While British Prime Minister Tony Blair has taken a pounding on the Iraq war, US President George W. Bush has worked to harvest a political dividend from it, hoping to help brush aside deepening questions over former president Saddam Hussein's arms programs.
The war's outcome changed the dynamics and the thinking of leaders in the Middle East, which offered Bush an opportunity to seize the moment and step up his involvement in trying to forge a comprehensive peace between the Israelis and the Arabs.
Thus Bush became the toiling peacemaker in a week that found Blair on the defensive and under investigation by the British parliament over the veracity of prewar claims about Saddam's still-unfound arsenal.
During a seven-day trip to Europe and the Middle East, Bush cemented ties with Eastern European nations allied with the US against Iraq, mended fences with Russia and China and put into play the most far-reaching Middle East peace initiative of his presidency.
Exuberant on the way home, Bush even had Air Force One fly directly over Iraq's capital as he pointed out landmarks to aides.
"I'm the master of low expectations," he had told reporters traveling with him on the trip.
With Blair battling charges he exaggerated Saddam's weapons capabilities, Bush was winning praise for getting the Israelis and the Palestinians together on a plan to foster peace and establish a Palestinian state by 2005.
At home, Bush's high approval ratings have keep Democrats, with their eyes on next year's White House election, on a cautious path on the weapons issue.
Senator Bob Graham, a presidential hopeful and former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is one of the few to challenge Bush openly on his war motives.
Graham suggested last week that the Bush administration may have "engaged in manipulation and the misleading of the American people" in overstating Saddam's weapons capability.
As for the Middle East, many Arab nations joined in public opposition to the US-British decision to go to war against Iraq. Now, many of those countries are supportive of the US-led reconstruction in Iraq and a strong US role in ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The war also is leading many Arab governments to take more aggressive stands against militant groups inside their borders.
The overthrow of Saddam, who never was held in high esteem by his Muslim neighbors, sent a message to hard-line governments such as Syria's that Bush was willing to act on his pledges to go after regimes that condone terrorism and develop lethal weapons.
"Iraq presented the world with a unique set of circumstances," said National Security Council spokesman Sean McCormack. "Countries like Syria are still faced with basic choices about terrorism and the spread of weapons of mass destruction."
Bush's two days of personal diplomacy in the Middle East also may help ease some of the rampant anti-Americanism in the Islamic world and reassure leaders in the region.
"Other good things can flow from a peaceful resolution of this very difficult problem," said Senator John McCain, a Republican member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
McCain suggests that over-throwing Saddam removed a major threat to Israel and to regional peace, and thus paved the way to progress toward overall Middle East peace.
Questions over how solid was the case for war with Iraq have embroiled Blair in the biggest controversy of his six years in power. Blair staked his reputation on the assertion that Iraq was developing lethal weapons and was ready to use them.
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