Wilkerson: There Was No Formal Decision by Bush to Declare War on Iraq

There is no evidence that Bush declared war on Iraq in 2003 in an order established by legislation, according to Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to former US Secretary of State Colin Powell.

There is no evidence that former US President George W. Bush declared war on Iraq in 2003 in accordance with the procedure established by law, Wilkerson said in an interview with the Latvian radio station Baltkom.

"There was never a formal decision (to go to war). Therein lies the mystery. Chronologists may spend years searching through documents, manuscripts and cryptograms, but they'll never find any evidence that Bush declared war in accordance with the law," Wilkerson said.

"There's no official document, no records from US National Security Council — there's nothing. It just happened."

Former Chairman of the Senate Committee on Armed Services Carl Levin previously claimed the Bush administration intentionally misled the public to justify the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

Washington accused Iraq President Saddam Hussein of being connected with international terrorist organizations and possessing weapons of mass destruction — accusations that later proved to be false.

The Iraq War began in 2003 with the invasion by American and coalition forces, primarily from the United Kingdom (Operation Iraqi Freedom). Hussein was overthrown and found guilty by Iraq's Supreme Court in crimes against humanity for the massacre in the town of Dujail in 1982 in retaliation for an assassination attempt against him. He was sentenced to death by hanging.

Operation Iraqi Freedom was officially over on August 31, 2010, when Barack Obama announced an end to the seven-year combat mission.

The list of countries the US invaded without didn't declare war on — and invaded anyway — is rather long and includes Vietnam, Afghanistan, Syria and Bosnia among other states.