They have a lot at stake, Bush's legacy as president is the most important thing he has risked here. He has bet his presidential farm on democracy in the ME, no democracy, he will be seen as an utter failure with the likes of Carter and Clinton, however if democracy takes hold in teh ME he will be in teh category of Lincoln, FDR, and Reagan.

Making money from war is nothing new, every war in history has been about taking wealth or protecting wealth in some way or another. Corporations have always profited from wars, and so ahev the peopel they employed, both Dems and Reps. However believing that going to war in Iraq was only to make money doesn't make any sense at all. Saudi Arabia would have been a much larger financial payoff than Iraq does, and wouldn't have needed WMD's to do it, the simple fact that the 9/11 terrorists were Saudi nationals would have been justification enough. All we would have had to do is claim they were Saudi military and attacked to protect our sovereignty. Invading Venezuala would have been more profitable than Iraq, less in military expenditures, no interference from neihboring states, and a large amount of oil deposits. Yes understand that Bush has changed the reasoning from WMD's to democracy, but it isn't his fault, it is the fault of the American people. For some reason it is believed that the American people need to be sold on something before they will support it, and the simpler the reason the easier the sale. WMD's and an immenant threat were just the easiest things to sell and exactly what the people wanted to here. There was proof Sadam had used them in the past, and we did recover remnants. The only speculation there is is whether or not Sadam had destroyed them(unlikely), or moved the to neighboring states, or simply buried them, both more likely. American didn't support war in Europe until the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and for the most part Americans didn't care about global terrorism until 9/11. In both cases it was something that didn't involve the U.S. directly, we were isolated from it, and as in both cases we were proven wrong.