The Pro-War Press Breaks With Bush

Not all war supporters think Rumsfeld is the issue.

Amir Taheri, an Iranian journalist based in England and a supporter of the war, writes in the Gulf News that the fate of any individual is less important than the fate of Iraq.

"Rumsfeld could always be booted out. George W Bush could always be voted out of office. But the unique opportunity to stabilise and rebuild Iraq as a democratic state must not be wasted. Let us have all the Abu Ghraib trials we need."

If Iraq is allowed "to slide into chaos or fall under a new despot," Taheri concludes, "the world will witness horrors compared to which Abu Ghraib would look like a garden party."

The editors of the resolutely pro-war Jerusalem Post are not conceding anything.

"No upstanding democracy can tolerate such behavior, and we are confident that America won't. Still, such abuses should, if anything, remind us what has been achieved in Iraq and how important it is that that success be consolidated rather than discarded for lack of patience or perspective."

Westerners should not "condemn ourselves and the world to much greater injustices by simply throwing in the towel in this war to defend our freedom and beliefs," they conclude.

But at least one war supporter is abandoning the cause altogether.

Toronto Sun columnist John Derringer writes that he thought "like so many millions of others did, that the American forces would be in and out of there before you could say Grenada."

"I truly believed that Saddam would be toppled and a new government set up within a year, with minimal American casualties."

Now, he says the war "is no longer about freedom or terror. It's about one man's political agenda, and dead American soldiers are obviously not about to get in his way. I thought it was about more than that. I was wrong."