The phrase ‘axis of evil’ was made famous by President George W. Bush of the United States of America. He used it in his State of the Union speech on January 29, 2002. Memories of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the Twin Towers were still fresh in the minds of the world. President Bush declared ‘War on Terror.’
President Bush in his speech further identified Iraq as a breeding ground for weapons of mass destruction. Hype was created over the large hoard of suspected arms squirreled away by Saddam Hussein. As it turned out later the intelligence reports given to the White House were not accurate but still were used as an excuse for launching a full scale war on Iraq in March 2003. Saddam Hussein’s regime came tumbling down in 2003.
The exact words which virtually launched the alliance of British and US forces were, ‘Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror,’ and that, ‘this is a regime that has something to hide from the civilised world.’ Finally he said, ‘states like these and their terrorist allies constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world.’
The lines became famous because they were spoken by the leader of the most powerful nation of the world. Saddam was sentenced and hanged by the Interim government of Iraq. The tyrant of the ‘axis of evil’ was killed but no weapons of mass destruction were found. Later the phrase was used by the President and others many times. The term recalls the Axis allies Germany, Italy and Japan of World War II.
It was a White House speech writer David Frum who was given the task of writing a short passage outlining the aggressive stand of America against the rising trend of terrorism directed towards the United States of America. Frum had actually proposed the phrase ‘axis of hatred’ which on reading President Bush changed to ‘axis of evil.’ He included Iran, Iraq and North Korea in this ‘axis of evil.’
The term became popular all over the world and even a movie Behind Enemy Lines 2 was named ‘Axis of Evil.’ The phrase is now also associated with the War on Terror which in itself is linked with an ongoing current WW III. It also is a testimony to the power of words in a political campaign.