The Causes US of the Invasion to Iraq

While oil undoubtedly was a prime factor why the US invaded Iraq, other complex factors also played an important role. Since the end of the Cold War, US geostrategic experts had been arguing for a more muscular Grand Strategy since there existed no challenger to US might. Brzezinski postulated that the key to control the Eurasian landmass rested in the control over central Asia that acted as a guard post over American control of the oil. In Brzezinski’s construct, the three grand imperatives of imperial geostrategy were to prevent collusion and maintain security dependence among the vassals, and to keep the barbarians from coming together”.

The Bush administration reportedly was heavily influenced by Brzezinski and hence embarked on a series of unilateralist measures to control Eurasia. Since Iran seemed too difficult to crack, Iraq with its ‘oppressive’ dictator, harboring ambitions to acquire WMDs was an easier target. Iraq’s reported sponsorship of terrorist groups was another geostrategic factor viewed by US as a reason enough to invade the state to ensure security in the region. In the months leading up to the actual invasion, Saddam Hussein had reportedly been threatening to convert Iraq’s oil trade from trading in Dollars to Euros.

Such a move would have threatened the primacy of the Dollar as the global currency of choice and would have hurt American security seriously. Iraq’s acquiring WMDs would have seriously upset the ‘Balance of Power’ and thus needed to be constrained. Thus from the classical realist viewpoint, Iraq represented a threat to the survival of the American state, its way of life, its economic and physical security and hence needed to be neutralized.