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This paper, part of a broader research project, is concerned with the question of how military intervention as part of the 'war on terror' was justified in the three core members of the 'Coalition of the Willing': the US, UK and Australia. In particular, we focus on the ways in which interventions in Iraq were justified to domestic audiences across these states. Building on critical constructivist understandings of security, we suggest the importance of conceiving of security discourse and policy as an intersubjective realm. Within this realm, the ability to legitimise or enable particular foreign and security practices is related to the extent to which these practices are located within dominant narratives of history, culture and identity within the political communities concerned. While political leaders in these three states therefore defined the need for intervention in broadly similar terms, subtle differences in emphasis and argumentation are potentially important not only in communicating how the military interventions themselves are made possible in different contexts, but also in illuminating the possibilities and constraints for discourses and practices of security in global politics. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]