A Failed Address

Wednesday, September 24, 2003; Page A28

A YEAR AGO this month President Bush delivered a powerful speech to the United Nations challenging it to stand up to the Iraqi dictatorship of Saddam Hussein -- a challenge that, for a time, united the Security Council in demanding Iraqi compliance with U.N. disarmament orders.

On his return yesterday, Mr. Bush read an address that conspicuously lacked such passion, determination or vision. His defense of his decision to proceed with an invasion of Iraq without Security Council support was almost perfunctory, as was his acknowledgement that many nations opposed the war.

He spoke one sentence about the so-far unsuccessful search for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction and provided no new information to an audience that last year heard him describe at great length the threat posed by those weapons.

Most remarkable, Mr. Bush had nothing new to say about the struggle to stabilize Iraq and establish a new government; more of his speech was devoted to the problem of human trafficking than to Iraqi reconstruction.

If the president's intention was to rally international support for a vital cause, the burden of which cannot and should not be borne so disproportionately by the United States, he missed an important opportunity.

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