Posted on 06/21/2007 5:51:47 AM PDT by meandog
bump
There are only two VIABLE political parties; the Stupid Party (A Casper Milquetoast) and the Evil Party (A Criminal Enterprise).
Unfortunately, people of noble character only have a chance of having their voices heard in the Stupid Party whose mainly well-meaning, but clueless, wonky majority never sees the sucker punches coming from the street fighters.
When you're caught off guard / flat-footed, and on the defensive ALL the time, you are incapable of mounting an EFFECTIVE offense, and the ignoble base of the Criminal Enterprise has free reign to demonize and take all our best people out of action.
Fill in the name of any of the "good guys" on our side in place of John Bolton's name in the quote below, and you have an accurate description of what happens, and will continue to happen, as long as "We the People" allow it:
"The U.N. ejected John Bolton in the same way a healthy person ejects a toxin from his system. For he was toxic to their evil." ~ Gagdad Bob
Aside from that, it is specious to assume that war goes according to plan and can just be managed. That's just a bunch of lawyerly blather which is disconnected from reality. They don't have a clue about management.
I seem to remember Rumsfeld getting a standing ovation worthy of a rock star when he paid a surprise visit to Iraq. Somehow I doubt that the same scenario would play out if any Dem (other than Zell Miller) were to drop in. In the aggregate opinion of thousands of troops Rumsfeld was the man. And, let’s face it, these are the people he supposedly failed.
. You can't just measure something against a perfectly good standard where Abu Gharib seems like a catastrophe, you also have to contemplate how it measures against a worst case scenario, and against that standard our Iraq war has been almost a cake walk.
I expect the plan in war is to replan and then replan again until you get the job done. I always thought THAT is what was meant by "stay the course".
An oldie but a goodie.
occurred in the winter of 1950, under Secretary of Defense George C Marshall
But it wasn’t Marshall’s fault. It was that senile old man MacArthur.
Factually incorrect on every point about Rumsfeild. When are you going to learn your emotion based opinions are not facts?
Considering your relentless campaigning for Jim Webb, Democrat Socialist Senator from VA, I would think you would have finally learned your emotion based dogmas are not to be trusted.
Since the Sec. of Def. post was established:1. Robert Strange McNamara served Kennedy and Johnson
2. Harold Brown (Carter)--both did abysmal jobs and hold a similarity to Rumsfeld so, perhaps, the answer should be that no good comes from sticking around for the second term or a president.
Because after the longest term of any Sec Defense he was tired of having to listen to the idiot rantings of Dincon morons who know absolutely NOTHING about Iraq but still cling arrogantly to their Do Nothing 09-10-01 political dogmas.
No, Rummy resigned because he was a lighting rode for all the demoagogary on Iraq. By resigning he allowed he changed the media template from all negative on Iraq all the time to “get Rummy” to something that does allow the occassional balanced peice thru.
Rummy put the good of the country in front of his ego or his personal political opinions Something the screaming lunatic Know Nothings on the Right, doing their best to elect Hillary Clinton President in 2008, would be wise to do.
You’re right meandog... I like Rummy... but he and Bush DID FAIL to hit them HARD when we had the PR behind us. They failed to learn from the lessons OF Vietnam and thus repeat them. We STILL can crush them if we just forget that public opinion will be harsh on it for a season. Where is the “bring it on”? W has become Harry Truman.
1. Too few "boots on the ground" in the initial stages of OIF. (We went into Iraq with less than 1/6 of the U.S. and coalition troops that invaded Kuwait--a country approximately 1/5th the size of Iraq.
2. Widespread looting and (probable) movement of WMD after Baghdad taken.
3. Iraqi army and paramilitary forces completely dismantled (instead of saving those loyal to the country and weeding out Saddamists, we opted to "rebuild" thus giving optimum time for insurgency to begin).
4. Micromanagement of commanders and disregard of opinion of military people such as Gen. Shenseki, others.
5. Resistence to "surge" which is now employed...
McClellan-like, Rumsfeld was only effective in rebuilding the military; not leading it and IMHO he goes down in history along with Simon Cameron as far as legacy!
When are you going to realize that your constant lies don't bother me--again, I voted for a libertarian in the Va. Senate race after Webb embraced the Clintons--and I certainly campaigned for neither Webb nor your boy, "Macaca"
If his resignation had anything to do with “the good of the country” he’d have resigned BEFORE the 2006 elections, not after Pelosi & company took over. That MIGHT have helped some good conservatives keep their seats, like Curt Weldon for one example.
No, he was Bush’s sacrifice in exchange for the shamnesty bill IMO.
For starters, we did completely dismantle the SS; and the Germans had an EXTREMELY professional army before the war that acted distinctly different from the SS, and which managed to survive Hitler - at least in part. Anyone in any sort of leadership position in Iraq's army was a Baathist - he'd done a Stalin-like purge of the Iraqi military before the first round of the Gulf War.
Leaving the set of connections and inter-relations intact would have been yet another obstacle to deal with. You may have noticed, but even as it is we've had a notable amount of trouble from infiltration into the various government agencies...imagine if we simply left them in place. Imagine also whether or not there would be any Kurd or Shia ability to trust the organizations?
I mistakenly pinged you. Meant my comment for someone else.
Considering that the opposition plan expected 9 months and 10k dead just to get to the edges of Baghdad. You know...the whole "we didn't send enough troops" crowd.
Even though I voted for him twice, I'm no Bush fan. However, I find it a lot easier to defend the president on Iraq than Rumsfeld. The SECDEF was charged with the responsibilities of ensuring our armed forces had the means and leadership to snuff out ALL resistance in OIF. Rumsfeld resisted the any idea of allowing Iraqi soldiers (those Republican Guard and IA professionals not loyal to Saddam) to remain after swearing allegiance to their country and he steadfastly resisted any notion of the "surge" now working--thanks to Gen. Petraus. Though successful in restoring the military handed to him by the Clintons, Rumsfeld, IMO, was a complete and utter failure in every other regard. A Ford adminstration had been, he was arrogant and oblivious to those such as Gen. Shenseki who had led Central Command and knew what he was talking about. He, McNamara and Harold Brown go down in my book as the worst SECDEFS since the post (Forrestal) was established in 1948 and he might be the worst since Simon Cameron (Lincoln's War Secretary) depending on the outcome of Iraq.
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