In the last three and a half years, 'Iraq' has come to stand for many things beyond a geographical location and a state: a political and moral commitment; the first testing of a new and hugely ambitious strategic doctrine; a bloody, many-sided conflict involving terrible atrocities; examples of hubris and incompetence; a bitter debate and...

The intense debate over the war in Iraq and American foreign policy has raised age-old questions about the rights and wrongs of intervention in the internal affairs of sovereign states, the pre-emptive use of force and the 'export' of democracy, but there has been little attempt to acknowledge and confront the special difficulties of discussing...