The Democrats' larger problem is that Iraq is now their war, too, since they mostly agree it would be disastrous for the United States to cut and run. Their critique of Bush doesn't answer the question of how to exit Iraq in a way that protects U.S. national interests and keeps faith with the Iraqi people.

It is in these delicate areas that Clark may have a special advantage if he decides to run. Indeed, but for the Iraq factor, the politically inexperienced Clark wouldn't merit serious attention.

On the big issue, Clark has the right stuff. He has commanded troops in battle and he won a decisive victory in his war -- the 1999 NATO campaign in Kosovo. He also stuck his neck out in criticizing planning for the Iraq invasion at a time when many Democrats were running for cover.

Clark's critique of the war touches all the now-obvious points: Because it deployed a thin force and couldn't invade through Turkey, the United States "trickled in, especially from the north and west" and didn't take decisive control of Saddam Hussein's strongholds. Worse, it failed to prepare seriously for postwar occupation, bungling what Clark says were obvious tasks:

"Where was the radio network that could have allowed the U.S. to communicate with the Iraqi people? Where were the thousands of Arab Americans ready to translate? Where were the trained Iraqi judges? Where was a new, mobile Iraqi police force that could have kept order? Where were the economic-development programs with contractors ready to go?"

They're all good questions, but that's not what makes Clark an interesting candidate. It's the fact that, like Dwight Eisenhower talking about Korea in 1952, the retired general can argue that he's the man to get America honorably out of a war others created.

A final reason to pay attention to Clark's version of "I told you so" is that it's linked to a broader analysis. He will argue in a book to be published next month that the administration showed "a fundamental misunderstanding of modern war." By rushing into battle, it lost the biggest advantage of American power, which is "the incredible leverage to bring other allies on board to help us."

Bush's mistake, he argues, was not in overestimating U.S. power but in underestimating it. Rather than alienating allies by crowing about America's new empire, the administration should have understood that "we already have a virtual empire," Clark says. The power of that virtual empire lies in America's inescapable dominance of the global economy and the international organizations that underpin it.

[Thanks to Shirley for the link]

Of course, Bush & the neocons couldn't possibly commit to working in that manner, because they are clearly interested in tearing down that infrastructure, the very one we were instrumental in creating and developing.

I don't have a good enough handle on the history of this, but isn't it true that conseravatives were once opposed to the U.N. because they were isolationists who didn't want us to continue to be embroiled in the problems of Europe and the rest of the world? If so, then it would be ironic and noteworthy indeed if today's conservatives, the neo-cons, objected to the U.N. and other international bodies because they potentially stand in the way of America exercising the power which they clearly feel it is our right to use as we see fit.

Ignatius also points out the Big Problem of the moment -- what should we do in Iraq? Or, in the words of The Clash: Should we stay of should we go?