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I had said before the invasion that Bush needed to tell the truth about Iraq. He needed to say that he was engaging America in a war of choice because it was the right thing to do.
Going to was over non-existent WMDs or some non-existent link between Iraq and Al-Qaeda was a mistake. One shouldn't go to war on the pretext of a lie as it will (and has) come back to haunt you.
Bush should have sold regime change on the premise that Saddam was defying the UN and making a mockery of their resolutions. He should have sold it based on removing a destabilizing influence in the Middle East in the hopes of replacing it with a beacon of democracy and modernization. Something that might have tipped the scales in favour of both region wide.
He should have combined this with massive efforts of diplomacy in Israel/Palestine - the Clinton deal needed to be put back on the table, Palestine needed to be told that suicide bombing needed to be scrapped in favour of Israel retreating to its borders of 1967, and Israel needed to be told , in no uncertain terms to stop the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza.
All of this needed to be combined with a massive attitude shift that would get rid of the arrogant, "you are either with us or against us" that left the US essentially without a coalition going into Iraq.
Bush should have taken more time to bring either NATO or some other larger coalition on board to aid in the nation building that was to happen post invasion. The US would not need any help in conquering Iraq, that was always a done deal that would take weeks. It is the years or decades of nation building that the US was never ready for.
The US public was not ready for the real cost and the real scope of this adventure. Bush never took the time to prepare them for it. There was no exit strategy.
With a real coalition at his side this might have gone differently.
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"My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars."
- Old Man Luedecke
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