February 15, 2003 anti-war protest
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In 2002, the United States government began to argue for the necessity of invading Iraq. This formally began with a speech by U.S President George W. Bush to the United Nations General Assembly on September 12, 2002 which argued that the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein was violating U.N. resolutions, primarily on weapons of mass destruction.
The proposed war was controversial with many people questioning the motives of the U.S government and its rationale. One poll which covered 41 countries claimed that less than 10% would support an invasion of Iraq without UN sanction and that half would not support an invasion under any circumstances.
Anti-war groups across the world organised public protests. According to the French academic Dominique Reynié between the 3rd of January and 12th of April 2003, 36 million people across the globe took part in almost 3,000 anti-war protests, the demonstrations on February 15 2003 being the largest and most prolific.
The February 15, 2003 anti-war protest was a coordinated day of protests across the world against the imminent invasion of Iraq. Millions of people protested in approximately 800 cities around the world. According to BBC News, between six and ten million people took part in protests in up to sixty countries over the weekend of the 15th and 16th; other estimates range from eight million to thirty million.
The biggest protests took place in Europe. The protest in Rome involved around 3 million people, and is listed in the 2004 Guinness Book of World Records as the largest anti-war rally in history. Opposition to the war was highest in the Middle East, although protests there were relatively small - Mainland China was the only major region not to see any protests.
The invasion of Iraq began on March 20, 2003.
At the time, many commentators were hopeful that this global mobilization of unprecedented scale would stop the coming Iraq war. The New York Times writer Patrick Tyler claimed that they showed that there were "two superpowers on the planet - the United States, and worldwide public opinion".
The potential effect of the protests was generally dismissed by pro-war politicians; the then US National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice was reported as saying that the protests would "not affect [the US administration's] determination to confront Saddam Hussein and help the Iraqi people". Her view was borne out as the day of protests, along with the protests that followed it, failed to stop the war. However, the protests and other public opposition have been held up as a key factor in the decisions of the governments of many countries, such as Canada, to not send troops to Iraq.
Despite failing in its explicit aim, the February 15 global day of anti-war protests had many effects that were not directly intended. According to United Kingdom left-wing anti-war activist Salma Yaqoob, one of these was that they were a powerful antidote to the idea that the war was a "clash of civilizations", or a religious war, an idea she claimed was propagated both by Western leaders and reactionary forces in the Arab world.
The proposed war was controversial with many people questioning the motives of the U.S government and its rationale. One poll which covered 41 countries claimed that less than 10% would support an invasion of Iraq without UN sanction and that half would not support an invasion under any circumstances.
Anti-war groups across the world organised public protests. According to the French academic Dominique Reynié between the 3rd of January and 12th of April 2003, 36 million people across the globe took part in almost 3,000 anti-war protests, the demonstrations on February 15 2003 being the largest and most prolific.
The February 15, 2003 anti-war protest was a coordinated day of protests across the world against the imminent invasion of Iraq. Millions of people protested in approximately 800 cities around the world. According to BBC News, between six and ten million people took part in protests in up to sixty countries over the weekend of the 15th and 16th; other estimates range from eight million to thirty million.
The biggest protests took place in Europe. The protest in Rome involved around 3 million people, and is listed in the 2004 Guinness Book of World Records as the largest anti-war rally in history. Opposition to the war was highest in the Middle East, although protests there were relatively small - Mainland China was the only major region not to see any protests.
The invasion of Iraq began on March 20, 2003.
At the time, many commentators were hopeful that this global mobilization of unprecedented scale would stop the coming Iraq war. The New York Times writer Patrick Tyler claimed that they showed that there were "two superpowers on the planet - the United States, and worldwide public opinion".
The potential effect of the protests was generally dismissed by pro-war politicians; the then US National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice was reported as saying that the protests would "not affect [the US administration's] determination to confront Saddam Hussein and help the Iraqi people". Her view was borne out as the day of protests, along with the protests that followed it, failed to stop the war. However, the protests and other public opposition have been held up as a key factor in the decisions of the governments of many countries, such as Canada, to not send troops to Iraq.
Despite failing in its explicit aim, the February 15 global day of anti-war protests had many effects that were not directly intended. According to United Kingdom left-wing anti-war activist Salma Yaqoob, one of these was that they were a powerful antidote to the idea that the war was a "clash of civilizations", or a religious war, an idea she claimed was propagated both by Western leaders and reactionary forces in the Arab world.
1. Search the meaning of the highlighted words in On-line dictionaries and provide examples.
2. Comprehensive Questions
- What was the main reason of this global anti-war demonstration? What was its aim?
- Where did the biggest rally take place?
- Did this anti-war protest have any effect in the imminent war? Why/Why not?
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