The value of any contribution to knowledge should be measured in terms of the prevailing consensus being challenged – the more sweeping the consensus regarding the crucial role of neoconservatism and other first-image theories of the war, the more pressing the obligation to challenge it, and the more valuable the conclusions if these theories are persuasively challenged, largely disconfirmed or significantly refuted. The objective of this book was not simply to defend an interesting counterfactual thesis on a Gore presidency, or provide a new, innovative way to apply counterfactual methodology to historical cases. The primary goal, as I explain in the Introduction, is to use comparative counterfactual analysis as a tool to construct a more compelling, complete, historically accurate, logically informed, theoretically grounded account of the Bush presidency and the strong support Bush and Blair received for the many key decisions they made from 2002 to 2003.

In light of the alternative explanation for the 2003 Iraq war outlined in the preceding chapters, any suggestion that neoconism or its underlying Gore-peace counterfactual deserve to retain their status as the only prevailing ‘truths’ about this war is, in a word, indefensible. Yet neoconism continues to be assigned a high degree of respect despite the clear absence of supporting evidence. If alternative accounts, like the one offered in this book, are summarily rejected despite the presence of an overwhelming body of supporting empirical (and theoretical) evidence, we will be destined to retain incomplete or, worse, fundamentally erroneous lessons from one of the most important wars in decades. What is perhaps most ironic about standard neoconist accounts of the war is that they are plagued by the same errors that proponents of neoconism typically attach to the Bush administration’s process in dealing with Al-Qaeda and the Iraq war: premature closure of inquiry; failure to challenge consensus; an unwillingness to change assumptions embedded in the prevailing wisdom; a systematic refusal to consider alternative theories that are inconsistent with popular accounts and opinions, etc. There are several reasons, therefore, why the arguments developed here using comparative counterfactual analysis are so important.