This chapter has argued that the explanation for the invasion of Iraq can be found in an extraordinary fusion of circumstances: the attacks on 11 September 2001; the power and conviction of a clique of officials with a grand vision for an era of American dominance; the personality of President George W. Bush; the conservative ascendancy within the United States, accompanied by rising religiosity; and the achievement of astonishing virtuosity in usable military power. These circumstances combined to allow the US system of checks and balances to be briefly overwhelmed, and for an action to proceed that, because it was viewed as a ‘home run’ on several fronts, was not critically second-guessed on any of them. The invasion of Iraq was at once an angry giant lashing out in shock at the impudence of the attacks on 11 September 2001 and supremely confident that it could now impose its grand vision more quickly and decisively than ‘normal’ circumstances might have allowed.

In the eyes of the world and in the eyes of a strong majority of its own citizens, the United States now stands diminished, its legitimacy as the world’s pre-eminent state questioned more seriously than ever before. This legacy of the current Iraq War will not soon be erased and historians are very likely to characterise the 43rd president and his administration as the most damaging in the history of the republic.

Looking ahead to the more immediate future, I am inclined to be more optimistic than the views set out in this chapter might suggest. The reasons for this optimism are twofold. First, a deeply-ingrained capacity for the United States to self-correct and (eventually) align itself with basic norms and principles ranks amongst its greatest political strengths. The United States has a singular capacity to renew itself, to step away from a course of action and take a new path with scarcely a trace of baggage from, or embarrassment about, its past policies. This process could be said to be underway. In his second inaugural address and the State of the Union speech in January 2005, President Bush recast the goal of an end to tyranny in the world as an ideal. He said plainly that making America fully secure once more would be the work of ‘generations’. And he acknowledged that this task was beyond the gift of the Pentagon alone. Similarly, the administration has become more cognisant of the value of partnerships and consensus, especially as regards Iran and North Korea, and the US State Department under Condoleezza Rice has been permitted to exercise its traditional skills in these arenas. While encouraging, these pointers could still be more in the nature of pragmatic adjustments to a transforming domestic political scene than evidence of a propensity to re-visit earlier policy settings and consider the need for significant recalibration. I would not expect this administration to be attracted to such a recalibration. Nor, perhaps, could it be credible if it tried. The sad and simple fact is that its legacy is wholly inseparable from Iraq, and it has no choice but to press on and hope for something resembling an honourable outcome.

The second reason for optimism is that, even in its diminished and chastened state, America’s shoes are way too big to be filled by any other state or, indeed, any imaginable grouping of states. As the prevailing turmoil so strongly suggests, a United States that is confident, engaged and leading remains indispensable to the necessary modicum of order and stability in world affairs. Nor will this state of affairs become questionable for some time. Depending on your projection, and on the exchange rate used, the United States will remain the single largest economic entity in the world for at least another 20 years. Its capacity to bring overwhelming force to bear anywhere in the world, precisely and relentlessly, is likely to remain unmatched for even longer. The point becomes more compelling if one asks when another country might arise with a package of attributes competitive with that offered by the United States: economic strength; military prowess; technological vibrancy; an admired political system; a very marketable set of basic values and beliefs; an appealing culture; a magnificent tradition of leadership and so on. That prospect, it seems to me, lies well into the indefinite future. This suggests that most governments will be only too ready to respond positively to overtures from the United States for a new compact on the governance of world affairs.

The Bush Administration miscued tragically and dissipated a probably unique opportunity to have unipolarity both accepted as a reality and endorsed as an acceptable construct for global governance over the foreseeable future. As Coral Bell has argued so persuasively (including in this volume), the United States should and, indeed, may now begin to look toward arrangements with the flavour of a ‘concert of powers’. A stepping-stone in this direction could be something that a Chinese leader might be tempted to describe as ‘unipolarity with democratic characteristics’. The primary vehicle for any new accommodation will surely have to be a joint resolve and a shared agenda to stop the spread of, and gradually wind back, the phenomenon of extremism.

This process will be neither easy nor certain. We cannot return to the status quo ante. Equally, however, given the US pronounced and comprehensive edge in strategic weight, no imaginable new construct for relations between the major powers in the decades immediately ahead will be unrecognisably different from the arrangements that have evolved since the end of the Cold War. Despite the belated but resounding step back toward the centre at the mid-term elections in November 2006, the impulses that have driven the United States during the past six years will not vanish in January 2009 when the Bush Administration completes its term. A further complication may be that certain other powers, notably China and (perhaps) Russia and India, probably have a rather different view today as compared to 2000 on how the world should work and of their proper role in the process. We might also consider whether we have applied unreasonable standards to the United States. We may have expected too much ‘good international citizenship’ from this extraordinary country, and will have to learn to cope with less as its degree of dominance of the international system stops growing and eventually starts to lessen. Whether there will be enough statesmanship in the relevant capitals to forge or to manoeuvre gradually towards a new modus operandi is an open question. In my view, over the short to medium term the odds appear reasonably favourable.