IRmep Policy Research Note
American Values vs. US Middle East Policy
The year 2004 plumbed dark new depths of America’s foreign policies in the Middle East. American citizens, usually willing to support official rationales for foreign policy, including military intervention, on trust in the office of the President, now overwhelmingly oppose the US invasion of Iraq. 56 percent of respondents to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released on December 21, 2004 conclude that the conflict “was not worth the fight” given mounting costs and new information that fundamental justifications for the invasion were incorrect. This new distrust is the backlash to a continuing series of legally and morally questionable actions which have stripped away America’s former reputation as a country operating under the “rule of law”.