Here’s a key point about the debate over Iraq–it was always fundamentally about how much risk we were willing to tolerate in a post-9/11 environment (page 328):
The absence of evidence and linear thinking, and Iraq’s extensive efforts to conceal illicit procurement of proscribed components, told us that a deceptive regime could and would easily surprise us. It was never a question of a known, imminent threat; it was about an unwillingness to risk surprise.