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A second Gulf War is being fought as U.S. and allied forces launch air strikes and occupy Iraqi territory, but the road to war is longer than the routes to Baghdad.

Over the past year, the world watched as the United States and Iraq moved closer to conflict, but the roots of the present war are deeper than the diplomatic battle over weapons inspections or even the military response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

“I think the Bush administration came into power fully intending to confront Iraq,” said political science professor Matthew Baum.

While running for president in October 2000, during his second debate with Al Gore, George Bush said, “If Saddam is developing weapons of mass destruction ... there are going to be serious consequences if I’m president.”

Bush has repeatedly stated Saddam Hussein’s regime is a serious threat to peace, and dislodging the Iraqi government is a strategic objective of the current war. However, this goal is not unique to the Bush administration. During the Clinton years, Congress passed a resolution favoring regime change in Iraq.

What seems to be the key difference between Clinton and Bush is not their attitudes on Hussein, but their willingness to use force.

Clinton was “not willing to wage a full-scale war,” said political science professor Kenneth Schultz.

Before war started, the administration focused heavily on Iraq, even as evidence mounted that North Korea and Iran, two countries the president included with Iraq in what he called an “Axis of Evil,” were pursuing nuclear weapons.

Baum said he thinks the president is hoping Teheran and Pyongyang will be less confrontational if the United States defeats Iraq at war.

“The administration is banking on countries like North Korea and Iran watching Iraq,” he said.

Baum added that such a strategy could backfire, since Iranian and North Korean leaders might hasten weapons development to deter the United States from strikes against their countries.

While trying to build global and popular support to use force against Iraq, the administration frequently described the Iraqi regime as a sponsor of terrorism. Though Iraq does pay rewards to the families of suicide bombers, no extensive ties between Iraq and al-Qaeda have been proven.

Though there is little evidence Hussein and Osama bin Laden are connected, Schultz said public concern over the threat of al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups has made it easier for the president to convince Americans to support the war.

“The events of Sept. 11 created a political opening for the Bush administration,” he said.

But other countries have been much harder to convince. While the United States enjoyed the support of a broad coalition and the United Nations during the 1991 Gulf War, many nations, most notably France and Russia, refuse to support the United States in the current conflict.

An obvious difference between the two wars was that Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990 was an obvious act of aggression, while in the past months the United States has had difficulty persuading others that Iraq seriously violated United Nations disarmament resolutions and that force was a justified response.

“Iraq, in invading Kuwait, had very clearly crossed the line ... you don’t have the same thing in this case,” Schultz said.

Baum and Schultz see international opposition to war in Iraq as part of a reaction to Bush’s unilateral policies, such as the rejections of the Kyoto Protocol and International Military Tribunal, and withdrawal from the Antiballistic Missile Treaty.

“That way of approaching the world is going to ... provoke opposition,” Schultz said.

Unilateralism, which is designed to increase the United States’ freedom of action, could compromise national security, Baum said, since terrorists are not constrained by national borders.

“We can’t deal effectively with al-Qaeda unilaterally because there’s no country to invade ... it’s a police effort and requires cooperation,” he said.

Many wonder what effects the war will have on the United Nations, which Bush warned would become “irrelevant” if it would not enforce Iraqi disarmament.

“I don’t know how much damage is done ... but you’ve got an administration that doesn’t believe in the United Nations,” Baum said.

In 1999, President Clinton committed the United States to an air war against Serbian forces in Kosovo without U.N. approval since Russia refused to accept strong resolutions against Serbia.

Schultz said it is very difficult to achieve consensus in the United Nations on resolutions that require nations to take a side against other countries.

“The U.N. is hurt by this, but it has never been spectacularly successful in this area,” he said.

The United Nations does better at humanitarian missions and peacekeeping efforts where the parties in conflict want the international body to monitor an agreement, Schultz said.

With reports from Daily Bruin wire services.