Bush Becomes a Wartime President

W A S H I N G T O N, Oct. 8 -- After nearly four weeks of preparing the nation and the world for war, President Bush leaned back in his chair in the White House Situation Room and told his national security advisers, "We're ready to go."

The wave of airstrikes launched Sunday against terrorist and military targets in Afghanistan was the first overt military action taken in what the commander in chief today vowed would be a "long" and "relentless" war against international terrorism.

According to national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Bush decided to pull the trigger on "Operation Enduring Freedom" last Tuesday.

"He decided that it was about time to go," Rice explained.

The Pentagon was then told to prepare for the assault, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was dispatched to the Middle East to shore up support and White House counselor Karen Hughes was told to begin work on the speech Bush would deliver to the nation five days later as the bombs and cruise missiles fell on Afghanistan.

"He called me to the Oval Office and told me that he waspreparing to launch a military operation and asked me to start thinking about an address to the nation," said Hughes. "He was very aware that he would need to define the goals of the operation."

"The Bush administration will enforce its doctrine," the president told his trusted aide, asking her to include in his remarks a reference to a letter written to him by the fourth-grade daughter of a reservist called to active duty in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks in New York and Washington.

On Friday, according to Rice, Bush turned to Gen. Richard Myers, the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and asked if the general who would lead the operation was ready for war.

"Dick, is Tommy Franks ready to go?" Bush asked, referring to the commander of the U.S. Central Command.

"Yes sir," Myers answered.

"Alright then," the president said. "We're ready to go."

Giving the Final Go-Ahead

The only thing that would be able to preempt the airstrikes would be an eleventh-hour objection by one of the "front-line states" in the region. But after returning from a four-day trip to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Oman and Uzbekistan on Monday morning, Rumsfeld reported no such last-minute snags.