[LS]

1. It wasn't "Rumsfeld's rejection." It was the generals, who drew up the plan. If the original plan went as everyone thought, Saddam's guys would have fought early, and died early. We needed speed and mobility. More troops=slow, more supplies.

2. As I wrote in "America's Victories: Why the U.S. Wins Wars," the "surge" was working before it worked. That is, one of the MAIN reasons it's working---which everyone seems to ignore---is that we killed more than 40,000 of these guys, wounded 200,000, captured 25,000, and in all likelihood another 10,000 simply quit or defected. These are astounding numbers, and they mean that by the time the "surge" got in place, we had already hollowed out AQ in Iraq, very, very badly.

[petercooper]

Going to check out your books. Do you have backup for those #’s you state- always looking to give lib friends cold hard facts to stymie their b.s. thanks

[Eric in the Ozarks]

The generals said what Rummy wanted them to. Nothing more, nothing less. Who do you think they worked for ?