The Generals and Rumsfeld

(Cartoon via TruthDig.com)

Rumsfeld: On His Way Out

Is the old man at the Pentagon, the incompetent Donny Rumsfeld, on his way out? One can only hope, of course.

What’s even sweeter is that, with Rummy out, America can begin to recover from the damage that this man created within our military; and, as Liberal Oasis notes, there’ll be some added benefits to make his departure even better:

[I]ncreasing pressure can potentially create a distraction for the Administration, sapping staff energy and crowding out news stories helpful to Bush’s agenda.

And if the pressure finally succeeds and Rummy leaves, there would certainly be a transition period at the Pentagon that would slow down the start of any new projects, say, war with Iran.

Since Bush’s clock is ticking, any delay could be a big help in saving us from another senseless war.

One can only hope, one can only hope.

General Zinni: Rumsfeld Should Resign

I don’t know how to feel about this… on the one hand here’s a highly decorated, knowledgeable and respected Marine general telling us what many of us that opposed Bush’s war of choice against Iraq knew from the get go, essentially: the Bush Administration lied the country into a strategic blunder in the Persian Gulf. But that’s not what am ambivalent about; instead, what I don’t quite get is, why didn’t the good general come forward before the start of the war? Of course, while I don’t know the exact answer to that question, I can guess at the myriad of reasons as to why general Zinni did not speak out before the start of the war — the conservative noise machine that vilified Bush Administration critics and, too, the Bush Administration itself, which was not shy about going after its critics. Just look at exhibit A: army general Shinseki, whom had the temerity to suggest that a US invasion force would require hundreds of thousands more troops than what the Bush Administration was saying it would need to control post-invasion Iraq. After general Shinseki publicly stated that the invasion force would need to be much larger than what the Bush White House was telling the American people, Bush’s conservative henchmen went after the general:

Hardly any of this the reached public domain until last month when Gen Shinseki told a congressional committee that he thought an occupying force in the hundreds of thousands would be required to police postwar Iraq. Mr Rumsfeld publicly repudiated him, saying he was "far off the mark".

In semi-private, the Pentagon’s civilian leadership was far more scathing. A "senior administration official" told the Village Voice newspaper that Gen Shinseki’s remark was "bullshit from a Clintonite enamoured of using the army for peacekeeping and not winning wars".

Then the general said it again. "It could be as high as several hundred thousand," he told another committee. "We all hope it is something less." Most of the media were too distracted by the build-up to war to notice. Serious analysts, however, were staggered by the insubordination.

This appears to have been round two of another, more immediately relevant, dispute about how many troops are needed to win this war. In this case, the military prevailed over the original civilian notion that fewer than 100,000 could do it. As even more soldiers rush to the Gulf to bring the number closer to 300,000, the original Rumsfeld plan looks in hindsight to be what the army said at the time: a recipe for possible catastrophe.

The full reality on the ground may not become known until Saddam Hussein has fallen, but no one can now seriously believe - as many top Pentagon civilians appear to have done a week ago - that the main problem for an occupying force will be what to do with all the floral gifts.

I’m sure that with the above as backdrop, general Zinni was reluctant to speak out against the march towards war; however, now we see that general Shinseki was prescient in his estimate and has not been fully vindicated; while the Bush White House and its supporters have been proven to be utter fools.

It’s no wonder how now general Zinni can demand Rumsfeld resignation without hesitation — I would go a step further, the entire Bush Administration should resign. Every. Single. Last. One. Of. The. Fools!

Stop the Deception - MoveOn.org Video

“No terror state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people and the stability of the world than the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq.”
— Donald Rumsfeld, September 18, 2002

Visit for the video http://www.moveon.org/censure/caughtonvideo/