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WASHINGTON (AP) -- Former general turned presidential candidate Wesley Clark says he has a four-prong strategy to win the war in Iraq and bring home the troops. In a speech prepared for delivery Thursday at South Carolina State University, Clark says the United States should bring in foreign help, reconfigure the military forces serving in Iraq, give Iraqis a stake in the country's success and rebuild partnerships with European allies. Clark said even though he opposed sending troops to Iraq, they must stay to finish the job. "Early exit means retreat or defeat. There can be neither," he said....

<p>The deadly downing of a U.S. military helicopter in Iraq shows the Iraqi resistance is growing in strength as U.S. forces continue their occupation of the country "without a real strategy for success," Democrat Wesley Clark said Sunday.</p> <p>Clark, a retired four-star Army general pursuing the Democratic nomination for president, countered Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's comments suggesting that the deaths of 15 soldiers in the attack west of Baghdad were a sad but inevitable consequence of war.</p>

What to do next in Iraq, and how to do it, consumed the White House last week. President Bush announced a new "Iraqi Stabilization Group" to coordinate policy, and White House aides promised a media campaign to reassure worried Americans that the occupation is making progress. The same topic has dominated conversation in military circles for months. Outlook asked five retired military officers, all with experience in war and its aftermath, to assess the occupation and discuss what the U.S. strategy should be now. Not all of them see eye-to-eye with Bush, who last week argued that the occupation was...

On Tenth Anniversary of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' President Clinton Says 'No Evidence to Support Ban on Gays in Military' 10/6/03 9:10:00 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To: National Desk Contact: Steve Ralls of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, 202-328-3244 ext. 116 or sralls@sldn.org WASHINGTON, Oct. 6 /U.S. Newswire/ -- In his strongest denunciation of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" to date, former President Bill Clinton says that "Simply put, there is no evidence to support a ban on gays in the military." The written statement was made to Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) in conjunction with the organization's End the Witch Hunts...

On the Fox News Hannity & Combs Show of August 21st, General Wesley Clark said the President Bush removed Saddam Hussein “under false pretenses.” The General should know something about false pretenses, as he was the NATO military commander in 1999, during the military intervention in Kosovo. This operation, during our recent co-presidency, was designed to save Muslim Kosovo from a rabid Serbian leader. It was hyped by a media campaign that charged “ethnic cleansing,” but found little evidence of mass murder (unlike the killing fields of Iraq). The propaganda campaign included faked photos supposedly taken of starving concentration camp...

<p>Democrats on Capitol Hill yesterday accused the Bush administration of "unforgivable" and "unconscionable" failures to plan properly for the post-Saddam Hussein hostilities in Iraq that had claimed more than 60 American lives.</p> <p>The Washington Times disclosed in yesterday's edition a secret report for the Joint Chiefs of Staff that said planning for the rebuilding phase was late in starting and not ready for activation when the war began March 19.</p>

WASHINGTON The Bush foreign policy team always had contempt for Bill Clinton's herky-jerky, improvised interventions around the world. When it took control, it promised a global stewardship purring with gravity, finesse and farsightedness.But now the Bush "dream team" is making the impetuous Clinton look like Rommel.When your aim is remaking the Middle East, you don't want to get stuck making it up as you go along.Even officials with a combined century of international experience can behave with jejeunosity — if they start believing their own spin.The group that started out presuming it could shape the world is now getting shoved...

Former Navy secretary blasts Bush on Iraq By DENNIS O'BRIEN, The Virginian-Pilot © August 30, 2003 NORFOLK -- Former Navy Secretary James Webb blasted the Bush administration's policy on Iraq, saying it was sold to the American people on false premises. ``I am very troubled by the fact that we went into Iraq and very troubled about how we're going to get out of Iraq,'' Webb said Thursday to about 200 naval officers, veterans and civilians at the Radisson Hotel Norfolk. The lecture was sponsored by the Hampton Roads Naval Museum and the Naval War College Foundation. The United States...

Some of the Nine Dwarves are trying to spice up their foundering presidential campaigns by blaming President Bush for the deadly bombing at the U.N.'s headquarters in Baghdad. "Had the president pursued the war on terrorism prior to initiating military action against Saddam Hussein, as I advocated last year, it is likely that al-Qaeda and other terrorist networks would not have been able to take advantage of the chaos that now exists in Baghdad and other parts of Iraq," said Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla. "It is becoming increasingly clear each day that the administration misread the situation on the...

A whole bunch of folks here in the USA and around this beat-up globe are all worked up over George W. Bush's 16 shifty words in his "Let's Do Saddam" State of the Union speech when they should be taking a harder look at the president's judgment on the most critical matter to a state: war. After all, most Oval Office dwellers during my lifetime told their fair share of whoppers. Just to name a few of the super-doozies: Ike and the Gary Powers spy-plane fiasco; LBJ and the phony Tonkin Gulf incident; Nixon and Watergate; Clinton and "I did...

WASHINGTON - Flawed assumptions by President Bush's advisers about postwar Iraq are contributing to Iraqis' resentment of the U.S. occupation and undermining its legitimacy, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said Sunday. Even the war itself has yet to be won, said Sen. Dick Lugar, R-Ind. "Having said that," Lugar said, "I reiterate we're there now. Whether they made a good choice or not in terms of tactics is irrelevant." Friday was the 100th day since Bush declared an end to major combat. In his radio address Saturday, he said the administration was "keeping our word to the...

Gore to give major Iraq policy address Thursday in New York... Developing...

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 front lines of a domestic war: the debate over U.S. military strategy in Iraq, and...

It is now three months since Bush declared that the war in Iraq was over. The occupation is costing almost $4 billion a week and lives continue to be lost to Iraqi attacks as troops seek to provide some security and stability. It was agreed that the US and Britain could not simply leave Iraq in chaos after destroying Saddam Hussein's regime, but the standard rememedy - a rebuilt Iraqi military government was not even considered. Instead the allies defied almost all expert opinion in pursuing the highly ambitious goal of endowing Iraq with an elected democratic government. By now,...

<p>We need to get out of denial and face reality if we expect to make rational and determined policy decisions on Iraq. It will take no less than two years of inspired leadership, courageous soldiering and $100 billion to put that nation back on its feet. Make no mistake, the air-ground-sea tactical victory by Gen. Tommy Franks's coalition forces was nothing less than brilliant. But to finish the job we need more U.S. combat forces on active duty to sustain the required force levels. We currently have 190,000 U.S. troops directly engaged in Iraq and Kuwait. Without the overall troop strength to support our Iraq, Afghanistan and Korea deployments, we risk breaking the back of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps in the coming 24 months.</p>

<p>SAN FRANCISCO (AP) Democratic presidential candidate Dick Gephardt on Tuesday issued a blistering criticism of the Bush administration's ''chest-beating unilateralism'' in its handling of the Iraq war, which he said weakened diplomatic alliances and squandered global goodwill following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.</p>

PAUL KRUGMAN NEW YORK TIMES More than half of the U.S. Army's combat strength is now bogged down in Iraq, which didn't have significant weapons of mass destruction and wasn't supporting Al Qaeda. We have lost all credibility with allies who might have provided meaningful support. British Prime Minister Tony Blair is still with us but has lost the trust of his public. All this puts us in a very weak position for dealing with real threats. Did I mention that North Korea has been extracting fissionable material from its fuel rods? How did we get into this mess? The...

Kerry Says 'False Pride' Holding Bush Back in Iraq Mon July 21, 2003 04:14 PM ET WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential contender John Kerry urged the Bush administration on Monday to seek U.N. support in stabilizing Iraq and questioned if "false pride" was delaying the move. Kerry, a Massachusetts senator who is one of nine Democrats vying to challenge President Bush in 2004, told reporters the help of other nations was crucial in helping stabilize post-war Iraq. He said "my blood boiled over" when he read in the New York Times on Saturday that some in the Bush administration might...

<p>We all remember the scene, and if not, the political strategists will remind us of it again and again. President Bush dramatically helped pilot a Navy jet onto an aircraft carrier returning home from the Persian Gulf, and the commander-in-chief who never actually saw combat was greeted as if he were a triumphant conquering hero.</p> <p>Saddam Hussein had been toppled. The United States and its allies had prevailed.</p> <p>"Major combat operations in Iraq have ended," the President declared, his voice cracking with emotion.</p>

<p>ASHINGTON -- Senator Edward M. Kennedy said yesterday that US troops in Iraq are ''police officers in a shooting gallery'' and that they are paying the price for the ''ideological pride'' of the Bush administration, which has failed to secure broad international support for rebuilding and stabilizing Iraq.</p>

If the situation in Iraq is allowed to drift for many more months, a decade from now historians will be asking, "Who lost Iraq?" It's less than four months since I reported that our diplomats were planning to throw away what our military was about to win. Back in February, the State Department and CIA successfully opposed the Defense Department's plan to "stand up" a provisional government and turn the about-to-be-freed Iraq over to Iraqis at the earliest opportunity. Instead, they planned to choose the new Iraqi government from among their "friends" in the region. While casualties mount, progress toward...

Sen. John Kerry, the leading Democratic presidential candidate, is building a war council to help guide his criticism of the president's foreign policy and handling of the after-war in Iraq. On board: Bush defector Rand Beers, former Clinton-era Defense Secretary Bill Perry, and several sympathetic former generals.

NATO should intervene in Iraq: Clinton Sat Jul 12, 4:14 PM ET LONDON (AFP) - NATO (news - web sites) and European states should step forward to take part in rebuilding Iraq (news - web sites) to internationalize the reconstruction process, former US president Bill Clinton (news - web sites) urged at the "progressive governance" conference near London. AFP Photo   "I was trying to think about some way the international community could come back together in the fight against terror. "Europe should take the lead, the Iraq nation-building process should be internationalized. NATO should offer to go in....

The deaths of US and British soldiers, the continuing violence and economic sabotage, and the rising popular resentment at the Western presence are just the first cracks in the façade of postwar American-British occupation. Every student of Iraq issued a warning about the aftermath of war: deep fault lines between Sunnis, Shias and Kurds, with additional tensions caused by Islamic extremists, Baathists and Arab nationalists, would make it difficult to hold the state together. The questions are, is this effort “winnable?” If so, how? And at what cost? Let’s be realistic: measured against the objectives, we haven’t done so well...

Now that military operations in Iraq have come to an end, assessments will be rolling in from every direction of the political compass. We'll be seeing a fair amount of Monday-morning quarterbacking, particularly from the gloom-and-doom armchair generals. (They're so popular, that phrase is now part of the lexicon) There will be the occasional shocked and awed apology from a pundit or two. As far as the anti-Bush movement is concerned, where you'll find the bitterest of anti-war demagogues, mutterings about how things will get worse and could have been better will pollute the airwaves. But this Second Gulf War...

Reducing troops in Iraq would be 'a disaster,' McCaffrey says By Eric Rosenberg Hearst Newspapers Monday, May 5, 2003 WASHINGTON — A force of about 100,000 American troops will be needed to police Iraq for the next five years in order to bring stability and a democratic-style government to the country, a former U.S. commander in the first Persian Gulf War said Monday. Retired Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who commanded the 24th Mechanized Division that helped expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait in 1991, said a smaller occupation force could undermine the swift U.S.-led victory that toppled Saddam Hussein's regime. There...

Commander: U.S. Underestimated in Iraq By CHRIS TOMLINSON .c The Associated Press BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Before the capital fell, armchair generals painted gloomy scenarios of perilous street fighting and plenty of American dead in Baghdad. America could fight from the air, they said, but lacked the stomach for a fight on the ground. Wrong, insists the man who commanded the assault on Baghdad. Col. David Perkins, commander of the 2nd Brigade Combat Team of the 3rd Infantry Division, says the war showed that Americans can fight in any environment. ``We did desert, we did swampland, we did canals, we...

Rumsfeld fires barbs at critics of Iraq invasion By Charles Aldinger AS SAYLIYA CAMP, Qatar, April 28 (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld congratulated top American military commanders of the Iraq war on Monday and fired barbs at critics of the invasion that overthrew Saddam Hussein. "There were a lot of hand-wringers around, weren't there?" he said with a grin to cheers from military headquarters troops. On a tour to thank Gulf leaders for support in the conflict and to discuss potential postwar changes in U.S. forces in the region, Rumsfeld quoted Winston Churchill as he spoke to 1,000...

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff have been unhappy with the criticism of their war effort by former military men appearing on television. So am I, but for a different reason. The top people at the Pentagon are wondering why these ex-military talkers can't follow the company line on how well the war has been fought. I'm wondering why these spokesmen for militarism are on TV in the first place. Here's a list: Lt. Gen. Bernard Trainor, Maj. Gen. Robert Scales, Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold, Maj. Gen. Don Shepperd, Gen. Barry McCaffrey, Maj....

Why have the war critics been so wrong?Joseph Perkins SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE April 11, 2003 Forgive me for engaging in a little "triumphalism." I'm darn proud of our men and women in uniform. They came, they saw, they kicked Saddam's posterior.In a mere three weeks. And "with less than half the ground forces and two-thirds of the air assets used 12 years ago in Desert Storm," as Vice President Dick Cheney noted this week.As coalition forces mop up in Iraq, the focus turns to the post-war campaign – getting humanitarian aid to the needful Iraqi people; installing an interim...

<p>The "armchair generals" who have been providing commentary on the Iraq war for television, radio, newspapers and magazines have taken much flak. Having been one those analysts since 1991, let me comment critically on my own performance and that of my colleagues.</p>

When I first heard that we were announcing our attack on Iraq as a war of liberation, I was horrified. I thought that it was possible that we could be greeted by segments of the Iraq people as liberators; but I was firmly persuaded that the attack on Iraq was justified for a whole host of other reasons, many of which I have spelled out in my articles for TCS. Hence, I reasoned, why take the risk of claiming to be liberators if we were not absolutely one hundred percent sure that we would be seen as liberators. And how...

The retired generals on CNN should have just faded away.

(2003-04-13) -- U.S. Gen. Tommy Franks said today that he can't wait to retire so he'll have a better understanding of what's going on with U.S. military operations. "Retired generals have better operational information than I do," said Gen. Franks. "When I give a news conference now, everything I say is doubted by the reporters. But when I'm retired, the big news media will hire me to talk about what's really going on in the theater of operations. I'm just not in the loop right now." Gen. Franks said he often calls retired generals to gather intelligence about the movements...

With the Pentagon now rushing thousands of troops from Texas to the Persian Gulf, a number of seasoned Gulf War ground commanders said yesterday that the U.S. invasion force moving rapidly to Baghdad is too small and should have included at least one additional heavy Army division. Snip "In my judgment, there should have been a minimum of two heavy divisions and an armored cavalry regiment on the ground -- that's how our doctrine reads," said retired Army Gen. Barry R. McCaffrey, who commanded the 24th Mechanized Infantry Division during the 1991 Gulf War . Snip McCaffrey's comments are part...

America, if it so chooses, can now remove despots with pinpoint precision By PETER WORTHINGTON -- Toronto Sun VIENNA-- Looking back on the three-week war against Saddam Hussein, what was astonishing - as well as the speed and efficiency of the victory - was how so many commentators and "experts" were wrong about how the war would go. While it's fair to say hindsight is 20/20, it should have been obvious the vaunted Republican Guard, with some inevitable exceptions, was mostly a sham. They were not "crack" troops and, given how the homicidal Iraqi regime worked, would never be much...

<p>Just two weeks ago, the news from Iraq was sobering. As coalition forces seemed to slow in the face of enemy tactics, retired military officers used television pulpits and newspaper columns to fret about the lack of forces on the ground. Newspaper headlines warned that ''War Could Last Months'' and announced that military planners faced a ''New Reality, Hard Choices.'' Weekly newsmagazines put photos of wounded US servicemen on their covers and described a conflict that was proving tougher and bloodier than anticipated.</p>

<p>April 13, 2003 -- CRITICS of Operation Iraqi Freedom have enough egg on their faces to bake a souffle worthy of a Paris bistro. At this writing, Saddam Hussein's tattered regime has not surrendered. Nonetheless, the coalition's stunning progress belies the impending doom that antiwar elements predicted.</p>

Stung by widespread criticism of the conduct of the war in Iraq, senior Bush administration officials have become defensive. War is a nasty business, they say, always has been and always will be—and in this one everything is still on track. There is no real reason to worry. They have a point. Despite recent setbacks, it is indeed far too soon to pronounce the military plans a strategic disaster, and the difficulties encountered so far may well look minor if victory comes relatively swiftly. It's also important to remember that in going up against Saddam Hussein, the United States is...

<p>Television screens, newspapers and magazines across the globe this week featured images of a joyously liberated Baghdad.</p> <p>Iraqis danced in the streets, kissed the cheeks of coalition soldiers, threw flowers in the path of tanks and cheered as U.S. Marines helped bring down a statue of deposed dictator Saddam Hussein.</p>

Why drive to Baghdad was a textbook campaign, flaws and all By Kim Sengupta in Baghdad and Christopher Bellamy 12 April 2003 Iraq 2003 is a campaign "military historians and academics will pore over for many years to come", according to Air Marshal Sir Brian Burridge, the top British commander in the Gulf. The rapid success of the military invasion can be traced to the combination of American technological superiority, speed and firepower and the disorganised defence mounted by the Iraqis. Plan 1003 Victor, the Pentagon war plan, had two key principles: "inside out" and "Baghdad first". It may not...

THE APRIL 7, 2003 ISSUE of the New Yorker contains an article by Seymour Hersh that will be taught in journalism classes for decades to come: "Offense and Defense: The Battle between Donald Rumsfeld and the Pentagon." Hersh's opening sentences read: "As the ground campaign against Saddam Hussein faltered last week, with attenuated supply lines and a lack of immediate reinforcements, there was anger in the Pentagon. Several senior war planners complained to me in interviews that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his inner circle of civilian advisors, who had been chiefly responsible for persuading President Bush to lead...

Audie Murphy would be proud. He fought with the U.S. Army’s “Rock of the Marne” 3rd Infantry Division from Africa to Sicily to Italy, and during that hard slug across France to Czechoslovakia, where finally, along with millions of other folks, he celebrated V-E Day. By May 8, 1945, the mighty 3rd had chalked up more combat days on the front line – and sadly more casualties – than any other U.S. division during World War II. Along the way, Audie was awarded more medals than he had places to hang them. Now the Medal of Honor recipient's outfit has...

Pentagon toy boys revel in war's distraction April 6 2003 By Roger Franklin Despite all the gee-whiz phone cams, and "fly away" satellite links, events in the two weeks since the first bombs rained down on Iraq have been anything but easy to follow. Exaltation at the initial surge gave way to surprise that Saddam's loyalists were not merely fighting back but doing so with spirit. Then came the stories of hungry GIs on the front lines, followed by the rumble of recriminations in Washington. It was all the fault of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, a small army of retired...

Can anything be more moving than the joyous throngs swarming the streets of Baghdad? Memories of the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the defeat of Milosevic in Belgrade flood back. Statues and images of Saddam are smashed and defiled. Liberation is at hand. Liberation — the powerful balm that justifies painful sacrifice, erases lingering doubt and reinforces bold actions. Already the scent of victory is in the air. Yet a bit more work and some careful reckoning need to be done before we take our triumph. In the first place, the final military success needs to be assured. Whatever...

THE fat lady hasn’t sung yet but she’s backstage warming up, clearing her throat and going through the scales. While the final act has yet to be played out and perils lie ahead, it’s not too soon to review the performance so far. By any standards, the achievements have been breathtaking. Coalition forces now control virtually all of a country the size of France after just three short weeks. While we don’t yet know the number of Iraqi troops killed, Allied casualties have been light. Although there have been civilians killed, the hundreds of thousands of deaths predicted by...

The war in Iraq seems to be drawing to a close in circumstances as mysterious as those that have surrounded its unfolding from the beginning. The chief mystery now is the whereabouts of Saddam and his entourage. Saddam has disappeared. He may have fled the country. He may have left Baghdad to take refuge elsewhere in Iraq. He may be hiding underground in the city. He may - though the likelihood is now discounted - be dead. Whatever his current situation, some of his supporters are still loyal and are fighting to defend what remains of his regime. Resistance cannot...

War designed to fit a theory, as the Bush administration learned last week, can falter when key assumptions don't pan out. After months of selling its case, the Administration gave the impression it had devised a Teflon war: quick, easy, relatively bloodless. War boosters predicted that Iraq's leadership would snap, Iraqi forces would surrender, Iraqi citizens would welcome American soldiers with open arms. Now that the first week's fighting has sometimes failed to match those expectations, some experts are asserting that the U.S. was not prepared for some of the possible difficulties. By JOHANNA MCGEARY Sunday, Mar. 30, 2003 THERE...

US War Plan Called 'Audacious, Brilliant' (CNSNews.com) - A British military commander with a "passion" for the study of conventional warfare said Monday that the U.S. deserves a lot of credit for the quick progress of the war in Iraq. "The U.S. advance on Baghdad is something that military historians and academics will pore over in great detail for many years to come," said Air Marshal Brian Burridge at a press briefing in Qatar. "It will be a required case study for staff college students throughout the world. They will examine the dexterity, the audacity, and the sheer brilliance of...