September 7, 2004 - President Bush was still holding press conferences in March of 2002. He held one on March 13th. In the aftermath of 9-11 he had taken advantage of the waive of international support for America and for an international response to the worst single terrorist attack in history to create a genuine coalition to attack Al Qaeda and the Taliban that harbored it. The Taliban had been driven from power but not destroyed. Its leaders escaped into the Afghani mountains. Al Qaeda had been driven from its network of training bases but like the Taliban its leadership escaped to plot further depredations. Asked about Bin Laden and the Taliban the President had this to say:
“"We haven't heard from him in a long time. I truly am not that concerned about him. I was concerned about him when he had taken over a country. I was concerned about the fact that he was basically running Afghanistan and calling the shots for the Taliban," Bush said. But now, "we shoved him out more and more on the margins. He has no place to train his al Qaeda killers anymore."
I’m not sure that President Putin and the parents, teachers and children of Beslin’s School #1 would agree. Our invasion of Afghanistan has hardly slowed the pace of Al Qaeda campaign of international terrorism. Bali, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Spain have all felt the scorpion’s sting. Now Russia is added to the list of victims. The Taliban is still active in a guerilla insurrection just as it was when it swept to power ignored by the United States after the demise of the Soviet Union.

That day, March 13th 2002, one reporter asked the President whether he was concerned that the growing deployment of military advisors across the Moslem world might plunge the US into a quagmire like that in Vietnam. His response was eerily prescient. He said that he had learned the lessons of Vietnam and added, "First there must be a clear mission. Secondly, the politics ought to stay out of fighting a war. There was too much politics during the Vietnam War,"

Seven US Marines died on the outskirts of Fallujah yesterday. Last April the Marines were poised to take that city after a three week siege. They were called off when a political settlement avoided the casualties that were inevitable by the simple expedient of turning the city over to the insurgents and Paul Bremer lifted the siege. A major engagement was not compatible with the President’s promise to turn a species of Sovereignty over to an Iraqi authority by June 30th.

Sovereignty was handed over on June 28th. There was no public ceremony, just a quick and private swearing in of an American selected interim government. In August we saw the siege of Najaf and Kufa. For three weeks the US Marines tightened a noose of steel around the Mehdi Militia. Suddenly there was a political settlement in time to reduce the casualties suffered on the eve of the Republican Convention and the President’s re-nomination. Najaf and Kufa remained in the hands of a hostile Shi`ite population. The Mehdi Militia withdrew with its arms and leadership intact. For the second time in four months politics intruded into the military operations in the Second Iraqi War. Fallujah, Ramadi, and Najaf have become “no-go” zones in the struggle to pacify Iraq while the casualties resume.