Why Kerry Is Right on Iraq
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By Fareed Zakaria*
Newsweek / Aug. 23 issue
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<<...John Kerry isn't being entirely honest about his views on Iraq. But neither is President George W. Bush. "Knowing what we know now," Bush asked, "would [Kerry] have supported going into Iraq?" The real answer is, of course, "no." But that's just as true for Bush as for Kerry. We now know that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Is Bush suggesting that despite this knowledge, he would still have concluded that Iraq constituted a "grave and gathering threat" that required an immediate, preventive war? Please. Even if Bush had come to this strange conclusion, no one would have listened to him. Without the threat of those weapons, there would have been no case to make to the American people or the world community. There were good reasons to topple Saddam Hussein's regime, but it was the threat of those weapons that created the international, legal, strategic and urgent rationale for a war. There were good reasons why intelligence agencies all over the world—including those of Arab governments—believed that Saddam had these weapons. But he didn't.
The more intelligent question is, given what we knew at the time, was toppling Saddam's regime a worthwhile objective? Bush's answer is yes, Howard Dean's is no. Kerry's answer is that it was a worthwhile objective but was disastrously executed. For this "nuance" Kerry has been attacked from both the right and the left. But it happens to be the most defensible position on the subject...>>
*Fareed Zakaria is The Editor of Newsweek International and his complete Bio is available at:
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