[WOSG]

What 'other side'? I dont see anyone arguing that the looting of the museum by baghdad residents was a good thing.
The issue is whether to buy this argument that the pentagon is to blame and not the LOOTERS THEMSELVES, and indeed the strawman argument that the pnetagon is somehow responsible for every bad thing that is going on a city that they barely have any control over.

[Rodney King]

The issue is whether to buy this argument that the pentagon is to blame and not the LOOTERS THEMSELVES, and indeed the strawman argument that the pnetagon is somehow responsible for every bad thing that is going on a city that they barely have any control over.

Right, that's the point. The war has all sorts of different groups who beleive that their preferences ought to equate with Rumsfeld's priorities.

You have th environmentalists not wanting us to use DU ammunition.

You have the reporters who want all planning to be done around their safety after they refuse to evacuate war zones.

And now you have the tea and crumpets crowd getting their panties in a twist because their won't be a tresures of Iraq coffee table book out anytime in the near future.

Yeah, it's a bad thing. It might even be as bad as the arm-chair generals here insist. However, the people to blame are Saddam Hussein and the looters.

We were given a list of important sites. We went out of our way not to bomb or damage them, even when Iraqi units were stationed nearby. For whatever reason, we failed to anticpate that this would happen.

Perhpas our generals were busy trying to find the other 7 POW's. Perhaps they were busy trying to find the nuclear and/or chemical weapons. Perhaps they were tracking down war criminals. Perhaps they were planning the attack on Tikrit.

It sucks what happened, and that's all there is to say. People need to get down from their ivory towers and realize that the world does not revolve around their priorities 100% of the time.