Not fought for oil but re-election
That Bush already wanted to invade Iraq in 1999, wasn’t news to me. What was news to me, were his motivations:
Bush?s circle of pre-election advisers had a fixation on the political capital that British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher collected from the Falklands War. Said Herskowitz: ?They were just absolutely blown away, just enthralled by the scenes of the troops coming back, of the boats, people throwing flowers at [Thatcher] and her getting these standing ovations in Parliament and making these magnificent speeches.?
Republicans, Herskowitz said, felt that Jimmy Carter?s political downfall could be attributed largely to his failure to wage a war. He noted that President Reagan and President Bush?s father himself had (besides the narrowly-focused Gulf War I) successfully waged limited wars against tiny opponents ? Grenada and Panama ? and gained politically.