Paul Wolfowitz however refers to the war on Iraq in a different way. In Text B in the first sentence of the article “terrorists” becomes the main subject of the sentence making it active as the collective noun “terrorists exploded a bomb”. This derives any sort of blame off American soldiers and straight onto the terrorists. In addition, by the writer referring to the defenders as “terrorists” it brings vast connotations of fear, victimisation, and horror towards the soldiers, thus the reader is able to sympathise towards the soldiers. This represents the war on Iraq in a good light as it is shown to liberate people of the world from such terrorists.
Text C refers to the war in a positive light using a cluster of three to highlight the goals of the war and the benefits it can bring, “to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger.” This rhetorical triad is used to persuade the listening American audience that the war on Iraq is a positive action, and that it will bring no disadvantages. Moreover, all the verbs used in this triad are in their infinitive form. Having the verbs in their simplest form, “to disarm” “to free” and “to defend” mirrors and reflects the simplicity of how the war is going to be. The dynamic verbs “free” “disarm” and “defend” are all connotations of . Therefore war is represented in a positive way, as it is almost building a better world. George W Bush tries to eliminate any negative connotations of war, also not referring to it as a “war”, as he persuades the audience to be supportive of his actions. This projects Text C’s representation of war in a way that shows how beneficial and world saving the war on Iraq is and that it is also saving the people of Iraq.
The speech uses the personal pronoun “my” to create a sense of unite force and to increase the moral amongst the American population. However because this speech could be heard by anyone around the world, the meaning of “my fellow citizens” could be expanded, expressing how the whole world are united against this cause together. This empowers America’s position, ensuring that the war against Iraq will be easily won.
Verbs and adverbs are used in all three texts to describe the American’s actions at war, with varying representations. Text C tries to represent the Americans as peace-makers emphasising that war is a good idea to make the world a better place. For example the infinitive verb “to free” in “to free its people” gives the impression that American forces are going to physically help and liberate people in Iraq rather than invade and destroy the country, which are original connotations of “war”. The speech is trying to represent the war in Iraq as almost a charity mission by the Americans giving and not taking. This twists the normal perception people have on war, showing it in a positive light, which leads people into a sense of security.
Text A uses many factive verbs such as “emerged” and “admitted”. These verbs are used to express truth and conviction as they are followed by as clause that is supposedly true. For example “recently admitted, the Iraq war was all about oil”. This tries to ensure the reader believes what they are reading is fact and not personal opinion. The word “invasion” has been nominalised, as it is being used as a noun rather than a verb in the sentence “The invasion of Iraq.” This emphasises the vulnerability of Iraq and how it is the victim of the war, showing how it has been abused and exploited by more than one country as it does not specifically mention that America invaded Iraq.
Text B uses terrorists as a subject of several material process verbs such as “exploded a bomb”, “killed scores of Muslims” and “threatend America”. These verbs represent the war on Iraq as being the fault of the terrorists and not the Americans who invaded Iraq. In addition, these dynamic verbs are mainly in the past tense emphasising how these problems have been going on for a while and America is finally going to liberate the world of such terrorists, highlighting the importance of the war on Iraq. The strong dynamic verb “exploded” shows how aggressive and violent the terrorist are also bringing connotations of destruction and murder. The semantic field and connotations of murder is carried on with the use of the verbs “killed” and “threatened”. Such harsh verbs against the Americans are used to highlight the vulnerability of the American forces and how volatile Iraqi terrorists are reassuring the reader that war would only have a positive impact.
In text A, the war is represented as having to have “exploited Iraq” by the Americans; also the reader accuses Britain of having the same mentality as America and Britain are both allies. This is particularly evident in “the same oil companies that used to exploit Iraq when it was a British colony are now returning… the Iraq war was all about oil”. The modal auxiliary verb “was” in the past tense makes the writer sound knowledgeable and certain that this was the case and also implies that it was not unexpected from the two super powers, commenting on how they “are now returning”. The verb “exploited” and the adverbial of manner “used to” creates sympathy towards Iraq showing how it has already suffered and been taken advantage of by the allies before. The writer then quotes that a US Federal Chairman, “recently admitted.” The verbal process verb “admitted” shows that even parties who are amongst the USA government acknowledge their greedy reasons behind the war on Iraq. The writer used this point to further more persuade that the war was a pointless decision.
All three texts refer to Saddam’s rule in Iraq in correlation to the cause of war in Iraq. Text A expresses how Saddam’s rule in Iraq was for the benefit of his people and the writer does not blame Saddam’s dictatorship for America’s invasion of Iraq. Text B, shows a strong opinion against Saddam’s “sadistic” regime. Whereas, Text C refers to Saddam’s regime to be the main cause of war against Iraq.
Eric Margolis in Text A, refers to Saddam’s rule as “the benefit of Iraq’s national development”. The abstract noun “benefit” ties in with the larger theme of the article – Iraq was in a well and stationary position before it was invaded, representing the war on Iraq in a negative way as it almost proves how there was no humane reason for war. However this shows the narrow-mindedness of the writer as Text A offers no criticism of how Saddam tortured his people under his dictatorship, or even explain in what way it increased Iraq’s national development.
Text B uses the evaluative adjectives “tyrannical” and “sadistic” to describe Saddam’s regime in Iraq. By representing it in this way, the article makes the American forces almost heroic because of their efforts to eliminate him.
In Text C, it states how the main goal of the invasion of Iraq was to “undermine Saddam Hussein’s ability to wage war”, again using Saddam’s dictatorship of Iraq as a main reason to war, emphasising the importance and positives of the war. In this simple sentence the word “war” is first used, as the subject of the sentence is Saddam Hussein, showing how war is only associated with him and not the Americans. To make Saddam’s actions sound more aggressive the dynamic verb is used to create the alliteration “wage war”.
The three texts use similar methods to represent the war on Iraq in the way that they want to. All three articles are heavily biased, which means one could argue that there could be lack of reasoning behind some of their points. They are also all trying to challenge the representations of the war, both positive and negative. Text A, portrays the war as having no backbone other than greed for oil by the Americans, persuading the reader that this is the “ugly truth”. Text B, tries to gain some sympathy towards American troops instead of the real victims of the American war against Iraq; however emphasising the good aspects the war on Iraq will bring such as liberating people from “Saddam’s sadistic regime”. Text B, uses rhetorical persuasive linguistic features to change the minds of people who are against the war on Iraq by convincing the audience that war on Iraq only has advantages.
