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 | What the Gulf War should have taught   us |  |  |  | The current degree of death and destruction in the Middle East is reason   enough to assess the first Iraq war, which was launched 25 years ago this Sunday.   But any assessment of the ultimate impact of that conflict cannot be completed   without looking at its sequel, the invasion of Iraq by the "Coalition of the   Willing," in then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's words, in 2003. Because that   sequel unleashed the current devastation.  | 
 
 
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