...I would not have gone to war against an already impotent Saddam Hussein without first having secured U.N. support for both the war and a plan for reconstruction. Then, with my credibility with the international community still intact, I would still possess the resources, both military and political to motivate Iran and North Korea to follow international law. As it is now, both of these nations know that our political and military capital are effectively spent in Iraq and Afghanistan and we are unable to muster up the wherewithall to open up a third and fourth front.

Frankly Iran and North Korea all along have been the more serious threat to American security in both the area of weapons of mass destructionand international terrorism. For some inexplicable reason, Bush chose to conduct war against an already fully contained and constrained nation that posed virtually no threat to the United States.

At the time we went to war against Iraq, we knew that North Korea was fully capable of producing a nuclear weapon with months and that they possessed ballistic missiles capable of reaching the west coast. Iraq had neither of these. And, at the same time, Iran possessed real political connections with Al Qaeda and other Islamic terrorist groups. Iraq had no such relationships.

Mr. Bush's priorities have been way off base and we will pay dearly for it.