“The nations in our coalition are determined to help the Iraqi people recover from years of tyranny. And we are determined to help build a free, and sovereign, and democratic nation.”

President George W. Bush, July 23, 2003

On April 9, 2003, much of the world’s attention was riveted on a scene in a public square in Baghdad, the capital city of the Middle Eastern nation of Iraq. Television cameras broadcast a picture of a group of Iraqi citizens, who, after several hours of trying and with the assistance of American soldiers and tanks, finally succeeded in toppling an enormous statue of Iraq’s now-deposed leader, Saddam Hussein. For Americans watching on television, the fall of the statue marked the triumphal moment of a military campaign begun a few weeks earlier to remove a regime that was seen as a threat to American security. For the Iraqi...