[PJ-Comix]

It's nice that Hackworth has changed his tune from his previous ARTICLE but his credibility is still pretty well destroyed as a result of it.

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[anton]

Hack was wrong, but he's still a great American, motivated only by his concern for young men in harm's way and cynical of politicos - even the good ones.

[jporcus]

I agree, and have been down on Hack (and some of the Generals). But, you know what? This man and those Generals put their lives on the line and fought for us in the past. So, I say, give them a pass.

[kcordell]

I caught Col. Hackworth on PMSNBC last night. Can't remember the name of the show.

[KeyWest]

I am with you on his loss of credibility. It was not just one article but many, including bad mouthing the training of the troops and that they were not as tough as prior generations. The latter is what turned me off. But it is a typical attitude of ex-military (I am one, a Navy lifer) that "When I was in, ships were made of wood and men of steel".

[Junior]

Hack is a hack, for want of a better term.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

He is an expert
You must break it down to syllables.
Ex= has been.
Spurt = drip under preasure

[San Jacinto]

screw hackworth

[Arkie2]

Sorry to see a tribute to the 3rd from Hack because he becomes the story and not the men of the 3rd. What a great victory for an historic division! Way to go guys. My hat's off to you.

[Gracey]

He acts not like a true American soldier, but as a Democrat, out to smear the opposition. I bet if this event happened on Clinton's watch, his attitude would have been much warmer.

Why the partisanship when it comes to our country and our military? Weird.

[wastoute]

Hack did himself in. He lept telling everybody to "read my book." So, guess what, a lot of us did. After reading a couple of his books you begin to realize the guy is a real leftie. That was why the media loved him. They could bring him on and pretend the were providing "balance" because he was ex-military everyone would assume he was "conservative". He did himself in. He has no one to blame but himself. How would you feel when you found out the used car you bought yesterday was a lemon. People get P.O.d when they find out they been deceived.

[Psalm 73]

Yeah, but instead of running for cover, he did the stand-up thing and admitted he was wrong - a pretty tall order for an ego like Hack.
Subjugating one's ego for the greater good is a very American trait - good for Hack....

[cynicom]

Hack is trying to get out of the hole he dug for himself. Once again, he is irrelevant as he tries to wave the flag as cover for himself. What a disgrace.

[KevinB]

We ain't buying it, Colonel Worthless Hack!

[RightOnline]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't Hack been the voice of doom and gloom throughout this war?

Everybody likes to side with a winner...........:)

[Beck_isright]

Notice that after he was ****canned by all of the conservative talk shows and basically booted off FNC, he's changed his tune. I guess his agent pointed out that being a "MSNBC Military Expert" doesn't do you a lot of good when there are only 3 people and 4 poodles watching the network.

V

[visagoth]

[Non-Sequitur]

This is the same military that this Hack was lambasting as too weak, too out of shape, too femanized by the Clinton years? The same military whose battalion and brigade commanders either started the careers or developed under thos Clinton mandates? Now he's changing his tune, isn't he?

People talk about a Clinton military and how he destroyed it. What the last few weeks have shown is that we don't have a Clinton military or a Bush military, we have the Armed Forces of the United States. Regardless of who is in the Oval Office, no matter how much he tried to destroy it, the military continued to do it's best. It continued to crank out dedicated enlisted men and women, and highly competent commanders. So let's give them credit for the job that they have done in spite of what they had to put up with during 1992-2000.

[genefromjersey]

I read this - AND his previous articles.

At one time I admired his outlook ; then, I began to wonder.I expressed my reservations about some of what he was saying- on his SFTT message board. Silence. I expressed the same reservations here, and ignited a flame war.

How DARE I say anything critical about this hero ?

I'll say it again. Hackworth is a genuine hero, and, as such,is worthy of respect and admiration. This does NOT make him a godlike figure, whose every word must be cherished.

Hackworth's "problem" is that he is writing for a "perceived audience" : one that traditionally votes Democrat, and that is hostile to/ suspicious of the present Administration. He also seems to have some issues with the "Brass" - ( I believe the Brass had some issues with him during the Vietnam conflict, as well. )

In any event, some of his newspaper /website columns wound up sounding like Iraqi "psy-ops" : almost guaranteed to worry the typical GI reading them. I'd like to think his reason for writing these columns was genuine concern; but, looking at his archives, the over-all impression I got was one of spiteful sniping.

Now, a singular victory having been won, he seems to have reversed course, and is shouting: " Congratulations ! I was with you all the way ! "

Wonder what he'll say NEXT week ???????

[mercy]

Dear David,

You are a whack job. Please don't bother us any more. You made the decision to become a 'personality' instead of a person and then you became an idiot. Go away.

[PGalt]

Camouflaged chameleon

[awelliott]

It's nice that Hackworth has changed his tune from his previous ARTICLE but his credibility is still pretty well destroyed as a result of it.

His credibility was destroyed long ago - after all this is the same guy who initially came out against Desert Storm and predicted that we would lose tens of thousands of troops.

[wasp69]

At least Hack was man enough to smile and eat his crow in front of the rest of us. For that I must give him credit. FWIW, I still hold him somewhat responsible for the death of Admiral Boorda while he displayed an unearned Ranger tab.

[NorCoGOP]

Gen. George “Bypass and Haul Ass” Patton

Considering the source, this was the only part worth reading.

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

I wouldn't necessarily say that his credibility is destroyed. Remember that he is bitterly opposed to perfumed princes and to those leaders who are always planning to fight the last war over again. He probably made the assumption (quite reasonable from his experience) that the perfumed princes were still running the show and that they were planning to fight in the traditional manner all over again. When he saw that he was wrong, he had the grace to admit as much. My hat is off to him for that. That said, he really should have kept his mouth shut for a few days longer. Even I, during the brief pause in action during the sandstorm, could see that the doom and gloom naysayers were fair and far off the mark.

[shotgun]

Altough I respect and thank Mr Hackworth for his service and dedication to this country and the troops, I am afraid that he is just looking for more face time on TV. IMHO

[NYCVirago]

Hackworth should be posting to stfu.org!

[r9etb]

It's nice that Hackworth has changed his tune from his previous ARTICLE but his credibility is still pretty well destroyed as a result of it.

This just proves he's a hack playing to his base. Prior to the fighting his biggest fans were predicting (even hoping) for a bloodbath. Now that it's not happened, he pretty much has to jump on the bandwagon.

It's all a matter of market share.

[Brooklyn_Park_MD]

The war according to David Hackworth By Jonathan Franklin http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/08/04/hackworth/index.html The war according to David Hackworth The retired colonel calls Donald Rumsfeld an "asshole" whose bad planning mired U.S. troops in an ugly guerrilla conflict in Iraq. His sources? Defiant soldiers sending dispatches from the front. - - - - - - - - - - - - By Jonathan Franklin Aug. 4, 2003 | Retired U.S. Army Col. David Hackworth is a cocky American military commander who for half a century was at the front lines of the Army's most important battles. Most recently, though, Hackworth has been at the frontlines of a domestic war: the debate over U.S. military strategy in Iraq, and whether the Bush administration planned well enough to achieve a decisive military victory, and to keep the postwar peace. Hackworth was everywhere on cable television during the first days of the war, when early military setbacks convinced him and other retired military leaders that the administration, whose backers sold the conflict as a "cakewalk," hadn't sent enough troops to quell Iraqi resistance. He wrote a widely quoted column headlined "Stuck in the quicksand" in early April -- just as the tide seemed to turn and the pace of victory picked up again. Though he is a colonel by rank, Hackworth was counted among the so-called "television generals" the administration blasted after Baghdad fell, and many conservative admirers turned against him. But now, with American soldiers still dying almost daily in Iraq, the tide of opinion may be turning again, in favor of Hackworth's argument that the administration was unprepared for what's turning out to be a long-term guerrilla resistance in Iraq. Today the primary front of Hackworth's war of opinion isn't cable television, but a pair of Web sites -- Soldiers for the Truth and his own site, Hackworth.com -- where he's campaigning to document the dire fate of U.S. troops in Iraq. The sites have quickly become a repository for the gripes and fears of America's beleaguered combat troops. - - - - - - - - - - - -