At few times in recent history have we seen a war so insistently and openly signaled as the U.S.'s looming war on Iraq. According to Rahul Mahajan, the coming war is a culmination of a process that the United States started with the Gulf War, where Iraq was made into a permanent target and pariah state. Mahajan argues that the Bush administration's post-September 11 policy toward Iraq is neither about controlling weapons of mass destruction nor fighting terrorism, but about consolidating U.S. control of oil reserves and dominance in the Middle East. Despite the prospects that attacking Iraq could quickly escalate into wider regional war and lead to further terrorist attacks, the Bush administration insists that violence is our only option. Mahajan cuts through the comic-book language of President Bush's "Axis of Evil" rationale, and presents a much-needed examination of the myths, facts, and history behind the U.S.'s pitch to start another war.

RAHUL MAHAJAN (Ph.D. University of Texas at Austin) is a longtime antiwar activist at the local and national level. He is a founding member of the Nowar Collective and serves on the National Board of Peace Action, the nation's largest grassroots peace organization. His first book, The New Crusade: America's War on Terrorism, has been described as "mandatory reading for all those who want to get a handle on the war on terrorism." He writes frequently for mainstream and alternative print media and for websites like Common Dreams, Zmag, Alternet, and Counterpunch.