War is a good thing was maybe not the right lesson. From George D. O’Neill Jr. at theamericanconservative.com:
Twenty years after the Iraq invasion: The people in power learned all the wrong lessons.
Twenty years have passed since George W. Bush decided to bring democracy to Iraq through shock and awe. The ill-fated war killed thousands of Americans, disfigured tens of thousands more, left hundreds of thousands of dead and wounded Iraqis, and wrecked many Iraqi institutions. Trillions of dollars were wasted. All for what? Iraq gained death and destruction.
Even the architects of the war cannot say what the U.S. gained. One would have hoped we gained the insight to not repeat this mistake. Instead, the cheerleaders of the war learned that such a grotesque failure was no deterrence for subsequent interventions.
In Iraq, the regime learned that deception and dishonesty appear to have no negative consequences. The war was based on multiple myths. Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction. He did not have any connection to Al Qaeda or 9/11. The Bush administration was aware these assertions were based on elusive evidence at best. Once America invaded and occupied Iraq, the myths were dispelled.
STRAIGHT LINE LOGIC 