3.  POPULATION: 24 million  CAPITAL: Baghdad  LANGUAGE: Arabic, Kurdish  RELIGION: Sunni Muslims, Shia Muslims, Christian  ETHNIC GROUPS: Arabs 72%, Kurds 23%, 5% other smaller groups

4.  Saddam Hussein  5 th President of Iraq 1979-2003  George W. Bush  43 rd U.S. President 2001-2009  Tony Blair  Prime Minister of United Kingdom 1997-2007

5.  America is attacked on Sept 11, 2001  October 7th, 2001 Operation Enduring Freedom is launched in Afghanistan  Bush calls Iraq a member of the “axis of evil”  He believed Iraq was manufacturing weapons of mass destruction

6.  www.americanrhetoric.com www.americanrhetoric.com  March 21, 2003  Coalition forces streamed into southern Iraq while a massive aerial assault was launched against the capital city of Baghdad known as “Shock and Awe”

9.  U.S. takes enters Baghdad on April 9, 2003 and pushes out Iraqi government  Looting and lawlessness becomes widespread, WHY?  America did not have enough troops to properly police the country.  Supporters of Saddam begin to attack power stations, oil pipelines and bridges in the hopes of trying to sabotage the American effort in Iraq.  Coalition forces become targets for suicide bombers.  Why are the Iraqi people responding this way?

10.  Believed that Iraq had a connection to Al- Qaeda.  Iraq posed a threat to our national security.  Believed that Iraq was producing or stock piling weapons of mass destruction.  What other reasons do you think made us decide to invade Iraq?

11.  Disarmament  End Saddam Hussein’s support of Terror  End a regime and free the Iraqi people  Train Iraqi forces  Advance democracy  Defeat terrorism in Iraq Our mission has changed over the past seven years, what do you think we have been fighting for?

12. KILLEDWOUNDED  4,282 killed  30,182 wounded

13.  Between 77,000 and 90,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed  Between 120,000 and 150,000 civilians have been wounded.

14.  A dire humanitarian crisis  4.5 million refugees, 2.8 million internal ones  Lack of clean water, electricity, sanitation, and health care are things that Iraqi citizens have to live with daily  4 year long drought plagues most of Iraq  Cancer rises in population, believed to be the result of “more that 1,700 tons of depleted uranium” used during the different bombing raids  Toxic wasteland  War and pollution have reeked havoc on Iraq’s ecosystems

15.  In 2005, Iraq held elections were they selected a new constitution and the first democratically elected government.  Iraqi government has grown in strength as well as their military and police force.  Violence has gone down created some desperately needed stability for the country.  2010 America ends it’s military mission in Iraq