WHEN Barack Obama announced an end to combat operations in Iraq yesterday, he did not spare George W. Bush from criticism.
But the US President also did not give the speech he could have given: he did not say what he really thought.
We know this because of the frank, much harsher, judgment of Bush's warmongering in Iraq laid out in Obama's 2006 campaign book, The Audacity of Hope.
Obama confirmed yesterday that he spoke to his predecessor before giving his prime-time televised speech. He said it was well known the pair had disagreed about the war from the outset.
At that point, Mr Obama's craftsmanship as a speechmaker took control as he tried to smooth over past divisions.
As commander-in-chief and not campaign hopeful, he turned fuzzy while lauding Mr Bush's aspirations. "No one could doubt president Bush's support for our troops, or his love of country and commitment to our security," he said.
Mr Obama's potted narrative of the war's course was accurate but verged on the anodyne compared with past writings.
"From his desk, 7 1/2 years ago, president Bush announced the beginning of military operations in Iraq," he said.
"Much has changed since that night. A war to disarm a state became a fight against an insurgency. Terrorism and sectarian warfare threatened to tear Iraq apart. Thousands of Americans gave their lives; tens of thousands have been wounded. Our relations abroad were strained. Our unity at home was tested."
In The Audacity of Hope, Mr Obama was blunt. He recalled how he could not support "a dumb war, a rash war, a war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics".
Perhaps worst of all, he wrote, the Bush administration "resuscitated a brand of politics not seen since the end of the Cold War".
He blasted the Bush method of pushing the doctrine of preventive war.
"Those who questioned the administration's rationale for invasion were accused of being 'soft on terrorism' or 'un-American'," he wrote.
While admitting he, too, faced pressures as an aspiring young senator, Mr Obama said he sensed that Saddam Hussein did not pose an imminent threat.
He knew that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale would only fan the flames of the Middle East.
Touring Baghdad as a senator later in 2006, Mr Obama admired the dedication, optimism and absence of cynicism among Americans involved in the conflict but referred to it as "a mess".
He was reminded, he wrote, of "just how quixotic our efforts in Iraq still seemed - how, with all the American blood, treasure and the best of intentions, the house we were building might be resting on quicksand".
