Or just the ones with oil?

No country has the right to invade another because it perceives it as a potential threat. A pre-emptive attack is only justified if the threat is certain and imminent and potentially devastating, and even that circumstance is as dangerous as it is unpredictable, as we have learned the hard way.

Even the most dangerous and treacherous aggressor states at least PRETEND to accept this principle, and find it necessary to devise elaborate lies when they violate it. Any nation that declared it had the right to wage unilateral war on any state it considered a potential threat, even if no hostilities were imminent, would be a rogue state, a menace to the rest of the world.

Iraq presented no danger to the United States. It's armed forces were crippled by war with the US and Iran, its economy blockaded and in shambles. The nation was overflown, bombed and photographed almost daily for a decade. It's neighbors hated it and its people were ripe for revolt. The only possible justification to legitimately attack it was if it had WMDs and it was preparing to use them.

Do you really think the American people or their elected representatives would have authorized an invasion of Iraq (especially a practically unilateral one, US and UK) if they hadn't been convinced first it was a matter of life and death, that we had no choice, that they had WMDs and could use them at any time?

And now Mr Cheney tells us WMDs or the lack of them made no difference to him. Iraq was a potential threat and needed to be eliminated. What is it about this you people don't understand?