Mormons and the Iraq War Drawing on my firsthand experience from two trips to Iraq with the pacifist group, Christian Peacemaker Teams, and my background in LDS theology and scripture, I will argue against the common misperception among Latter-day Saints that the U.S. military is waging ‘a war of freedom’ to liberate Iraqis, that the U.S. presence is preventing civil war in Iraq, and that LDS doctrine provides theological justification for the war. Given that Iraq has never attacked the United States, the war in Iraq is an offensive war-something vigorously condemned in the Book of Mormon and counter to the Doctrine and Covenants injunction that we ‘renounce war and proclaim peace.’

William Van Wagenen, J. Bonner Ritchie