It is a war against terrorism, and terrorism started well before 9-11-2001.
Terrorism is a tactic, not a foe.
Remember Saddam was paying the families of martyrs tons of money, which encouraged bombings.
Remember that the US gov pays Israel tons of money, which encourages Israeli repression and occupation.
Here is a list of Terrorist groups that Saddam allowed and sheltered within Iraq: Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), Palestine Liberation Front (PLF), Abu Nidal organization (ANO).
The US gov has sponsored terrorist groups.
To give you just one example, the most extreme act of Mideast international terrorism in the peak year of 1985 is a car-bombing in Beirut on March 8 that killed 80 people and wounded 256. The bomb was placed outside a Mosque, timed to explode when worshippers left. "About 250 girls and women in flowing black chadors, pouring out of Friday prayers at the Imam Rida Mosque, took the brunt of the blast," Nora Boustany reported. The bomb also "burned babies in their beds," killed children "as they walked home from the mosque," and "devastated the main street of the densely populated" West Beirut suburb. The target was a Shi'ite leader accused of complicity in terrorism, but he escaped. The crime was organized by the CIA and its Saudi clients with the assistance of British intelligence. Sources: Boustany, _Washington Post Weekly_, March 14, 1988; Bob Woodward, _Veil_ (Simon & Schuster, 1987, 396f.).
Saddam also had terror training camps within his country,
The US has terror training camps. One of the more notorious is the
School of the Americas.
Not to mention he was firing at US military planes enforcing the no-fly zone on an almost weekly basis.
Not to mention that US military planes were violating Iraq's airspace on an almost weekly basis.
And he tried to have a United States President assasinated.
Supposedly.
A Case Not Closed
by Seymour M. Hersh
Issue of 1993-11-01
Posted 2002-09-27
The confrontation between the United States and Iraq has revived interest in a decade-old charge—that Saddam Hussein ordered the assassination of President George H. W. Bush. This alleged plot has been cited in recent days by the current President Bush as one of the U.S.'s grievances against Hussein. In this article, from 1993, Seymour M. Hersh investigates the assassination story.
"The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them." -- George Orwell