this objective, they also wanted a radical restructuring of geopolitical relations in the area in order to promote the long-term security of Israel. Supporting the Administration were powerful domestic constituencies, especially evangelical Christians. Opposition to the war was expressed by leaders of three professional services responsible for American security: the American army and marines, the Foreign Service, and Middle East experts in the CIA. Opponents of the war believed that there was no threat posed to the US by Iraq; they also believed that the civilian leadership of the Pentagon was not competent and that planning for securing and pacifying postwar Iraq was inadequate. The opponents of the Iraq War have proved correct.

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Key Words: clash of civilizations • evangelical Christians • Iraq War • Islam • Israel • Middle East • neo-cons • Pentagon • Powell Doctrine • terrorism

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President George W. Bush’s costly and reckless war against Iraq has resulted in the greatest threat to the security and well being of the United States since the US Civil War. The war against Iraq has significantly exacerbated dangerous social, cultural, and regional fissures in US society. The war has not only undermined the social and political stability of the Middle East, but has also let loose forces that threaten the entire global political and economic system. The hubris, ambitions, and incompetence of the ideological amateurs managing the foreign policy of the Bush Administration are unparalleled in the history of the United States. The needless deaths and the maiming of thousands of both combatants and Iraqi civilians weigh, or at least should weigh, heavily on the conscience of every American. Every citizen of the United States and millions of others around the globe have been placed at serious risk for the foreseeable future. Rather than serving as a ‘beacon of light unto the nations’, the United States has become almost universally hated and distrusted. Further and more importantly, the ‘pre-emptive’ war against Iraq, launched ostensibly to eliminate Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) and its links to international terrorism, has actually greatly increased the magnitude of the terrorist threat to the United States and other societies...

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