Rumsfeld Blasts Top Brass

ny daily news ^ | 3.29.2 | RICHARD SISK

[Madame Dufarge]

I would like to find out if these guys - Army Gen. William Kernan and Adm. Robert Natter - were appointed by Clintonistas......just curious.

"Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen announced today that the President has nominated Navy Vice Adm. Robert J. Natter for appointment to the grade of admiral with assignment as commander, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, Norfolk, Va."

[Redbob]

I think those two yahoos had their own agendas and were trying to use that forum, testifying before Congress, to air those agendas.
They sounded "over-tired" alright, and both should be brought home for a little time-off - say, the next couple years in a windowless office the size of broomcloset in the Pentagon.

[Madame Dufarge]

I would like to find out if these guys - Army Gen. William Kernan and Adm. Robert Natter - were appointed by Clintonistas......just curious.

"Gen. William F. "Buck" Kernan became the first Army general to head NATO's Allied Command Atlantic when he took the reins of leadership from Adm. Harold W. Gehman during a change of command ceremony aboard the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt Sept. 5 in Norfolk, Va. "Along with becoming the supreme allied commander, Atlantic, Kernan became the commander in chief of the recently redesignated U.S. Joint Forces Command. "Buck Kernan is one of the nation's best rapid reactors -- as the leader of the 75th Ranger Regiment and most recently as the commander of the 18th Airborne Corps, America's premier rapid reaction force," said Secretarty of Defense William S. Cohen."

[RetiredArmy]

Security briefings are not held in view of the public or the press. They are held private. Then the so called politicians can fight over who leaks the information first. The briefings however to discuss what we have and what we do not have should be in private.

It goes back to the silly reporter asking I think it was Rumsfeld, when our next special opps attack was going to take place, I.E., date and time of it. That was stupid don't cha think?

[Uncle Miltie]

Time to pull troops out of non-critical areas like:

Haiti
Bosnia
Europe

Focus is key. We are in WW IV, and keeping the troops fresh is critical.

We seem to be pursuing a wise strategy of one terrorist crackpot dictatorship at a time. Good. That has meaning for troop deployment. Next up is Iraq, so let's pull in our horns elsewhere so that we have overwhelming concentration of force there.

Other dominoes will fall more easily, and perhaps without force if we can roll from crushing victory to crushing victory. Focus, gentlemen.

[A Navy Vet]

"Why is it so wrong for these top officers, responsible for the lives of so many to tell the truth as they see it to Congress?"

Because WAR time protocol is different, and rightfully so. I'm utterly amazed at these two, they should have known better. What I'm curious about is why there was no briefing with Rumsfield prior to testimony.

[stands2reason]

It wasn't a closed-door session because the reporters were asking questions about it. If you read the transcript of the press conference, you'd know that Rummy was just responding to their questions, not taking the time to publicly berate these men.

[clintonh8r]

Right. Time to let the Euros defend themselves for a change. We've been propping them up for half a century. Time for them to grow up and get out of the house. We have some other stuff to take care of now.

[kayak]

We are in WW IV

Just call me Rip Van Winkle ..... I slept right through WW III.

[monday]

Do you know for a fact that these briefings were held in public? I have read through this whole thread and still haven't a clue?

It seems to me that the nature of Rumsfields rebuke was that the Generals did not have the facts, not that they should not have revealed them to the House Panel. In other words Rumsfield says our troops are fresh, while the General and Admiral say they are tired.

This is just a guess, but I would tend to think that a congress person leaked the General's testimony to the press?

[texlok]

Freaking 4 stars SHOULD know better than to say something that provides the press with fodder to slam GW and the military. SecDef did his job. If they don't know any better they should be called down in PUBLIC. The troops are NOT tired. They are pumped.

God forbid they actually tell the truth. And how can you say they are not tired and pumped??? We are deployed all over the world, and just remember, our President kept hammering the point home just a year and a half ago that our military was in a poor state of readiness. He did not magically solve that overnight or over the past year.

Our troops are stretched thin. I've got buddies serving overseas, both in the Persian Gulf, and in what's left of the former Yugoslavia. They are having a hell of a time. Unfortunately, congress and Bush won't pull our troops out of all the nation building missions, so our troops in the hotspots are having to do more than they normally would.

[smithson]

"If someone in the current administration had actually served in the military...."

The CURRENT administration? Can you enlighten us about Clintoons extensive miltitary expearience. I think all of us, on this thread ,would like to know. We can handle it.

[RetiredArmy]

Rumsfeld said Kernan, chief of the Joint Forces Command, was out of line for telling a House panel two weeks ago that the troops were tired because "we are busier than we have ever been."

. . .

Natter came under fire for saying the Navy had run short of joint direct attack munitions, or J-DAMs, and had to borrow some of the satellite-guided bombs from the Air Force.

"We damn near ran out in Afghanistan," Natter said three weeks ago.

The way I read this, it seems that it was before Congress in open session and the other guy spoke out loud also it seems. That is the way I read it.

[stands2reason]

Can you make the connection a little more clearly to someone who doesn't quite follow you? Thanks in advance. :-)

[monday]

It doesn't say open session. Unfortunately it just says House Panel, which could be open or closed. There is not enough information in this article to decide .

Anyway, like I said before, Rumsfield seems upset not so much that they said it, as upset at what they said. He disagrees that the Navy almost ran out of bombs and that the troops are tired.

[Quix]

Well said about vascillating. The Book says a double minded man is unstable in all his ways.

[RetiredArmy]

Well, I am sure the troops are tired. But, they are being rotated in and out, so they are getting much needed and deserved R&R. I hope that the commanders and Senior NCOs are taking care of the people. Different types of units have been in and out of there, so I think they are getting needed breaks. We have used a lot of bombs and stuff and with the Klinton cutbacks, we were already short bullets as it was. Firing up a few million is going to make it shorter.

[kinghorse]

Look here, the freedom loving west has a storied history of improving warfaring technique through introspection and argument. If this was done in Ira_ the generals and their families would be fertilizer by now. The point is, through the open and free exchange of ideas people feel they have a say in the outcome and fight harder and SMARTER than their adversaries. One need only look at the example of the naval defeat of the numerically superior Islamists and their Suliman off the coast of Italy back in the 15th century to know freedom and the right to dissent wins the day. The western ship captains adapted in mid-battle by sawing off their bows to make the ships more manueverable in narrow straits and won the day. The Easterners were too fearful of their slaves to even consider unshackling them to respond in kind. So they sank to the bottom of the strait shackled to their rowing benches.

Dissent is all good.

[smithson]

"Our troops are stretched thin."

I missed something. What country in their right mind , during a war, would spread this information around? Can you explaine this new kind of strategy?

"He did not magiclly solve it overnight or over the past year."

Your right. He didn't solve eight years of neglect overnight.

[Uncle Miltie]

Communism. Many fronts, some hot, some cold. Undoubtedly it was the third world-wide confrontation in which virtually everyone had to choose sides. We won WW III.

WW IV just takes on the latest megalomaniacal tyrrany: Islamic Fascism. Choose sides folks, this is going to be a long one.