Bush was the one who weakly mused that if "a sovereign Iraq" wanted us to leave we would have to leave. Can you imagine Truman saying that about postwar Japan?
You’re right.
Bush hardly defended himself when in office so why say much now?
It’s all “New World Order” as Bush 41 said many times.
The idea of nation building Iraq into a pro western democracy was a utopian fantasy from the very start. It’s an idea promoted by half-baked Western elites who make an idol out of democracy, insisting that democracy is the messiah that will bring peace to the world.
The underlying Islamic culture will always dominate Iraq. Giving it a democratic veneer is meaningless, unless you believe that having Iraq’s Muslims vote to oppress their Christians and other religious minorities is a rousing success.
Once we tire of spending the lives of our military and money that we borrow from the Chinese we will leave, whether that’s now or 50 years from now. Islam will still be there waiting to reassert itself with an internecine struggle for dominance between the Shia and Sunni.
What does work is finding authoritarian leaders who we can work with in Islamic countries, and supporting them. And even then we need to be wary. None of this will be of any consequence if the idea of a Caliphate spreads throughout the Umma.