But they gave their lives trying to get rid of one of the most evil regimes in history.
There may be no evil "empire" in today's Middle East, but there are more than enough evil regimes to go around.
As the Second World War morphed into the Cold War, the terrible truth about one of the most evil regimes in history began to leak out.
Then, in a clear reference to Germany and Japan after World War II, the president added that "we and our allies have fought evil regimes and left in their place self-governing and prosperous nations".
It toppled one of the most evil regimes on the face of the earth, and I don't think we know even a fraction of how deep that evil went.
Indeed, in "Allies," Shawcross notes that while the neocons are considered "radical" for their insistence that evil regimes have sacrificed their absolute right to sovereignty, these arguments "sound close to mainstream liberal internationalist thought".
And the Bush administration, should it take its war on terror to other "rogue" or "evil" regimes beyond Iraq, is plainly prepared to dispense with the legitimacy conferred by a Security Council resolution.
"We must not step back from the challenge presented by rogue regimes, evil regimes, as the president put it" when he singled out Iran, Iraq and North Korea in his State of the Union address on Tuesday.
