A VICTORY ONE CAN LIVE WITH. Sixty years ago, the United States military demonstrated the effectiveness of nuclear weapons. To this day, that deployment is controversial. Some people say thoughtful things. Others are very foolish. In the second category, consider USA Today founder Al Neuharth.

Truman will be remembered as the president who brought us both victory and peace in a war that was justified and necessary. By contrast, self-proclaimed “War President” George Bush has brought us neither victory nor peace in the Iraq war, which former president Jimmy Carter this week called “unnecessary and unjust.”

The victory may have occurred on President Truman's watch. That Joe Stalin played a role in encouraging both Germans and Japanese to work with the United States, also on President Truman's watch, requires your consideration as causes of the peace. The destruction of German and Japanese cities as a precondition to victory continues to lead some observers more sensible than Mr Neuharth to suggest that the victory was not a victory they could live with. It's also something that the current administration has in mind: the objective is to remove the non-state actors and state sponsors of Islamofascism without the kind of slaughter of civilians that accompanied the 1945 victory.