New Yorkers should probably get ready for a weekend of wailing and hand wringing from the editorialists over the war in Iraq. Senator Kerry is taking on, in respect of the war, a tone of voice that suggests he may replace his running mate, Senator Edwards, with Jane Fonda. And the New York Times rushed in late Wednesday with a report that the intelligence community warned back in August of a pending civil war in Iraq. The White House is seeking to downplay the significance of the estimate. But if that’s what the intelligence community is saying, it could well be correct.

Indeed, a civil war is already under way. It’s now unclear whether Ayad Allawi is even the sovereign leader of Baghdad, let alone Iraq. Al Qaeda has stepped up its recruitment of terrorists, who have effortlessly entered the country through Iraq’s arbitrary borders. The former American viceroy, L. Paul Bremer, failed ultimately to disband any ethnic or religious militias. He allowed Iran’s favorite cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr, to build one of his own. Iraq’s neighbors are doing their best to make sure those free elections the United Nations has been promising are canceled for security reasons.

From the American point of view the thing to focus on is that we are in this war. We’ve lost 41 brave men this month so far, and this month American casualty figures surpassed the 1,000 mark. While every death is important and painful, this is not a large number of casualties for a war of this scale and importance. But it is important to note that insurgent attacks on coalition forces are increasing. Our military has killed or detained 2,580 insurgents since the beginning of September, according to the Brookings Institution’s Iraq index.

Mr. Kerry would have Americans believe that he would manage the war better. In August he said he had a secret diplomatic plan to occupy Iraq with Arab soldiers, thus relieving us of the obligation of fighting Islamic terror in its home court. Yesterday he warned that it’s difficult “to distribute ballots in places like Fallujah and Ramadi and Najaf and other parts of the country, without having established the security,” hinting that if it were up to him, he would give up on Iraqi elections for the time being.

President Bush has made mistakes. He must regret declaring the end of major combat operations when he did. No doubt he erred in trusting the counsel of Iraq’s neighbors at the exclusion of Iraq’s patriots. The neighbors had been playing footsie with Saddam Hussein for years. Mr. Bush opened Iraq’s borders to our enemies. He listened to advisers who thought it more prudent to cut all ties with Ahmad Chalabi than prevent Fallujah from falling to Saddam loyalists. A debate also rages on about whether Mr. Bush sent too few troops, though we tend to think the other errors were more important.

But at least the president knows that we are at war and that America will not win this war until Iraq, and one day the rest of the Arab world, is free. Mr. Kerry on the other hand would have us believe that were he elected, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Syria would all become willing partners in building a democracy out of the ashes of Saddam’s gulags. He has sketched a policy of appeasement in respect of Iran, just when we need it least. He sends a dangerous signal of retreat by pledging to bring our troops home by the end of his first term.

This war, after all, could well go on a lot longer than that. We deserve a leader who never loses sight of what our brave soldiers are fighting for. On March 21, 2003, two days into the war, the president said, “We will defend our freedom. We will bring freedom to others and we will prevail.”

It is a war aim that is well worth sticking to, even through an Iraqi civil war, if it comes to that. Americans know from their own experience the pain of civil war. But we also know that a better nation can be forged from fighting for what is right. Mr. Bush gives every sign of being prepared to stick with this fight. Is Mr. Kerry?