A question that was, and has been, much debated is whether the U.S. Administration, under President George Bush, was justified in going to war against Iraq which was, and remains, under the regime of Saddam Hussein. This essay will argue that, in terms of a just war, the American involvement in the region was morally ambiguous and probably unjustifiable. However, in terms of American interests - and, indeed, in terms of the economic and political interests of many other parties in the conflict - the American-led war with Iraq was justifiable. This distinction, as will be seen, is important considering the complex network of interests and interested parties that focused on the Persian Gulf in 1990-91.

In military terms, the Persian Gulf War represented the culmination of modern military technology and tactics. In the first t

Hiro, Dilip. Desert Shield to Desert Storm: The Second Gulf War.

The problem Hussein faced, and why he probably arrived at the misconception that the United States would tacitly approve of his invasion of Kuwait, was that the American Administration, in the period immediately prior to the conflict, was highly sympathetic toward the Iraqi regime.

It is difficult to assess, in light of the historical record noted above, why the Bush Administration made what appears to be such a sudden about-face on the subject of Iraq. Within a matter of days the United States had gone from what was previously a somewhat diplomatic relationship with Iraq to the point where the Bush administration was drawing parallels between Saddam Hussein and Adolf Hitler. Clearly, Hussein could by no means be compared, in power or significance, to the Nazi dictator whose ambitions plunged Europe and much of the world into the Second World War (Hiro, 192).

of Order. London, ON: Canadian Institute for Policy

Salinger, Pierre and Eric Laurent. Secret Dossier: The Hidden

wo weeks of the air campaign against Iraq, the Allied air forces dropped more conventional explosives on Iraq and Kuwait than had been dropped in World War Two, which had lasted 310 weeks. To maintain its 430,000 troops in the war, the United States military had to move some 6 million pounds of supplies a day (Hiro, 4).

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