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Sorry, but we didn't liberate Iraq to "spread democracy" but to destroy our enemy.

If only.

I agree with Mark Levin and Ann Coulter. We should have carpet-bombed at least a dozen major Iraqi cities into complete rubble and allowed their inhabitants to die.

That would have been actual progress if we were serious about achieving our war aims.

However, I oppose the use of nuclear weapons except for our own national defense. Iraq doesn't rise to that level of threat. But a campaign of massive destruction in Iraq would give our entire arsenal, including nuclear, a far greater leverage because our enemies and our allies would understand that we were perfectly willing to use it when threatened or hit, as we were on 9/11. Such bold action would also have tilted the geopolitical balance toward us in New Europe even more strongly and we would have had even more allies. Especially since we would have been able to guarantee a steady flow of oil.

If it is to be war, then let it be all out. Few things are as destructive as sustained low-intensity conflict. No pantywaist nation-building missions, no spreading democracy crap. Bomb them into the Stone Age, then tell the survivors they are not allowed to practice Islam (Nazism, communism, emperor worship) and they will henceforth conduct themselves as democratic republics with universal human rights within their domains but under our military supervision for at least the lifetimes of those who survived our attack.

For examples of a successful use of these tactics, see Germany and Japan, circa 1945.

Naturally, one can formulate various opinions on whether Iraq was as suitable a target in the War On Terror as Afghanistan was. I personally believe that Saudi Arabia and Iran are the real homes of the Islamonazi threat. History may demonstrate that Iraq was a useless diversion in which we dawdled away our remaining time to stop the threat of a nuclear Iran, the real home of the mad mullahs.

I agree with Mark Levin and Ann Coulter. We should have carpet-bombed at least a dozen major Iraqi cities into complete rubble and allowed their inhabitants to die.

That'd make us terrorists. No thanks.

That would have been actual progress if we were serious about achieving our war aims.

Being serious about the war doesn't require that we commit atrocities. It would have required more ground troops to stabilize the region and keep law and order, and forestall the sectarian violence we now see.