Reasons for U.S. involvement in the Middle East have changed since mobilization began.

The government has a couple of reasons for its involvement in the Middle East crisis, said Daniel Kempton, a professor with NIU’s political science department.

The justifications are: protecting Saudi Arabia’s oil fields from invasion and preventing “a country which has always been antagonistic to U.S. interests (Iraq) from gaining a monopoly (of oil),” Kempton said.

Kempton said the goals of the U.S. military are to keep oil prices low and to help friendly Middle East regimes to maintain stability.

But while these are U.S. goals, the action actually has boosted oil prices, and the Saudi Arabian government might be undermined because of our military presence, Kempton said.

Professor Lawrence Finkelstein said the government is having problems convincing Congress and the American people of their rationale. He said this is because the administration has said many different things.

Finkelstein said the government first tried to justify a U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia by saying Iraq’s invasion jeopardized the U.S. “way of life,” and that U.S. interests had to be protected. President Bush now claims that the “naked aggression” of Iraq is unacceptable, Finkelstein said.

To attract and keep widespread Arab support for the United States, Bush points to the brutality of the Iraqi invasion, such as the wiping out of the southern sector of Kuwait, Finkelstein said. The administration has stressed that this is a direct challenge to the United Nations, he added.

Finkelstein said the end of the Cold War starts “a new page in history,” and “this is the first major crisis of this page.”

Finkelstein said he supported Bush’s actions during this “recent history.” He said the president has been in contact with Soviet Premier Gorbachev, and both countries want “collective security;” the belief that no nation should be able to attack its neighbor completely unprovoked and show “naked aggression.”

Finkelstein said the president is near saying this is U.S.

olicy and one of the reasons for involvement, but he has not actually done so because “this is an idealistic idea, and an extended notion of national interest.”

Finkelstein said it might be hard to sell to the American people that international peace should be an interest of this country.