We will be on the losing end in Iraq as well:When Frontier Justice Becomes Foreign Policy: "In April 1986 President Reagan authorized an air raid on the home of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya that spared him but killed his daughter. The Reagan administration never acknowledged that Colonel Qaddafi, personally, was the target, nor did it publicly speculate two years later that Libya's bombing of an American jetliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270 people, was Colonel Qaddafi's revenge for the death of his daughter. But the administration got the message: after Lockerbie, Washington relied on legal action to settle the score."

President Bush, in contrast, personally approved the attempt to kill him, without feeling the need to explain why Mr. Hussein was no longer protected by President Reagan's prohibition and without being asked to do so by Congress.

Like most questions in wartime, this one is impossible to answer in advance