Multilateralism In Iraq

Throughout George W. Bush’s administration policy towards Iraq between January 2001 and his decision to intervene in March 2003 American foreign policymakers have demonstrated their desire to act unilaterally contrary to their declaration that multilateralism is extremely important. During George W. Bush’s first month in office his foreign policy team revealed to the American people that they were going to deal with the world in ways that previous Presidents had not done before, they would be adopting a new confrontational approach to deal with international issues. Thus making their underlying desire to act unilaterally towards the rest of the world clear. America’s desire to act unilaterally was partially due to the fact they believed
Because of Bush’s focus on unilateral actions he began to purposely form a narrow military arrangement. While the Bush administration gained endorsements from all of the major international organisations: UN, NATO, Organization of American States (OAS) and the EU this however was not to create a multilateral coalition but to make sure America could choose its allies so they could avoid dealing with the whole alliance. As Philip Gordon stated: the United States saw the support of other nations as politically useful rather than militarily. America’s use of precision weaponry during their campaign demonstrated the unilateral approach to the military
When Spanish president Jose Maria Aznar met with Bush on 22nd February 2003 Bush made It cleared that he wished to punish the smaller nations, including Russia, if they did not vote with the US on the second UN resolution. Although Bush realized he did not have the support of most of the world he believed that he could gain enough votes to make it look as if the whole Security Council body had authorized military action. Bush went on to declare that bringing the second resolution to the United Nations was just a cover story to hide the real agenda of public diplomacy. This act of deception showed America’s need to make it seem like they believed in multilateralism when all they really wanted to do was act unilaterally. Defeat came for Bush when on March 16th there were not enough votes necessary for the United Nations to support the war. The rest of the world were becoming increasingly suspicious of America’s motives for going to war and feared what would happen if they won. Hence why preferring alternative policy schemes. However because of America’s unilateral way of thinking Bush was unfazed by these concerns and on March 16th decided to go ahead