Our motivations for the current war have shifted quite a bit over time. At the beginning, at least according to the current administration, armed conflict wasn't inevitable. There were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq -- we knew this, we had reliable intelligence for God's sake -- all Saddam had to do was to get rid of them. As weapons inspections continued without finding anything incriminating, we insisted; the weapons are there all right (remember, we had intelligence reports confirming their existence), but since the UN can't find them, Iraq must be hiding them somewhere.

America didn't have direct control over the inspection teams, regardless of what the Iraqi information minister said. We couldn't order Hans Blix to look harder for the contraband. Our strategy then became to scare Saddam so badly that he would un-hide all of his weapons, put them on trucks, and hand them over. And it would of worked too, if it hadn't been for those lousy Europeans. Without the backing of the whole of the First World behind us, Saddam wasn't adequately terrified. So, no admission, no capitulation, and, most importantly, no weapons (which, remember, we knew where there because of our absolutely rock solid intelligence). As world- wide support seemed less and less likely to materialize, we rattled our saber harder and harder, until we wound up with pre-emptive protests across the world.

Meanwhile, the administration shifted smoothly into it's new stated goal: The current regime in Iraq must change. It was once about weapons; now it's personal. We went beyond telling Saddam that he has to give up his WMDs (which we absolutely knew he had), into telling him that he had to leave. Just walk away, we said. Just walk away and there will be an end to the horror.

Instead of following our commands, Saddam insisted on staying right where he was -- surrounded, no doubt, by toadies and yes-men constantly reminding him of his God-given indestructibility. All those people telling him that they would gladly leap into the jaws of death to protect his dictatorship probably didn't hurt either. In the days before the war, we slipped easily into a new justification, like a well-worn glove: We must liberate the people of Iraq. That's what we're doing here. We've gone past threats to comply, past the weapons (remember, intelligence), past just ordinary regime change. This is about the freedom of all of the Iraqi people who aren't in the military, or the Ba'athe party, or the Hussein family. As for the collateral damage -- well, better dead than repressed by a homicidal dictator (we'd have been at the gates of Moscow in the 50's if it wasn't for the nukes). Well, we're in Iraq now, up to our necks. In spite of the various justifications, the administration has been remarkably on-message throughout. They did their best to make sure we weren't distracted by anything; the economy, Afghanistan -- many people even forgot about Israel for a moment there.

Cheney had said that this war wouldn't last all that long. That remains to be seen, but when it's over, the administration will be sitting pretty no matter what. Especially with regard to the morality of this conflict. There are two reasons for this. First, wars are easier to justify after they've been won. But the brilliance of the government's public relations strategy is something to marvel at.

We went from a concrete justification (we've got to make them get rid of those weapons that our intelligence knew without a shadow of a doubt were there), to something that's much easier to accomplish, but harder to define. After all, as far as the administration is concerned, "liberation" is a polite way of saying "regime change". As long as Saddam winds up either dead or out of power, by golly, we've liberated Iraq!

As it turns out, the word liberation has three definitions, according to Merriam-Webster's online dictionary. The first is merely "to set free". Pretty vague, although it does mention that it sometimes refers to freeing a country from a foreign power. Since Saddam is in fact an Iraqi, this specificity doesn't really apply. And given the fact that the other two definitions are to "free from combination" (like in chemical reactions) and "to take or take over illegally or unjustly," we can pretty much assume that the administration is referring only to the first part, of the first definition of the word. Certainly, nobody has mentioned the third interpretation.

Only time will tell whether or not this rationale will stick. It depends on what happens in Iraq once the shooting has died down, and a new government is installed. Still, one must wonder if the purpose of the war will change yet again once it's over. If we find lots and lots of weapons of mass destruction, it'll probably regress to its original state.

Whatever happens, we've got to keep it up until November 2004. Of course, if this all gets settled prematurely, we could just threaten to shoot anyone who wants to complain about the economy.

-B. C. Silvia