Posted on 04/17/2006 5:48:39 AM PDT by .cnI redruM
There is a great furor over whether the opinions of a number of retired high-ranking officers should tip the balance in the ongoing debate over the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
But the question really isn't whether Rumsfeld should resign. He has already resigned several times and had President Bush tear up his letters of resignation. He clearly is taking responsibility for his actions on a continuing basis.
But now that a galaxy of flag officers are raining down on Rumsfeld demanding his resignation, no one seems to have bothered to ask which, if any, of these generals had ever submitted his own resignation in protest against the conduct of the Iraq war, or the bumpy transition we are locked in now. The demands for Rumsfeld's resignation began with Gen. Anthony Zinni.
(Excerpt) Read more at suntimes.com ...
Thanks ;*)
ZINNI: Mr. Chairman, that is absolutely correct. It is my decision. The refueling of that ship in Aden was my decision. I want to be clear. I pass that buck on to nobody. And I want to be clear that the decision oftentimes that we take is not received or agreed with by others. But it is my decision.
And when I take an action regarding force protection, in some cases, Mr. Chairman, I have had to waiver force protection standards because they were physically impossible to achieve. I will not let any of my component commanders waiver it.
ZINNI: I accept that responsibility solely. And I wanted every single waiver, no matter how minor, to come to my desk. I was the authority. I was the one responsible for those decisions. And if I lessened the requirement for operational necessity, because it was physically impossible, or completely unaffordable to do it, and I had to take that risk, it was my risk.
Its so hard to find good help in the military nowadays....what with the war and all. We need more team spirit and sharing ...not so much rough language and such ...our soldiers are beginning to get their feelings hurt. Our school experience was never like this!Group hugs all around.
If true, why was he giving a press conference on Afghanistan in 2001 and why was his "retirement" dinner not until 2004?
He also supervised our withdrawal from Somalia.
But...but...but, didn't some Clintoon Def. Dept. official tell us that the armed services were "...too macho?"
}:^)
Rumsfeld can start by doing his job rather then the Generals' job ie:
"Rumsfeld's Plan" to attack Iraq .... just how wrong can you be .... "Here General Franks .... ignore your recommendations and your staff ..... instead I want you to use MY plan to attack Iraq." Talk about a pathetic "leader".
But let's go to the present time. The National Emergency ends this September. What is Rumsfeld's manning plan in Iraq and Afghanistan WITHOUT using the Guard and Reserve? Does he even have one? Why not? Isn't 5 years enough time?
So what the hell is this? Some kind of banana republic where the generals can toss out their civilian leadership???
Only if Rumsfeld's moles told Hirsch .... someday after Rumsfeld leaves and the truth comes out .... then many of these Rumsfeld lovers will start demanding Rumsfeld's head ...
It does seem to me that Civilian control of the military is one of the more civilizing principles of American government.
The idea that Zinni is a Middle East expert is laughable. His statement that, "I know the area, I know the people, I know the culture, I know the situation" based on his three year stint in CENTCOM shows what a collosal ego this guy has.
Question: You were an early critic of the decision to go into Iraq and take down Saddam Hussein's regime. Most analysts would conclude that the war itself went well. What hasn't gone very well is what has followed, particularly in the last month or so. Do you feel vindicated?
Answer: I don't think of it in those terms. To be very honest with you, this was probably the only time in my life I wanted to be wrong. There is no satisfaction in either saying 'I feel vindicated' or 'I told you so.' I'm very careful to say that none of the things I said was in any way prescient. No one can see the future. I voiced them as concerns. Because I know the area, I know the people, I know the culture, I know the situation. I knew the intelligence right up until the day of the war and I knew it wasn't there, the threat.
Do you think Saddam had any stocks of banned weapons?
I believe there probably might have been some laying around that he wasn't aware of. They would have been obsolete, even dangerous to move around. There might have been some that were destroyed, there just wasn't proper accounting. But he wasn't even focused on that; they (the U.N. arms inspectors) were. So my belief of what was there was the possible, the potential that you had to plan for, of old stocks, artillery shells, rocket rounds. There was probably about two dozen Scuds (ballistic missiles) that were unaccounted for at the outside that could have possibly been weaponized. But as time went on, these things would have been much more difficult to move, much more difficult to upload. If he possessed those tactical weapons, these things would have had maybe marginal tactical effect on the battlefield in the short term. But certainly nothing of a great threat to the United States. So I really did not think this was a major or imminent or grave and gathering or potential threat.
What should we have done, then, in your view?
Continue to contain them. Containment worked. The president has said containment didn't work. I disagree. First of all, containment worked with the Soviet Union, the Cubans, the North Koreans, thus far. Containment was done at very low cost. In Centcom, in my time there when we had the dual containment policy, there were less troops on a day-to-day basis in the entire theater than than report to work at the Pentagon every day in the entire theater.
Not applicable.
Does he even have one? Why not?
Oh, there's likely a contingency plan somewhere on the shelf. That's pretty standard. But if "he" doesn't have one, you might be better off asking the operational commanders (specifically their staffs) who write the plans. But Rummy's made no secret about how he uses the guard/reserves.
Isn't 5 years enough time?
For what? Liberating 50 million people? Yes.
Decimating Al Qaeda's leadership & infrastructure and preventing another attack on our homeland? Yes.
Neutralizing the capabilities of not one but TWO (Iraq and Libya) rogue, or threat, countries? Yes.
Ending the global war on terror? No.
This is a good question...the same question my 1sg hubby has been asking.....these generals have some axe to grind, each and everyone of them.
I know Zinni does have extensive experience in that region. He headed up a relief effort after Desert Storm and had connections with Somalia operations.
You are right. The woman in question was Sara Lister. After that comment the old cow was quietly put out to pasture.
Are you making this stuff up out of whole cloth? It was Franks' plan and he is proud to claim credit for it. Franks didn't like Zinni's plan, which he inherited. Do you really believe that Rumsfeld authored the operational attack plan for Iraq?
"And there's this low boil on Iraq until the day before Thanksgiving, Nov. 21, 2001. This is 72 days after 9/11. This is part of this secret history. President Bush, after a National Security Council meeting, takes Don Rumsfeld aside, collars him physically, and takes him into a little cubbyhole room and closes the door and says, ‘What have you got in terms of plans for Iraq? What is the status of the war plan? I want you to get on it. I want you to keep it secret.’"
Woodward says immediately after that, Rumsfeld told Gen. Tommy Franks to develop a war plan to invade Iraq and remove Saddam - and that Rumsfeld gave Franks a blank check.
”Rumsfeld and Franks work out a deal essentially where Franks can spend any money he needs. And so he starts building runways and pipelines and doing all the preparations in Kuwait, specifically to make war possible,” says
I guess it is all relative. As a fomer foreign service officer who served seven years [read lived] in the area, I don't consider myself to be an expert. Zinni's statement about knowing the culture, people, etc. is pure nonsense. He doesn't know the language and has not dealt on a daily basis with the people of the region. CENTCOM is based in Florida.
I was part of a group that received a briefing from Zinni while he was at CENTCOM. Unfortunately, these unified commanders seem to believe that they are proconsuls. They are loose cannons, which is why the State Department assigns political advisors (POLADS) to these commands. Zinni came across as a pompous ass with a giant ego. He wants to remain in the limelight and probably has political ambitions. He is another Admiral Crowe.
A number of retired diplomats were very critical of Zinni's appointment as Middle East envoy by Powell, because Zinni didn't have the credentials or knowledge of the area.
Okay, I can understand your point and perspective. Just wanted it to be known that CENTCOM wasn't his only experience with the Middle East.
This is nothing more than a "drive by media" event.
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