I don't think anyone will nitpick about the "soldier" term except the purists. I use the term in a general sense, and probably most people do.

It is amusing how they are snubbing Bush, but hardly surprising. An American Republican could be responsible for the elimination of the Soviet Union, and still not be recognized for it. One would think that the American military had just been sitting around playing cards one day until one of them said, "Hey, let's go over and throw Saddam and the Taliban out on their butts." It will be interesting to read the actual article.

The magazine glorifies the soldiers but not the Bush administration for putting them in Iraq, calling troops ''the bright sharp instrument of a blunt policy,'' and leaving it to scholars to debate ''whether the Bush doctrine is the most muscular expression of national interest in a half-century.''

The justification for a U.S. military presence in Iraq has been widely questioned, as coalition forces have found no weapons of mass destruction, which President Bush had argued Saddam was stockpiling.