Andy McCarthy of National Review wonders, ‘wha’ happened?’
That doctrine, highlighted with great moral clarity a year later in “The National Security Strategy of the United States,” asserts that: “The United States will make no concessions to terrorist demands and strike no deals with them. We make no distinction between terrorists and those who knowingly harbor or provide aid to them.” (Emphasis added.) Even as the State Department and the White House were in the final days of considering their sea change in Iran policy, President Bush took the opportunity of his West Point commencement address on May 27 to reaffirm that “America makes no distinction between the terrorists and the countries that harbor them. If you harbor a terrorist, you are just as guilty as the terrorists and you’re an enemy of the United States of America.”