If this statement is true and given some UN Security Council members' reluctance to endorse this invasion of Iraq, then the coalition forces have no business in Iraq. But then again, the U.S. has had a history of international unilateralism, including usurping the role of the UN. In the cold war years, the U.S. refused to support the notion of collective security under the jurisdiction of the UN; the U.S. refused to internationalise the atom bomb under UN supervision; the U.S. disrupted the UN Relief and Rehabilitation Administration after World War II, to facilitate its replacement by the U.S. Marshall Plan; the U.S. now refuses to support a comprehensive UN role in post-war Iraq, as enunciated by the U.S. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.

The U.S. Administration has had a tradition of military interventions and other forms of external aggression around the world producing the 'Age of Imperialism' in the late 1800s and early 1900s. In fact, 32 U.S. interventions took place in Latin America alone from 1902 through 1954. Today, this situation has intensified. The problem of periodic capitalist crises, the hunt for more markets and increasing profits, and the call for a relief valve to stem the pressure and conflict generated by the unemployed and the poor, have all produced an increased tendency by advanced nations to exploit the developing world.

Rationale for imperialist adventures

The rationale for this kind of imperialism was well articulated by Senator Albert Beveridge in 1898, thus: "American factories are making more than the American people can use. American soil is producing more than they can consume. Fate has written our policy for us; the trade of the world must and shall be ours...We will establish trading posts throughout the world as distributing posts for American products. We will cover the ocean with our merchant marine. We will build a navy to the measure of our greatness. Great colonies, governing themselves, flying our flag and trading with us, will grow about our posts of trade...And American law, American order, American civilization, and the American flag will plant themselves on shores hitherto bloody and benighted..." (Greene, p.105).

Former American President Woodrow Wilson promoted the idea of imperialism, too, thus: "...Concessions obtained by financiers must be safeguarded by ministers of state, even if the sovereignty of unwilling nations be outraged in the process. Colonies must be obtained or planted, in order that no useful corner of the world may be overlooked or left unused" (Parenti, p.40).

Old world interventionism

The attempt at U.S. domination was based on the old world order interventionism which comprised the polarity between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, on the one hand, and Pax Americana, on the other hand. Pax Americana demonstrates the ascendancy of the U.S. in expansionism, military strength, world politics, science, and industrialisation. The Soviet-U.S. dichotomy reinforced Pax Americana because this dichotomy was manipulated as a gambit to mobilise support for U.S. Third World policies. An example of this ploy was when the U.S. falsely charged that there was a conspiracy to overrun Guatemala by the Soviet Union. Accusation of Soviet expansionism enabled the U.S. to gain political and economic grounds in vital Third World terrain. An important component of the old world order interventionism, according to Kloby, is the sustained expansion of the capitalist world economy into all parts of the world, piloted by U.S. capital through the patronage of the world's political and financial institutions, and indeed, supported by threat or actual use of military force.

Some people may argue that this injection of U.S. capital worldwide is in itself a good and is a significant part of the globalisation framework. But we need to understand the motivations behind globalisation. Globalisation is stimulated by the overaccumulation of capital in advanced capitalist countries. Corporations in those countries are unable to seek out increased profitable ventures for their investment within their own countries. Complex communications systems, with the assistance of computer and satellite technology, and an improved growth of air and sea transportation, have all enhanced globalisation activities.

U.S. corporate success depends on its transnational activities in Third World countries. The investment return on U.S.-based multinationals is 50% higher in Third World countries. Between 1985 and 1990, U.S. corporate foreign investment increased by 84% and this percentage continues to grow even bigger. About 400 of the 37,000 U.S. transnationals control about 80% of capital assets in the global market. The top 100 U.S. transnationals acquire about 50% of their income from outside the U.S. These statistics are sourced from Kloby's work. Clearly, U.S. interventionism is highly motivated to continue apace.

Examples of U.S. aggression

U.S. interventionism and other forms of aggression against the developing world are well documented. Some of this documentation follow: the overthrow of Premier Mohammad Mosaddeq of Iran and installing Shah Moammad Reza Pahlavi (Shah of Iran) in 1960; the CIA's Council of Generals' military coup in Indonesia toppling President Sukarno in 1965; the killing of President Allende of Chile in 1973; President Johnson in 1965 sent 25,000 Marines to the Dominican Republic to prevent the return to office of the elected Juan Bosch; Prince Sihanouk was removed by the army led by CIA-trained General Lon Nol; the CIA's Counter Terror Teams and the Provincial Reconnaissance Units, used techniques of terror, assassination, physical abuse and intimidation in Vietnam; U.S. Marines supported a conservative party revolt against a nationalist government and where they remained for 20 years in Nicaragua; the Marines set up a National Guard under Somoza who later headed a dictatorship; and the invasion of Grenada in 1983. These are just a few examples of both overt and covert U.S. interventions in the developing world.

Why the war on Iraq?

Against this background of U.S. intervention and external aggression, it should be clear as to why mainly U.S. and British coalition forces are pounding Iraq with full artillery and superior air power as we speak. But before we address today's war on Iraq, let's review the reasons for the Gulf War 12 years ago. The reasons are: boosting George Bush's popularity that was at its lowest point in 1990; at the end of the Gulf War, his approval rating increased to 88%. Another reason was to reassert U.S. dominance in the Middle East. A final reason was to destroy the Vietnam Syndrome, providing a signal to the world that the U.S. is willing and able to pursue military action on any important global issue. In essence, the U.S. is continuing to persist with its old interventionist policies. Former President Bill Clinton, at the University of Florida's O'Connell Center, in describing the Bush Administration's plans in international politics, said, "We got the power. We got the juice. We shall do the job." Clinton disagrees with this kind of thinking.

Persisting old intervention and external aggression policies bring us face-to-face with the current war on Iraq. Why the war on Iraq? Some people argue that oil is not the issue. Well, let's examine the assertion. At this time, only 14 countries around the world have oil supplies in excess of 10 billion barrels. In fact, in terms of oil reserves in billions of barrels of crude oil, Saudi Arabia tops the list with 265.3 billion barrels closely followed by Iraq with 115.0 billion barrels. About 90% of Iraq is unexplored for oil, as there are deep oil-bearing formations largely in the Western Desert region; this area has the potential for producing an additional 100 billion barrels. Iraq also has the lowest oil production costs in the world. Today, Iraq has about 110 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

Clearly, American oil companies have not lost sight of these proven reserves of 115 billion barrels of crude oil, as many of them have not had much of a relationship in Iraq since the late 1980s. An oil industry analyst noted, "There's not an oil company out there that wouldn't be interested in Iraq." An opposition leader of the Iraqi National Congress said, "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil."

A political change in Iraq will herald the reemergence of especially American oil companies on a larger scale than we have seen in Iran when the Shah replaced Mossadeq. At that time in Iran, the Shah facilitated a new oil agreement that gave 40% share of Iran's oil to Gulf Oil, Standard Oil, Socony-Mobil, and Texaco. In fact in 1960, Kim Roosevelt, the grandson of former President Theodore Roosevelt, became a Vice President of Gulf Oil. Indeed, after the war on Iraq, there will most definitely be a scramble for oil from several countries' oil companies.

If the war on Iraq is not about oil, then what is it about? Is it about weapons of mass destruction? According to Charles Pena of the Cato Institute, the Defense Department maintains that 12 nations with nuclear weapons programmes, 13 with biological weapons, 16 with chemical weapons, and 28 with ballistic missiles, are menacing threats to the U.S. But it is only Iraq among those countries that holds the world's second largest oil reserves and is the only country being invaded by the coalition forces.

The Washington Post and the British press reported on March 31 that before Bush declared war on Iraq, special operations teams from the U.S., Britain and Australia entered Iraq's western desert to take four highest-priority targets. The coalition team found no weapons of mass destruction. In fact, there were no missiles, no TELS, no chemical warheads, or chemicals. The U.S. forces now have tested 10 sites that were considered to be their top intelligence clues, and have found no weapons of mass destruction. A Joint Staff Officer of the Defense Intelligence Agency informed the Washington Post, "The munitions that have been found have all been conventional."

Where are the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Or are the attractions of Iraq's 115 billion barrels of crude oil and the unexplored possibilities of an additional 100 billion barrels, plus a further attraction of the coalition forces' seemingly divine right to defend and control Persian Gulf oil interests, determining factors for the war on Iraq?