What Bush Should Have Said

An alternative speech for a president seeking support on Iraq

'I want to tell you something I've never acknowledged: the U.N. inspection regime that was forced on Saddam Hussein in 2002 was working. We should have had more patience with it and supported it more fully. In the end, it would have revealed what we now know: that Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction. That revelation would have destroyed the dictator's credibility. His brutal regime might have toppled from within. At the very least, his power would have been severely compromised. But—impatient again—we rushed to war, without sufficient preparation and sufficient allies.' TIME: Exclusive - Joe Klein