In an April 2006 column, Ignatius tried to explain his mistakes:

In a sense, the media were victims of their own professionalism. Because there was little criticism of the war from prominent Democrats and foreign policy analysts, journalistic rules meant we shouldn't create a debate on our own. And because major news organizations knew the war was coming, we spent a lot of energy in the last three months before the war preparing to cover it -- arranging for reporters to be embedded with military units, purchasing chemical and biological weapons gear and setting up forward command posts in Kuwait that mirrored those of the U.S. military.

But Ignatius has a problem. In January 2003, he wrote this:

[General Wesley] Clark's argument, in simple terms, is that unless the United States can bring a strong coalition into a war against Iraq, it may put itself in greater danger. The chief threat to U.S. security right now is al Qaeda, he argues. Disarming Iraq is important too, he says, but it's not the most urgent task.

The Bush administration's mistake in Iraq, says Clark, is one of priorities. "They picked war over law. They picked a unilateralist approach over a multilateral approach. They picked conventional forces over special-operations forces. And they picked Saddam Hussein as a target over Osama bin Laden."

Clark worries that the Iraq policy is fatally flawed because it's likely to create new recruits for America's main enemy -- the Islamic fundamentalists who destroyed the World Trade Center and attacked the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. He recalls a military dictum from his days as commander of the Army's National Training Center: "There are only two kinds of plans -- ones that might work and ones that won't work. You have to avoid a plan with a fatal flaw."

. . . Clark doesn't doubt that overwhelming U.S. military power would quickly crush Saddam Hussein's relatively weak forces. Indeed, he gave a dazzling briefing for global leaders at the World Economic Forum here this week about how U.S.-led forces will move toward Baghdad. His concern, instead, is about what comes after -- "the unpredictability of consequences," as he puts it. Clark fears that the new dangers generated by a war in Iraq might outweigh any gains from disarming Saddam Hussein.

Clark cites three tests that the administration must meet before going to war. "First, are you sure you won't destroy the international institutions you say you are supporting, and thereby undermine the war against terror? Second, can you win the war quickly and smoothly, avoiding the collateral damage that would make you lose while winning? And third, in the aftermath, can you prevent the growth of al Qaeda and control the weapons of mass destruction that may be hidden?"

If the Bush administration can answer "yes" to all three, then the Iraq war will succeed, Clark says. But he isn't convinced.

Ignatius chose to believe and follow Bush, Cheney and Wolfowitz instead of Clark. He is disqualified as an expert on what to do in Iraq in my judgment because of this. He simply does not have the judgment and intelligence to discuss the issues cogently. To the sidelines with you Ignatius. Don't worry about what the Democrats might do. Try and figure out how you got it so spectacularly wrong first and explain to us why you did. Once you do that, then maybe we can talk.