BY DAVE CLARK ARABNEWS

WASHINGTON: They were the men who were to remake the Middle East, but 10 years on, the alliance of politicians and neoconservative thinkers who launched the Iraq war are a discredited band.

GEORGE W. BUSH: As US president and commander-in-chief of American forces, George W Bush bears ultimate responsibility for launching the war to topple Saddam Hussein, an act he perhaps hoped would secure his legacy.

Now 66, and apparently happy to pursue his artistic endeavors in a Texas retirement, the high point of his public life came after the 9/11 attacks when he stood at the ruins of the World Trade Center and defied America’s enemies.

The image of him as a resolute leader with a bullhorn might have lingered longer had he not, two months after the start of the 2003 Iraq war, appeared on the deck of an aircraft carrier under a “Mission Accomplished” banner.

The mission was far from accomplished and Iraq haunted the rest of his presidency, even after his 2004 re-election, bleeding America of men and wealth even as his justifications for the invasion fell apart.

While the Republican leader’s American conservative base largely turned its back on him because of his uncontrolled spending, Iraq ultimately became the main factor discrediting him before a world audience.

TONY BLAIR: Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair admitted last month in an interview with the BBC about his support for Bush going into the Iraq war: “I’ve long since given up in trying to persuade people it was the right decision.”

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