Why did the United States invade Iraq, setting off a chain of events that profoundly changed the Middle East and the US global position? The Regime Change Consensus offers a compelling look at how the United States pivoted from a policy of containment to regime change in Iraq after September 11, 2001. Starting with the Persian Gulf War, the book traces how a coalition of political actors argued with increasing success that the totalitarian nature of Saddam Hussein's regime and the untrustworthy behavior of the international coalition behind sanctions meant that containment was a doomed policy. By the end of the 1990s, a consensus belief emerged that only regime change and democratization could fully address the Iraqi threat. Through careful examination, Joseph Stieb expands our understanding of the origins of the Iraq War while also explaining why so many politicians and policymakers rejected containment after 9/11 and embraced regime change.
Author(s): Joseph Stieb
Series: Military, War, and Society in Modern American History
Edition: 1
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2021
Language: English
Commentary: From Z-Library.
Pages: 283
Tags: Iraq
Contents
Acknowledgments page viii
List of Abbreviations xi
Introduction 1
1 A Hope, Not a Policy: Containment and Regime Change during the Gulf Crisis, 1990–1991 14
2 The Fallout from Victory: Containment and Its Critics, 1991–1992 54
3 The Long Watch: The High Years of Containment, 1993–1996 98
4 Saddam Must Go: Entrenching the Regime Change Consensus, 1997–2000 140
5 Not Whether, but How and When: The Iraq Debate from 9/11 to the Invasion 189
Conclusion: Containment, Liberalism, and the Regime 248
Bibliography 260
Index 265