During his first 30 months in office, the man from Midland had started a foreign policy revolution. He had discarded many of the constraints that had bound the United States to its allies and redefined key principles that had governed American engagement in the world for more than half a century.

Like most revolutions, Bush's had numerous critics. Yet he now traveled through Europe and the Middle East not as a penitent making amends but as a leader commanding respect. America unbound was remaking the course of international politics. Bush was the rare revolutionary who had succeeded.