History’s judgement of our actions in Iraq will (I predict) depend critically on the next three administrations. Constancy of purpose enlightened by clarity and depth of understanding give us the chance to remake the entire middle east, and to change the strategic picture of the whole world. For good or ill, we might add, though I hope that the road will be toward peace and prosperity for all.

Whether we will be wise or lucky enough to chose Chief Executives who understand this, care about it, and have the skill to act on it is up to us. The most vocal advocates of the Nanny State are, by necessity or accident, the most feckless when facing the community of nations. They seem to raise fecklessness to a virtue; by letting things go to hell they prove both their “humility” and their singleminded apathy for everything outside their social agenda.

Petraeus is the one:

http://americanpowerblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/vladimir-putin-and-russian.html

But there is reason for caring because a lot of people do read it. And believe most of what they read.

The problem is, as I see it, there aren’t enough middle of the road or conservative media outlets in this country. All points of view are well represented on the blogosphere, but not enough people read the blogosphere for it to have the kind of impact that some of these mass circulation publications have.

In the U.S. it seems that about 30% are committed to the left wing philosophy and 30% are on the right. It is the 40% who are in the middle that actually move this country in one direction or another.

Most of the MSM are tilted left. Some, such as the NYT, extremely left. It is difficult for the middle 40% to hear the other side of the story or even get a neutral point of view. Wouldn’t it be refreshing to see a new mass circulation publication dedicated to reporting only the facts in its news stories, but with a lively editorial page where both sides of issues were debated? Would it sell? I sure would like to see it tried.

“They seem to raise fecklessness to a virtue . . . .”

I have known many liberals in the academe and liberal-religious situations, and came to think there was an underlying cowardliness in avoiding choosing better from worse, from fighting for the better, much less entering the police or military where physical discomfort, again, much less danger, becomes a real possibility.

But that didn’t seem the correct word, so to the New SOED:

coward: noun. A person who shows unworthy fear in the face of danger, pain, or difficulty; a person with little or no courage. Heraldry. Of a lion or other animal: having the tail drawn in between the hind legs.

But many liberals I’ve know — albeit a sample skewed to the upside of sixty — have been very courageous, effective people. So, back to the New SOED:

fecklessness: adj. Feeble, futile, ineffective, aimless; irresponsible.

njcommuter has an excellent sense for the correct word.

They periodically gong on me to renew (including at one juncture sending me the rag, unrequested, then billing me for it), but on each invoice I wrote, “Lose the reflexive anti-Americanism and then I’ll reconsider.”

Probably doesn’t do any good, but it makes me feel better.

Time and Newsweek have both been, in my view, relatively uninteresting and sub-par news organizations for many years now.

As for the NYT being “left-wing” — that may be true in some ways, but you guys are probably forgetting that it was the NYT that published a long series of extremely pro-war articles by Judith Miller among others, which relayed disinformation coming from Chalabi and other bad intelligence promulgated by the White House with far more credulity than it deserved. The New York Times was responsible for a large amount of cheerleading in favor of going to war, based on bad information and lack of skepticism of very unreliable intelligence (of course, they weren’t alone in this in the runup to the war — though some more astute reporters did notice there was something fishy about the stories — for example, the fact that the same source would one day be reported to be a colonel, another day a general, another day a senior Iraqi civilian official, etc.)

Their website has archives that go back to the 1920s.

I made a page on my website that shows all the reporting they did from 1922 to 1967 (that’s where I stopped)

You can see back in the 20s and 30s Islam must have been in the news a lot. How said how much we forgotten in the past 50 years.

Here is the link

http://home.comcast.net/~vincep312/timemagislam.html

I made a page on my website that shows all the reporting they did REGARDING ISLAM rom 1922 to 1967 (that’s where I stopped)

Didn’t think so.

This reminds me of what Howard Roark said to Gail Wynand in the Fountainhead:

“Gail, how much lying to yourself are you capable of?”

Read the whole thing here. I hope you’ll stop asking the question now, now that you’ve been informed.

http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=09F9FC90-1752-4965-8D02-D2EFD4FB112B

FP: John Loftus, Dave Gaubatz and Ryan Mauro, welcome to Frontpage Symposium.

John Loftus, let us begin with you.

Your volunteers at the IntelligenceSummit.org have been examining the secret documents captured from Saddam — and it appears that they have solved a large part of the mystery of Saddam’s missing WMDs. Correct?

Loftus: Yes, now the truth is beginning to emerge. Saddam’s own secret files show that he was lying to the UN, year after year. He told the UN that Iraq had no more WMD after 1991, and would never start those WMD programs again. But his own secret records show that in 2001, 2002, and 2003, Saddam was repeatedly purchasing banned chemicals, covering up radiation leaks, and generally orchestrating a cover-up.

Are the records genuine? We had NSA check the audiotapes to make sure it was Saddam’s own voiceprint. It is. Now, why would Saddam and his top aides record all those tapes year after year and hide the forgeries in secret vaults? There are three shelf miles of paper records. What is the point? These are secret internal records, it is not as if he was using them in public to fool the Iranians into thinking he had WMD. These records almost did not even make it onto the light of day. They were buried amid a forest of documents that might not have been reviewed for decades, if ever. I cannot think of any explanation but these are genuine secret archives of Saddam’s innermost feelings at his innermost meetings.

Moreover, at the time people like Dave Gaubatz and John Shaw were putting their statements on the record about how the WMD ended up in Syria, they did not know that we would get circumstantial corroboration from Saddam’s own files. Statistically, this is beyond the realm of possibility of fabrication.

Gaubatz: Thanks Jamie. My friend Mr. Loftus is the person who has inspired me to continue requesting our political leaders and the American public demand the truth about WMD be brought forward. There was a point in time when I had raised the flag indicating I surrender and can no longer fight the WMD cause further. Then I thought of the innocent children who would suffer the most during a terrorist attack in which WMD was used. I have obtained a second wind and want to inform everyone based on many years of working counter-intelligence, I left Iraq knowing WMD had indeed been buried, some had been transported out of Iraq directly before the war, and some has now been looted by our enemies.

Are the records genuine as Mr. Loftus stated? The documents are genuine. In the last year I was informed by Federal Agents on the ground in Iraq, that many Iraqi sources who provided WMD intelligence to us in 2003, were subsequently kidnapped and killed for helping Americans.

I want people to realize the war in Iraq is unlike any that our country has ever faced. There was chaos in 2003, and there is chaos in 2007. I do not mean to put fault on any one person for the failure to locate the WMD when we had the opportunity. Our leaders had the best intentions, but failed to properly review intelligence reports in a timely manner, and most were not acted upon. We are now suffering the consequences of not listening to the counter-intelligence officers on the ground and who was obtaining first-hand intelligence. In 2003 we reported the pending civil war between the Sunni and Shia Muslims. In pure Islam the Sunni Muslims consider Shia Muslims to be non-believers and apostates. The punishment for apostasy is death as described in Fiqh Us Sunnah. Fiqh Us Sunnah is in virtually every Sunni mosque in America. Our mapping team just left Florida. A prominent Islamic Scholar (Sunni) advised that all Shia people need to be
killed in the U.S.

The best way to solve the WMD mystery is to have all witnesses involved in either the search or excavations come before Congress and testify. This is when I will release names and contact information of the Iraqis who know first-hand about WMD and the Al Qaeda presence in Iraq well before 2003. Military agents will then be called forward.

This issue is very easy to prove. Put all players before Congress, under oath. The truth will be revealed. Some will be hurt politically or their military careers will be damaged, but America will know the truth. The truth is the only thing that may have a remote chance of preventing another attack against our great country.

Mauro: In 2006, particularly after pressure from the Intelligence Summit, the Bush Administration began declassifying some of the millions of documents that have been found in Iraq. Many of them were not translated due to the sheer volume of documents the U.S. possessed and how few reliable Arabic translators we have. These documents, as they were declassified, were put on the Internet where concerned citizens, fluent in Arabic, began translating them. Joseph Shahda and Ray Robison are two individuals who played a critical role in this. My only role was organizing and presenting them at the 2007 Intelligence Summit, and coupling it with the extensive open-source research I’ve done.

However, this web site where the declassified documents were placed has been taken down. An Iraqi document with critical details on how to build a nuclear weapon was posted, and the government decided it was best to end this practice. As a result, millions of documents are not translated and analyzed, leaving a big gaping hole in our intelligence collection. Though the picture is incomplete, we have clear indications that Iraq, at the least, had the capabilities to produce WMD and was actively researching and expanding that capability. There is also evidence that WMD went to Syria.

Is Shinseki and you therefore better (armchair) generals than Petraeus?

So now even actual generals are armchair generals to you guys?

What’s so disheartening about reading comments like yours, Ymarsakar, is that you seem to be so wedded to the idea of your side always being right that you can never see even the possbility that any critics of your “side” can ever be right, no matter how overwhelming the evidence.

>if we had an oppressively heavy footprint in iraq

If we had had enough troops to begin with, we would have had a chance of preventing much of the unrest we’ve seen before it even began. Of course, it would also have been a huge benefit to have had much smarter tactics on the ground, which wasn’t about to happen while Rumsfeld was in charge. The insurgency would have still happened, of course, but on a much smaller scale, and we would have had far less reason to engage in tactics such as the Falluja incident, etc. So, I think you’re wrong, Vince P — it would have resulted in fewer accusations of brutality, etc., against our troops.

Sure.. what ever you say.

That’s why I tend to put the word “surge” in scare quotes—the term itself indicates that the most important (and perhaps the only) change was in numbers. The increase in numbers was certainly vital; but the change of tactics was at least an equal factor, if not a greater one.

Are you somehow trying to claim that Shinseki had the same combat command responsibility as Petraeus right now does or did as the commander of the 101st? I know you aren’t claiming this about yourself, but you are under the presumption, I assume, that Shinseki has made the same kind of decisions as Petraeus.

Even if we assume such an erroneous view on the past is correct, it would still only mean that Shinseki made the wrong decisions while Petraeus made the right decisions given the fact that the success is occuring now under Petraeus and now under Shinseki, whatever Shinseki was over on.

Ymarsakar, is that you seem to be so wedded to the idea of your side always being right

I think you’re talking about yourself and all those generals that failed in Iraq and are now putting the grindestone to the axe.

Petraeus is not on your side, yet you still behave as if your views about Petraeus are somehow compartible with your views on other generals, like Shinseki. Those beliefs are rather in conflict, have you not noticed?

that any critics of your “side” can ever be right, no matter how overwhelming the evidence.

The only evidence you have provided is that somehow you can see into alternate dimensions and state, with finality, what would have happened if things went the way you said they should have.

Am I supposed to accept this “evidence”, Mitsu?

which wasn’t about to happen while Rumsfeld was in charge.

McCaffrey made the same point that you did here. He also praised Petraeus’ actions. The comment I made over at Belmont Club covers why General McCaffrey is operating on tunnel vision. Specifically, tunnel vision on how Rumsfeld was bad and they were right. Rumsfeld was not bad and they weren’t right.

I’ll dig up the link later.

and we would have had far less reason to engage in tactics such as the Falluja incident, etc.

There is the belief that simply with a bigger hammer, the enemy won’t try and fight like they did in Fallujah. That’s an erroneous reading of human nature, of course, but that’s proto-typical of those with the wrong philosophy.

Wars contain more than just your plans and reasons, Mitsu. It also contains the enemy’s reasons and plans. Any analysis in the midst of a war, before a war, or after a war must take into account the fog of war which means the fog of human liability and fallibility.

The insurgency would have still happened, of course, but on a much smaller scale

That simply demonstrates that regardless of how much you may praise Petraeus, you simply do not understand the reasons for his success. That is due to the fact that you have erroneous assumptions about what could have happened, what Rumsfeld did, and things like that.

it would have resulted in fewer accusations of brutality, etc., against our troops.

The idea that the international media and Al Qaeda would create less Blackwater deathblossom accussations, less Haditha civilian massacre accussations, and less Abu Ghraib masturbations if Bush had used 500,000 American troops, is an idea that is simply without sense.

Do atrocities and mistakes become less frequent when you add more people into the pot? Do they? Does the enemy suddenly become more reasonable and say that it is no longer profitable to cry war crimes if there are two Americans instead of one in a particular neighborhood?

Look, Neo. Petraeus is a puppet and carries Bush’s political water to the Left. There is no way the Times believes Petraeus is influential, because they don’t believe Petraeus is his own man. You can’t change such beliefs easily, as you know already.

But Iraq, and our recent turnaround there, is of major consequence to the world, not just to the US—especially if it is allowed to go forward and to be built on further.

Every war is meaningless and nothing but a cycle of violence. Thus how can any one man influence it either way?

the gratitude of so many of the Iraqi people, and the satisfaction of tackling a very hard and important task and doing it well—work that is far from over, and that continues to be difficult and risky.

You may or may not have heard this story from Blackfive, Neo, but Petraeus was shot in the chest, unarmored, at a live fire training exercise one time. He was touring the premises, presumably, when a soldier dropped his rifle and it fired off and into Petraeus. Now, normally, such a soldier would have found that his military career just died. Petraeus, on the other hand, recommended that soldier for the Rangers.

# Occam’s Beard Says:
December 23rd, 2007 at 1:01 pm

Mitsu, any idea where I can get down a bet on last week’s NFL games?

Forget that, I want the next year’s NFL games. Let’s go to lottery numbers as well. There must be more than one alternate dimension with the same lottery number. Find the ones with the greatest repetition and I’ll use em.

The oracle that can see into alternate dimensions also gets a cut, of course.

There are some decent arguments advanced there for the position that more troops would not have been a good idea early on although they were a good idea later on.-Neo

Numbers mean nothing without the right leadership, Neo. So long as the Army insisted on failed policies, strategies, and Rules of Engagement, nothing decisively productive will get done even with more people. Shinseki could not solve the Army’s problems. The Army’s problem was solved by learning from a mortal enemy, Al Qaeda. You can’t get that through bureacratic number crunches. No matter how well intentioned or how “if only we could have, we would have been…”.

The increase in numbers was certainly vital

Not to the Democrats that said we should have had more troops in Iraq in the first place. Then when Bush was actually going to increase the numbers, suddenly things were different. Suddenly the Democrat obstruction started failing to put the fog of war over on folks.

Neo,

Thanks for the reference. I looked at the thread. One commenter made the point that COIN would not have worked prior to 2006 because the local insurgents were not interested in cooperating with the American military at that time. My point is somewhat different — that a much heavier troop presence at the outset of the war would have prevented the initial insurgency from gaining nearly as much traction as it did, i.e., fending off the cooperation between enemy forces that existed in Iraq prior to 2006.

I fully agree, of course, that Petraeus’ success is not due merely to numbers of troops, but to a set of counter-insurgency tactics which are far more intelligent than what was in place prior to this. In other words, I agree that without Petraeus’ tactics, the surge probably would have failed — note that the surge merely increased troop levels to a level where they were previously, and at that time it didn’t work, and now it is (though one should also note that Petraeus is benefitting from natural political evolution in Iraq, as Iraqis themselves are recoiling against the fundamentalists just as Iranians have in response to the hard liners there — i.e., it is partly Petraeus, partly just time).

But I still think significantly greater troops, guided by intelligent generals on the field, would have made a big difference. We DO have experience dealing with similar situations — for example, Bosnia. What people don’t realize is that Shinseki didn’t pull his estimate out of his ass — it came from the troop densities used successfully in Bosnia and elsewhere. There were existing tactics and strategies we and other Western nations have used with success in volatile areas, which Shinseki had in mind (according to press reports) when he gave his estimate. Another interesting fact is that Petraeus’ COIN manual also specifies a very similar troop density to what was used in Bosnia, i.e., if you follow his manual, we should have had hundreds of thousands more troops in Iraq at the outset.

The “surge” strategy has a lot of prongs, but one idea was that since we don’t have the troops to implement COIN across the whole of Iraq, he used the “surge” troops to implement greater troop density in a much smaller area, the most unstable parts of Baghdad. It’s a testament to his creativity and intelligence that he managed to fashion a strategy that is working, to some degree, in Baghdad, despite the fact that he’s working with far fewer troops than his own manual recommends.

But I suppose my general point is that I think that even without a brilliant general like Petraeus in charge, we could have done a lot to prevent the breakdown of security in Iraq had we simply employed strategies and tactics we’ve used successfully elsewhere, which required much greater troop density. That is, Petraeus can pull off the surge with a small number of troops but lesser generals may have needed more. Further — I really do think Rumsfeld simply lacked the vision to plan and prepare adequately, and didn’t want to be ready to employ the civilian population control tactics we already knew how to do before COIN, because he believed that everything was going to be fine after the invasion, like most of the architects of the war.

Finally, let me make another point regarding Falluja. The breakdown there was not sudden — it was precipitated by a number of events, including our killing of a number of peaceful demonstrators who were objecting to us commandeering a school for our troops. I believe if we had had a more troops, ironically, they may have felt less trigger happy and threatened, and incidents like that may have been averted. Naturally, this is just my speculation — but look at the success, for example, of increased police presence in, say, New York City — it has eventually led to a significant downward trend in crime in the city that has sustained itself, combined with lower tensions between police and minority communities. Of course, Bratton’s COMPSTAT had a lot to do with it, plus community policing and other similar tactics, but the point is that sometimes more “troops” (in this case, police) actually leads to less tension, not more.

Alternatively, more troops might have just provided more targets of opportunity to the insurgents.

Hey, Mitsu, do you think that modern troops line up shoulder to shoulder and shoot musket fusillades at the enemy?

More conventional troops become a liability in fighting an insurgency. The reason the ’surge’ is working is not that it is ‘more troops’ it’s because it is more troops performing unconventional warfare tactics.

This is not something an army just learns overnight. Only a few troops ever go to counterinsurgent and unconventional warfare courses.

Now we have the bulk of the Army performing those specialized and delicate missions.

You don’t know anything about this….

Shinseki was just sniping at the current leadership. He was one of our ‘affirmative action’ generals less qualified by his rather undistiguished career than by his ethnicity. Worthless….

Yes, I am still enjoying my stupid Shinseki Black Beret that he took from the Ranger Battalions and gave to the undeserving, much like Shitsacki’s generalship.

It is amusing to me to see the acronym “COIN” blythely tossed off the keyboard of an utter and complete neophyte

It took a while, but there it is:

The Old Blood Libel against American troops.

In Kosovo, we were arming and training the insurgents.

Mitsu 12/23/2007 2:34 PM
Gray, are you even aware that Petraeus’ own COIN manual specifies troop densities similar to those recommended by Shinseki?

You did the parts where people have said that it wasn’t troop numbers alone that made the difference.. it was the their entire force posture.

My God this is tiresome. Even if Shinseki were 100% correct back when and should have had his advice implemented (which, following Gray, I do not concede), it’s irrelevant now. Read, e.g., Bruce Catton’s history of the Civil War to gain some perspective on how a war can be really screwed up, again by a Republican.

The simple fact was that we did not have enough troops in uniform to send the number of troops Shinseki called for!

His call for ‘more troops’ was wholly political and disingenuous:

If we gave every cook, clerk and 98lb female truckdriver an M-4 and pointed them toward the enemy, we would not have enough troops.

Shinseki was calling for a draft for political reasons, not advocating a ‘troop density’….

How exactly was Shinseki planning on separating the Baathist insurgency from foreign jihadists?

I agree that without Petraeus’ tactics, the surge probably would have failed

And yet you see no conflict in believing that if we had done as Shinseki wanted, things would now be even better than it is, when Shinseki had no ability or willingness to engage in counter-insurgency.

note that the surge merely increased troop levels to a level where they were previously

Two brigades reinforced Al Anbar to bolster the Sunni Awakening Council and the US brigades in Baghdad were doubled due to the fact that he who controls the capital controls the nation.

though one should also note that Petraeus is benefitting from natural political evolution in Iraq

All politics are local. There is nothing natural or evolutionary about politics. It does not “naturally” get better or worse. It just reflects what people are, good and bad, wise and foolish.

But I still think significantly greater troops, guided by intelligent generals on the field, would have made a big difference.

When war is a game where we can see the tactical, strategic, logistical, and loyalty traits of any allied and enemy general, then maybe we can make use of what you said here.

We DO have experience dealing with similar situations — for example, Bosnia.

No way, not even close.

Have you heard the stories coming from Bosnia US peacekeepers?

What people don’t realize is that Shinseki didn’t pull his estimate out of his ass — it came from the troop densities used successfully in Bosnia and elsewhere.

And how long are we in Bosnia? Iraq needs to be taken care of and then used as a logistical base to launch new attacks. It is a totally different mission than saving Europe’s bacon, again, in Bosnia.

which Shinseki had in mind (according to press reports) when he gave his estimate.

AQ would rip his forces apart if he tried fighting Bosnia over again.

Another interesting fact is that Petraeus’ COIN manual also specifies a very similar troop density to what was used in Bosnia, i.e., if you follow his manual, we should have had hundreds of thousands more troops in Iraq at the outset.

Which section are the book are you trying to refer to?

I believe if we had had a more troops, ironically, they may have felt less trigger happy and threatened,

To believe that Arabs will act wiser because you have more Americans standing around is a gross distortion of Arab character and pride.

but the point is that sometimes more “troops” (in this case, police) actually leads to less tension, not more.

You’re still doing the armchair general trick of traveling back in time and trying to fix something with what you learned from a completely different timeline.

Useless, irrelevant, and pointless even if you could do it well.

None of what you say, write, or believe will ever be of use against current or future US enemies.

Bosnia’s a UN designed disaster. The UN got themselves kicked out of Iraq when their HQ was bombed. Who knows whether the locals cheered the removal of the UN sex for food cliques.

None of that should be repeated for Iraq.

Your desire for more bodies is similar to your desire for international allies, Mitsu. It all rests upon the same belief that problems are solved by putting a bigger hammer on it. Or in your case, a greater and larger confederation of people/allies/organizations.

I have a different philosophy about fighting conventional and irregular forces.

# Mitsu Says:
December 23rd, 2007 at 3:34 pm

Gray, are you even aware that Petraeus’ own COIN manual specifies troop densities similar to those recommended by Shinseki?

War isn’t about “reading a manual”, Mitsu. Don’t you know that by now? Shinseki could quote Petraeus’ own words 24 hour/7, but Shinseki will still bungle leadership and warfare when it is time to put the steel to the fire.

Gray, folks over at blackfive and some other sites were seriously pissed about that decision with the brevets.

With the berets? Yeah, I know. I was one of them….

The only upside turned out to be that the Rangers really, really like the new tan berets, and they are striking.

The rest of the Army looks like crap–like chefs, or Frenchmen–even a lot of the senior officers don’t know how to form and wear a beret.

Good ol’ Shitsacki….

The Iraqi people, especially the Sunnis, would not have “awakened” to help our side and their government, if they had not had a full dose and more of the insurgents.

It takes a good deal to overcome nationalism, religious solidarity, opposition to female soldiers (one Iraqi was quoted as saying the Americans brought women soldiers to humiliate Iraqi men), ethnic identity, language commonality, and other factors. If al Q and other insurgents had not had time to torture, kill, rape, bully, and rob Iraqi civilians wholesale, we would not be in our current favorable situation.

So, whether on purpose or by accident, the post Golden Mosque-bombing chaos worked to our advantage.

I half subscribe to this. It does take a deal of work to get some people’s attention. It is not for nothing that five-hundred pound bombs were referred to as “Serbian hearing aids.”

I agree with what you said.. I thought the same thing myserlf

Plus, i hope we’ve shown ourselves to be honorable and trustworthy (at least our miitary.. cant say the same for our treacherous govt) and that the Sunnis and Shiias will remember our conduct and our sacrtifice on their behalf for a long time.

Which is what really pisses me off about the Dems… all this hard work wer’re doign and if it ends badly becaue someone wanted to win a senate seat who knows what the price to pay will be

Seriously–as an arab, I’d like to see his take on some of these things.

The best one I heard recently was:

“There are many tribes in Iraq, and now you have become the Al Ameriki tribe, the most powerful tribe of all.”

That’s how you win respect, but it’s a two-edged scimitar: You’re still locked in the tribal system….

Richard, I don’t know how much you know about Iraq?
Are your words from media? Or from other sources?

Just to say Iraq was the top of 3rd world list in early 1980 there were Iraqi women in within police department and most Iraqi women working side by side with men in Iraq, this not new it’s started from 1050 and I can say before when Iraq women inter universities and collages. while most other countries around Iraq behind Iraq in all aspects includes the women rights, sadly those who come with US and supported by US in Iraq (specially Iranian background and supported/Mullah) or open minded but corrupted folks like Ahmad Chalabi these sort of people who put US on the wrong tack in Iraq they trying to drive the wheels back, hope they will fail.

Please read this from old days of (corrupted) Sheikh Paul Bremer III

The Iraqi Governing Council Attacks Women’s Rights

In summer 2003, L. Paul Bremer, the top administrator of the US occupation, assembled the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), described by The Washington Post as, “a body that will cooperate with [the occupation] and support policies that are generally in line with US interests.”4 The members of the IGC were hand–picked by Bremer, who retained final veto over the Council’s decisions. Among those who Bremer appointed were Islamists who openly declared their intent to restrict women’s rights.5 These same men are the architects of Iraq’s civil war. One of the first acts of the US–installed IGC was a harbinger of things to come: the Council replaced Iraq’s observance of International Women’s Day on March 8 with a celebration of the birthday of the daughter of the Prophet Mohammed.

Then, on December 29, 2003, the IGC held a quasi–secret vote to replace Iraq’s 1959 family law—among the most progressive in the region. The family law (also referred to as the personal status law) was enacted in 1959 by the left–leaning government of Abd Al Karim Qasim, who was later overthrown by the Ba’athists (with support from the United States). According to Huibin Amee Chew, “Aspects of the progressive family law persisted until the eve of the US invasion, when Iraq still remained exceptional in the region. Divorce cases were to be heard only in civil courts, polygamy was outlawed unless the first wife consented, and women divorcees had an equal right to custody over their children. Women’s income was recognized as independent from their husbands’.”6 The law also restricted child marriage and granted women and men equal shares of inheritance.7

Apologies being out topic but just to correct some info here

in other words, the reason we had the troop levels we had was Rumsfeld wanted to prove his lightweight, air-centric approach would work in Iraq. He didn’t think the postwar would look anything like it has. To me, that was by far the biggest error of the war.

It indeed does turn the troops in a wasteful and wasted invasion and war, ordered by a wasteful, thoughtless administration of gamblers and schemers who had no hesitation about spilling other people’s blood, into hostages. Realistically, for an administration that was, until now, unfazed by the crisis at Walter Reed, this is nothing but building your politics on the backs of the dead, the maimed, and the psychologically distraught or destroyed.

As the Iranians in 1979 took American diplomats hostage, so in 2007 the top officials of the Bush administration, including the President and Vice President, have taken our troops hostage and made them stand-ins and convenient excuses for failed policies for which they must continue to die. Someone should break out those yellow ribbons. Our troops need to be released, without a further cent of ransom being paid, and brought home as soon as possible.

Tom Engelhardt, who runs the Nation Institute’s Tomdispatch.com

Petraeus “Person of the Year?”
Yes, he will be when he finishes his job by saving US face from a wasteful and wasted invasion, manmade disastrous war.

Man, look at him pick up those goal posts and go!

No, it is as though they though fewer troops would be enough and Shinseki and others though we needed more….

We have defined military disasters down. Things have gone very, very well in Iraq in comparison to any other campaign in history!

I’ll bet Mitsu would have been calling for Eisenhower and Bradley to resign after The Battle of the Bulge:

“How could they let a ‘bulge’ form? Why aren’t there more troops? Why didn’t they have winter clothes and more armor? Why didn’t our allies help more? Why wasn’t there enough food or ammunition? Why-yi-yi-yi-yi-yi!”

Y’know, you’ve never even warn a uniform: Shut the hell up, quit second-guessing the experts and learn some military history.

This is as good as it gets and it could be a hell of a lot worse….

So, ‘Truth’, how long should we have enforced the sanctions on Iraq? Forever?

It’s not about ’saving face’. We’re not arabs, we don’t even understand that kind of thing in America.

If we actually were fighting a war to ’save face’, we would be respected and feared…..

‘Cuz he’s a relatively privileged Syrian with an internet connection and he knows that if Iraq gains freedom, the crack down will come in Syria to prevent any such thing there.

US Success in Iraq would make his life hard as the Syrian hardliners cracked down….

Besides, there is no such thing as ‘arab freedom’ in the Middle East, there is only ‘my freedom’.

All right, for Christ’s sake, Mitsu, they were wrong. WRONG! They were not PERFECT!

Happy now?

In the words of the communist fellow-travelers, move on.

What a joke… it’s one thing to dispute strategic and tactical analysis, but to suggest that even the best strategists have done everything as well as possible is ludicrous on its face.

Many people, both in uniform and not, thought the neocon predictions of postwar stability were pipe dreams. I was hardly the only one who thought so. Now that we turned out to be right, we’re accused of “second guessing” the “professionals”? That’s pretty amusing, Gray. Whether we are right or wrong, I guess you will always be a cheerleader for whatever your side did, no matter how clear the evidence of a mistake.

On my side, however, I both admit mistakes and criticize faults. The surge: a mistake to have opposed it. Overly quick withdrawal: also a mistake. Has your side ever made a mistake? Clearly not in your brain.

I am not trying to get into a childish battle of one side vs the other here. I do disagree with the architects of this war on many fronts, but what really depresses me is the fact that we can’t debate reasonably about it, because no one is ever willing to admit making a mistake, for fear it makes them seem weak. To me, we’re all Americans and we should be trying to discuss everything openly. I don’t think Republicans are always wrong any more than I think Democrats are always right. It seems to me we’re stronger when we all admit mistakes on either side. Maybe that makes me the crazy one in this charged political climate today.

Later:

I am not trying to get into a childish battle of one side vs the other here.

No, Mitsu, of course you’re not….

You predicted defeat, expected defeat, sought defeat and then you claimed defeat in spite of any and all evidence of success.

“A foolish consistancy is the hobgoblin of little minds” –Emerson.

And you have been so veryconsistant!

Iraq is already won, this is the post-mortem.

Free those Arabs go after those ………PLEASE………

I also think the thing that annoys people when someone says “mistakes were made” about a military campaign is that mistakes are part and parcel of virtually every military campaign. Big mistakes. And one can always imagine it would have been better if we had done this and this and that instead of what actually happened.

One cannot be perfectionistic about war; it’s exceedingly unrealistic to expect that mistakes won’t happen, and that they won’t be costly. It is always possible (and relatively safe) to say a certain alternative would have been better, because we cannot go back and see whether that’s correct or incorrect. We can only go forward.

We can definitely learn from our mistakes, and we need to discuss mistakes for that reason. I, for instance, have said for quite some time that I think the way the looters were treated right at the beginning was a mistake and set a tone of chaos and free-for-all, and the way al Sadr was allowed to flourish was a mistake. But I reluctantly accept that many mistakes are always made in wartime, even though I wish it were otherwise.

NY Times:

“Father of 5 shot in cold blood by American troops for a loaf of bread. “This is worse than Saddam, maybe Al Qaeda can protect us!” Said an arab source we made up.”

The ‘antiquities looting’ turned out to be a hoax. They were sold off by the museums….

and the way al Sadr was allowed to flourish was a mistake. But I reluctantly accept that many mistakes are always made in wartime, even though I wish it were otherwise.”

Washington Post:

“Rumsfeld is preparing for a lengthy and brutal post-invasion insurgency conflict. “Arabs are not capable of self-governance and can only live under oppression, it’s their nature.” said a Pentagon official we made up. “Americans cannot win a counterinsurgent war without a basquillion troops in the field.” Said some old lefty peacetime general.”

I think we played Sadr perfectly by squeezing until he ran off to Iran and lost support. Cracking down would only have created a new cause to rally around.

The only ‘mistake’ we make in considering Iraq is thinking like a Westerner…..

And I respectfully disagree with you on al Sadr. From what I read, initially he didn’t seem to have a whole lot of support, and “cracking down” would probably not have caused all that much trouble at the very beginning of his ascent.