Three op-eds and two stories: Who do you believe?

Today's New York Times, marking the anniversary of the US and British invasion of Iraq, has run three Op-Eds of some note: the NY Times editors themselves, Donald "Bubba" Rumsfeld and Paul Krugman. Now for some excerpts: Let's tart with Rummy:

"In Iraq, for 12 years, through 17 United Nations Security Council resolutions, the world gave Saddam Hussein every opportunity to avoid war. He was being held to a simple standard: live up to your agreement at the end of the 1991 Persian Gulf war; disarm and prove you have done so. Instead of disarming -- as Kazakhstan, South Africa and Ukraine did, and as Libya is doing today -- Saddam Hussein chose deception and defiance.

Repeatedly, he rejected those resolutions and he systematically deceived United Nations inspectors about his weapons and his intent. The world knew his record: he used chemical weapons against Iran and his own citizens; he invaded Iran and Kuwait; he launched ballistic missiles at Iran, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain; and his troops repeatedly fired on American and British aircraft patrolling the no-flight zones."

So Rummy's story is that Hussein didn't disarm, although Rummy doesn't bother to give any evidence of this.

Now let's go to the New York Times editors:

"It's nonetheless important to remember that none of this [Iraq invasion] might have happened if we had known then what we know now. No matter what the president believed about the long-term threat posed by Saddam Hussein, he would have had a much harder time selling this war of choice to the American people if they had known that the Iraqi dictator had been reduced to a toothless tiger by the first Persian Gulf war and by United Nations weapons inspectors. Iraq's weapons programs had been shut down, Mr. Hussein had no threatening weapons stockpiled, the administration was exaggerating evidence about them, and there was, and is, no evidence that Mr. Hussein was involved in the 9/11 attacks.

Quite the contradiction to Rummy's article.

Now for the Krugman punch line:

"But yesterday [...] the president of Poland — which has roughly 2,500 soldiers in Iraq — had this to say: 'That they deceived us about the weapons of mass destruction, that's true. We were taken for a ride.'"

So Rummy says "we were right" and the Polish president, along with the new Spanish Prime Minister, both says the US lied. Now who do you believe?