"History doesn't repeat itself," Mark Twain reportedly once advised, "at best it rhymes." On 21 May 2004, four professors sought to find assonance between the Iraq War and previous American conflicts during a roundtable at the 2004 Policy History Conference near St. Louis, Missouri. Joining me as presenters were Michele Angrist of Union College, Mark Lawrence of the University of Texas at Austin, and Chester Pach, Jr., of Ohio University. During the two-hour session, we each spoke for ten minutes and then answered questions. The roundtable attracted an audience of about fifty people.

My opening comment noted the difficulty of placing a war that U.S. forces still were fighting in perspective. And while it made sense at a Policy History Conference to discuss U.S. wartime policy in Iraq, it was not clear that President George W. Bush had one. I then presented a brief discussion of how, in my view, the Iraq War reflected the unilateralist pattern in U.S. foreign policy from the start of the Bush administration. My purpose was to provide a context for my colleagues to offer comparative analysis.

On 17 March 2003, President Bush delivered his ultimatum to Saddam Hussein, demanding that he leave Iraq or face U.S. military action to oust him from power. Two days later, the war began. On 1 May, Bush declared victory aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln. Not only did the U.S. military prevail after just six weeks, there also were fewer American casualties than the United States suffered in the Persian Gulf War twelve years earlier. But despite its brevity, it was a long fuse that had ignited the Iraq War.

Bush and his advisors had followed a curious road leading to the president's day of apparent triumph on an aircraft carrier's flight deck off the coast of San Diego. During the 2000 presidential campaign, candidate Bush had criticized prior American attempts at "nation-building" abroad. He instead insisted that the United States should be "humble" in world affairs. His stunning volte-face after taking office exposed a brazen arrogance that was driving the administration towards war with Iraq. For eight months, the Bush administration followed policies that rejected the need for international cooperation.

That the United States stood as the world's only superpower had an intoxicating impact on Bush and his advisors. Far from being humble, they in fact were developing a National Security Strategy that provided a blueprint for the achievement of nothing less than global hegemony. Since no nation could match U.S. power, they seemed to believe, nothing would stop fulfillment of their vision of an orderly post-Cold War world. For its first eight months, however, there was no compelling rationale to persuade countries to unite behind the U.S. plan. Then came the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001.

Bush opened his "War on Terrorism" with a warning, in neffect, that "you are either with us, or against us." Afghanistan was a sideshow in his hegemonic plan, as the president made clear in January 2002 when he identified the "Axis of Evil" as the real target. Iraq would be the test case. But Bush had problems from the start, at least abroad, because he could not link Saddam Hussein with 9-11. More persuasive was the necessity to remove Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, although UN inspectors found none. When Bush prepared to wage a preemptive war, many historians objected that this would be a dramatic break in U.S. policy. George Kennan, the father of containment, was among Bush's critics.

I then read my post to H-Diplo of 19 March 2003:

George W. Bush made it clear in his 17 March ultimatum speech that his war against Iraq seeks regime change as its exclusive goal. . . . Absolutely nothing that the UN inspectors accomplished would have satisfied the Bush administration, which, to repeat, has had as its sole aim to oust Saddam Hussein, regardless of the consequences. . . . Just yesterday I recalled what Madame Nhu said in November 1963 after the assassination of her husband and brother-in-law in South Vietnam: "This will be just the beginning of the story." Americans should know that dictating what sorts of governments people should have is a dangerous business that can have unexpected and disastrous results.

Since Bush's victory declaration, events in Iraq provided confirmation for this warning, most recently the prisoner abuse scandal, the attack on an alleged Iraqi wedding party, and the repudiation of Ahmad Chalabi. The emerging irony of the Iraq War was that it was providing an answer to the main American question after 9-11: "Why do they hate us?" It was because of the towering hubris of U.S. leaders like Vice President Dick Cheney, who told the world that Iraqis would greet U.S. soldiers as liberators. William Sloane Coffin was right when he observed how "power blinds before it corrupts."

Michele Angrist, assistant professor of political science, spoke next. A specialist on government and politics in the Arab states, she soon will publish a book titled Party Systems and the Origins of Democracy and Dictatorship: Explaining Regime Formation in Turkey, Iran, and the Arab World. Angrist underlined the importance of comparing current U.S. difficulties in Iraq with British experiences during the 1920s. When Britain assumed government power in 1928, Iraqis immediately rose in armed rebellion. A long history of nationalism meant that it was naïve to think Iraqis would welcome liberators.

Angrist then described Iraqi politics during the decade after World War II ended to show how expectations of democracy taking hold in that country are overly optimistic. Competitive multiparty elections occurred from 1945-1954, but the result was increasing political polarization. New governments followed policies that threatened the power base of elite groups. Three issues created the most discord: border disputes, including uniting with Syria, land reform, and ties with Britain. Fears of radical nationalists seizing power ultimately led to rigged elections and the utter failure of democracy in Iraq.

Britain helped promote this unfortunate outcome because it remained involved in Iraqi politics. The United States, Angrist explained, is now playing a similarly polarizing role. She emphasized that the Bush administration's primary goal must be to end all U.S. involvement in Iraq's internal affairs. Angrist ended with five policy recommendations for the United States: 1) stick to the 30 June deadline for self-rule; 2) elections must take place before 2005; 3) start U.S. military withdrawal soon; 4) support a federal form of government recognizing religious and ethnic differences; 5) do not exclude the Baathists. Angrist was not optimistic about the future success of U.S. policy in Iraq.

Mark Lawrence, assistant professor of history, then drew comparisons between Iraq and the U.S.-Philippine War of 1899 to 1902. A specialist on postwar U.S. policy in Southeast Asia, his Constructing Vietnam: the United States, European Colonialism, and the Making of the Cold War in Indochina, 1944-1950 will be published later this year. As a starting point, Lawrence recommended John Gaddis's new book Surprise, Security, and the American Experience, where the author contends that United States has followed the policies of unilateralism and preemption since Washington's Farewell Address. War on Iraq was not a radical departure, but comfortingly consistent with U.S. tradition.

Lawrence, however, challenged Gaddis's description of the Iraq war as preemptive. Rather, much like Vietnam, it was a war of choice. He then explained how the Philippine conflict offered a more revealing set of comparisons. In both cases, the president moralized the reasons for war, but critics saw behind-the-scenes manipulators controlling events for ulterior motives. After an initial conventional combat phase, each became a guerrilla war. Both administrations acted on bad information and then manipulated the press to build public support.

Two common aspects of these wars Lawrence viewed as especially illuminating. First, he noted the complexity in the chain of events leading to war, equating the sinking of the battleship Maine with 9-11, Assistant Secretary of the Navy Theodore Roosevelt's prewar machinations with those of Vice President Cheney, and the dream of exploiting the famed China Market with the drive for access to oil. Second, the United States waged war using questionable methods. For Lawrence, U.S. soldiers abusing prisoners was the ultimate tragedy of both conflicts. He speculated that domestic outrage over these acts of barbarism might turn public opinion fully against the Iraq War, as it did in Vietnam.

Associate Professor of History Chester Pach, Jr., who has written comprehensive studies of both the Eisenhower and Reagan administrations, also recommended Gaddis's book, describing it as provocative and insightful. He then remarked on how current U.S. difficulties in Iraq demonstrated the powerful hold that memories of Vietnam had on the thinking of Americans. Senator Joseph Biden had likened a recent attack on U.S. forces to the Tet Offensive and Senator Ted Kennedy had referred to Iraq as a quagmire. Even Secretary of State Colin Powell denied that prisoner abuse was another My Lai.

Pach then emphasized that Iraq was not Vietnam, except in the sense that both were wars gone wrong. First, Bush waged war in the Mideast for regime change, while his predecessors fought in Southeast Asia for regime preservation. Second, U.S. public support for the Vietnam conflict never approached initial American approval for the Iraq War. Vietnam destroyed Lyndon Johnson's presidency, but Bush's political situation is not so dire. And the former president's pessimism about his war contrasts sharply with the optimism of the latter. Johnson, unlike Bush, had no expectation of victory.

In conclusion, Pach perceptively observed that a domino theory motivated the thinking of U.S. leaders in both wars. If the United States allowed South Vietnam to fall, U.S. leaders believed that the Communists would seize power in one after another nation in Southeast Asia. Once Iraq emulated the U.S. example, Bush and his advisors expected the rise of democracies across the Mideast. For Pach, Bush's policy in Iraq was reckless in comparison with the strategy of containment his predecessors pursued in Vietnam. In contrast to Vietnam, however, the United Nations still might become involved in Iraq.

Circumstances in Iraq have improved since our roundtable attempted to place this war in historical perspective. The Bush administration appears to have learned that it will pay a stiff price for following a unilateralist foreign policy both at home and abroad. But gaining UN Security Council support for Iraq's interim government does not validate a Bush Doctrine that seeks global regime change. President George H.W. Bush explained why in 1998 when defending his restraint in the Persian Gulf War: "Trying to eliminate Saddam, extending the ground war into the occupation of Iraq . . . would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. . . . The United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land." It appears that father knows best.