Bush and Iraq

Some critics of the hard line President Bush is taking against Iraq have assumed the United States is headed full throttle for war. Welcome developments Thursday make it clear that the situation is more fluid.

The United States retracted a demand that a new United Nations resolution authorize the use of military force if Saddam Hussein impedes the work of weapons inspectors.

Bush has had the support of Britain, a fellow permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, all along. The Thursday compromise is more in line with what the other three permanent members, Russia, China and France, have said they would support. The United States also has won the backing of the European Union and several other nations for its demand that inspection teams be free to travel anywhere in Iraq, including into the dozens of huge compounds that Saddam misleadingly calls presidential palaces.

This is all undeniable progress toward Bush's goal of putting pressure from a coalition of nations on Saddam. Diplomacy clearly is still Bush's weapon of choice.

--The Repository, Canton, Ohio