No End in Sight By BOB HERBERT

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April 2, 2004

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/02/opinion/02HERB.html?pagewanted=print&position=
OP-ED COLUMNIST
No End in Sight
By BOB HERBERT

We're told that President Bush watched the television news coverage of the Iraqi mob that attacked, burned and mutilated four American civilians in Falluja on Wednesday. I can imagine the fury he must have felt. But I wonder what specific thoughts ran through his mind, and what other emotions he experienced.

Was there any soul-searching, any second thoughts about whether he did the right thing in launching this war, which he thought was all but over last May but which remains with us, with no end to the carnage in sight? With so many now dead, might the president have felt even the mildest of qualms, the faintest flickering of regret while watching the hideous images from Falluja?

If you talk to the troops who have served in Iraq, you can only marvel at their bravery and commitment to duty, and the lack of bellyaching at the difficult hands they were dealt. I've interviewed several servicemen and servicewomen who have returned from the war zone, including some who were horribly wounded, and I've yet to hear one of them utter any variation of the complaint, "Why me?"

But I inevitably come away from these conversations asking the question for them. Why were they ever placed in harm's way in Iraq? Wednesday's atrocity was inexcusable — unconscionable — and those responsible should be tracked down and punished. But even if that happens, the greater tragedy of the war itself will continue indefinitely.