This is a guy who stole a next door nation and tried to steal 1/3 of the world's oil reserves in 1990.

He provoked and led a horrific 10 year war with Iran that cost nearly a million lives.

He's gassed his own people, and certainly would have gassed others if he thought he could have gotten away with it.

He's launched completely unprovoked acts of aggression against Israel, out of a oil-related dispute with his Gulf neighbors, a conflict the Jewish state wasn't even remotely involved in.

There's already substantial, but mostly circumstantial, evidence linking Saddam's regime with international terrorists. The Czech government has linked Saddam's spy network with one of the Sep. 11th hijackers (but not yet proven any Iraqi involvement, and in all fairness they might have just met to have tea together, right?)

In light of Saddam's personal history of mass murder and mayhem, and repeated attempts at destabilizing neighboring states (many allied with the US), and provoking further Middle-east strife, the USA simply can't allow such an unstable, unpredictable and extremely dangerous character to develop weapons of mass destruction. We just can't afford the risk that he'll use them, or that he'll slip them into the hands of others who'll use these weapons.

There are in fact increasing signs that Arab states have signaled to the US that they'll 'go along' with an overthrow of the Iraqi regime, but only if the USA pressures Israel and Arafat to accept the recent Saudi peace proposal. It's difficult to stomach the linkage of these two processes, but it may the political price the USA will have to pay to execute a smooth and successful military campaign by year's end to finally rid the world of Saddam Hussein. Perhaps Israel will be convinced to go along as well because Saddam is a grave theat to them as well. But the real stumbling block in the whole plan is the persistent acts of Islamic terrorism, which Arafat seems unwilling and/or unable to stop.