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 ...
In a nutshell Rumsfeld's plan was attacking Iraq with 40,000 troops roughly an Armored Division reinforced .... Frank's first submitted plan was for 380,000+ soldiers ... a Desert Storm II and Rumsfeld "vetoed" it.
Rumsfeld did not give Franks a blank check .... Rumsfeld was a roadblock.
Yes it's incredible what our soldiers have done DESPITE Rumsfeld.
"Pampered retirements" for a career military officer, means having a retirement AT ALL. To protect your retirement, your wife, and your family is NOT a dishonorable thing.
Rummy is and has been a jerk--even if the press (and Bush loyalists) love him.
Bush loyalists, in my opinion--due to his consistant big-government policies--are not true conservatives anyway...
I guess I quibble with the word "experience." It was more like a brief encounter. Maybe Zinni stayed at a Holiday Inn.
I guess that is about the best response you could hope to come up with after being smacked. If the soldiers felt the way you do, perhaps you'd have a point. But overall they really don't. Perhaps because they know what's at stake, and they know what's involved in planning, mounting and maintaining combat operations in a variety of theaters.
Rummy is and has been a master--even if the press (and Bush haters) despise him.
:-D
No 'Profiles in Courage' here.
Why not read Franks American Soldier to get a firsthand account of what happened?
"Franks defends his policies, quite at odds with the first Desert Storm / Colin Powell doctrine of using overwhelming force, describing the fall of Baghdad as only having been unexpected by cable news networks such as Al-Jazeera and CNN; the smaller force made his tactical movements far easier to accomplish. "
Treasonous Six Ping!
"Not Applicable" is a response? .... pull your head out of the sand or out of your fourth point of contact. Rumsfeld's plan is just to continue with the emergency ....that is no plan. Rumsfeld's reasoning does not do America justice.
zzzzz
unknown unknowns or known unknowns or known knowns
"Reports that say something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know,"
"We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know."
--Don Rumsfeld--
LOL. Where does it say that Rumsfeld vetoed Franks' plan and decided to implement his own?
The latest critic, MG Batiste of the 1ID, refused a promotion to LTG and be the second in command in Iraq because of Rumsfeld. He decided to retire at MG instead.
So, yes, he did get his "pampered retirement," but he turned down a serious promotion, a $14,000 a year pay raise (base pay only, not counting perks), and a quick look at the retirement pay calculator shows about $500 more a month initially if he'd taken the promotion and then retired.
No, he was marginalized (Patton would never have been at the Battle of the Bulge if not for his friend Eisenhower), relieved, and given a paper command to await his retirement. We have an established history of politics screwing over effective generals.
Just as Rumsfeld laughed at Franks .... Franks is displaying far more loyalty to Rumsfeld then Rumsfeld did to Franks. Rumsfeld also undercut Frank's authority as a commander. One way Rumsfeld did this was by having SOCOM report directly to Rumsfeld ....a clear violation of the Principle of War called "Unity of Command".
Read under "Planning"
Reason for Batiste's appointment to newly created post is unclear
V Corps explains appointment of a second deputy commander
At the beginning of April this year, Baptiste accepted the position of CEO of Klein steel.
"The company just built a 132,000-squarefoot building on Vanguard Parkway a couple years ago. It now has 115 employees. The newest one is Klein's president, John Batiste. Batiste started just two weeks ago but is already looking toward the company's future." Sounds like a bit of a come down for someone who has the nerve to lecture a Rumsfeld with his long and successful public and private record about his leadership and management abilities.
"We want to dominate the Rochester area,” Batiste said. “We want to dominate New York and then, beyond that, New England." Maybe his higher public profile will help him in this regard.
Klein Steel has rated as one of Rochester's top 100 firms since 1995.
Supposedly, Baptiste was offered a promotion if he returned to Iraq as second-in-command. He declined and quit the military in November, reportedly because he no longer wished to serve under Mr Rumsfeld. He said that the lack of adequate troop levels was among a series of mistakes that helped to create the Abu Ghraib abuse scandal by giving too much responsibility to incompetent or undertrained troops. Many serving officers, he said, felt the same way.
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