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We've been trying to tell him this for years. But none of the options involve adopting an effective defensive posture against jihad activity. "Rumsfeld Memo on Iraq Proposed ‘Major’ Change," by Michael R. Gordon and David S. Cloud in the New York Times:
WASHINGTON, Dec. 2 — Two days before he resigned as defense secretary, Donald H. Rumsfeld submitted a classified memo to the White House that acknowledged that the Bush administration’s strategy in Iraq was not working and called for a major course correction.“In my view it is time for a major adjustment,” wrote Mr. Rumsfeld, who has been a symbol of a dogged stay-the-course policy. “Clearly, what U.S. forces are currently doing in Iraq is not working well enough or fast enough.”
Nor did Mr. Rumsfeld seem confident that the administration would readily develop an effective alternative. To limit the political fallout from shifting course, he suggested the administration consider a campaign to lower public expectations.
“Announce that whatever new approach the U.S. decides on, the U.S. is doing so on a trial basis,” he wrote. “This will give us the ability to readjust and move to another course, if necessary, and therefore not ‘lose.’ ”
“Recast the U.S. military mission and the U.S. goals (how we talk about them) — go minimalist,” he added. The memo suggests frustration with the pace of turning over responsibility to the Iraqi authorities; in fact, the memo calls for examination of ideas that roughly parallel troop withdrawal proposals presented by some of the White House’s sharpest Democratic critics. (Text of the Memo)
The memo’s discussion of possible troop reduction options offers a counterpoint to Mr. Rumsfeld’s frequent public suggestions that discussions about force levels are driven by requests from American military commanders.
It also puts on the table several ideas for troop redeployments or withdrawals, even as there have been recent pronouncements from American commanders emphasizing the need to maintain troop levels for the time being.
The memorandum sometimes has a finger-wagging tone, as Mr. Rumsfeld says that the Iraqis must “pull up their socks,” and suggests that reconstruction aid should be withheld in violent areas to avoid rewarding “bad behavior.”
Other options called for shrinking the number of bases, establishing benchmarks that would mark the Iraqis’ progress toward political, economic and security goals and conducting a “reverse embeds” program to attach Iraqi soldiers to American squads....
With Mr. Rumsfeld’s resignation, the options no longer have the same weight. In recent weeks, some have been discarded as the Bush administration tries to adjust its military and political strategy in Iraq. But others, like increasing the number of advisers attached to Iraqi forces, live on and have also been recommended by others....
Titled “Iraq — Illustrative New Courses of Action,” the memo reflects mounting concern over a war that, as Mr. Rumsfeld put it, has evolved from “major combat operations to counterterrorism, to counterinsurgency, to dealing with death squads and sectarian violence.”
The first section of the memo contains two pages of options that Mr. Rumsfeld describes as “above the line” ideas worthy of consideration. Some that Mr. Rumsfeld found intriguing appear to reflect his long-held view that the United States should use relatively modest force in intervening in foreign countries to avoid creating a dependency on American power. That approach, critics have charged, left the United States unprepared to deal with the chaos that followed the ouster of Saddam Hussein.
Mr. Rumsfeld has frequently emphasized the difficulty of stabilizing Iraq and the need to turn over responsibility to Iraqi authorities as quickly as possible. But he has also been a forceful, even cantankerous, defender of American policy, often insisting his critics were unduly pessimistic. On Oct. 31, just a week before finishing the memo, Mr. Rumsfeld told a radio interviewer, “I feel that we are making good progress with the piece of it the Defense Department has.”
One option Mr. Rumsfeld offered calls for modest troop withdrawals “so Iraqis know they have to pull up their socks, step up and take responsibility for their country.”
Another option calls for redeploying American troops from “vulnerable positions” in Baghdad and other cities to safer areas in Iraq or Kuwait, where they would act as a “quick reaction force.” That idea is similar to a plan suggested by Representative John P. Murtha, a Pennsylvania Democrat, a plan that the White House has soundly rebuffed.
Still another option calls for consolidating the number of American bases in Iraq to 5 from 55 by July 2007, a considerable shrinking of the American footprint. At the same time, Mr. Rumsfeld all but dismisses the idea of setting a firm date for removing forces from Iraq, listing it as one of the less palatable ideas.
One of the more provocative options would punish provinces that failed to cooperate with the Americans by withdrawing economic assistance and security. “Stop rewarding bad behavior, as was done in Falluja when they pushed in reconstruction funds, and start rewarding good behavior,” the option reads. “No more reconstruction assistance in areas where there is violence.”
Some military officers have said that the idea of denying assistance in some areas ignores the fact that many Iraqis are afraid to cooperate with the Americans for fear of retaliation by insurgents.
Falluja has been the focus of reconstruction efforts following an offensive by Americans that crippled city services and damaged scores of buildings, leaving the United States few options beyond rebuilding or evacuating the city. Now, it is considered by the Marines to be one of the few relatively stable areas in the dangerous Anbar Province. Many of the other towns in the region have become even more hostile because the economic assistance has been minimal, leaving the residents feeling neglected by the authorities in Baghdad, military officers say.
Then, too, work on infrastructure that sprawls across the country, like the electrical grid and the oil pipelines, network, cannot be limited to nonviolent areas....
Posted by Robert at December 3, 2006 5:33 AM
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l find it interesting that these memos find their way to the NYT. perhaps Rummie has been reading JW, or one of his people.
Posted by: ZenaWarriorPrincess![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jihadwatch.org/nav-commenters.gif)
at December 3, 2006 6:39 AM
Bush will go down as the Squanderer in Chief; every opportunity he was given, he squandered. Why give 'democracy' to people who'd rather see us dead--after they sell us their oil? I was one of those idiots who initially supported this war, but didn't realize we'd have some pantywaists managing it so as not to offend anyone. This could have been shorter and less hellish for both sides if they'd gone in hard, had a latter-day Sherman march to the Gulf, and told them it was our oil until they behaved. That would have encouraged them to organize and learn how to govern themselves faster.
Posted by: FallaciFan at December 3, 2006 8:46 AM
"If only there were a little less scapegoating of the wrong man, Donald Rumsfeld, who was one of the least enthusiastic and least messianic and most eager, among the main participants in what turned out to be, but did not have to be (and still doesn't, if "victory" is interpreted to mean leaving Iraq in a state which will inevitably cause those sectarian and ethnic divisions to flourish, thereby dividing and demoralizing and weakening the Camp of Islam)to leave Iraq. One had the feeling that Rumsfeld never wanted the troops to stay, and he seldom engaged in the kind of rhetoric about "freedom" that Bush and Rice and Cheney all indulged in.
When will "victory" be defined correctly? When will this nonsense about abhorring "instability" and about the need to "avoid the catastrophe of civil war" stop, and sensible people see how this is not to be deplored, but to be received with grim, and growing, satisfaction." [Posted by Hugh at November 10, 2006]
-- from a posting put up the day after Rumsefeld submitted his resignation
Those who were raised in the Cold War, those who were handed, that is, the pieties and certainties of that war and did not have to learn or think for themselves overmuch, have demonstrated their limits. However well-spoken they may be (and Rumsfeld is well-spoken and far more intelligent than Bush, Rice, or most of the others), they have been raised in an environment where completely independent thought simply is hard to find.
And they are busy, busy, busy. Those reports. Those endless meetings. Those more reports. Those bullets. What in god's name did Rumsfeld, the smartest of the lot, understand about Islam and about the idiocy of the phrase "war on terror"? What did Rumsfeld, the smartest of the lot, understand about how the Muslim Arabs (the Kurds are a special case, because they were grateful for past protection, and eager for future support protection that can only come from the United States) were inevitably going to treat their "liberators" after a short while? What did he know about the Sunnis and the Shi'a, and how everything that has happened has happened inevitably, was perfectly predictable (and was, at this webiste, predicted and predicted and predicted)? What does Rumsfeld, know about the notion of Jihad, and of the instruments of Jihad?
Perhaps, now that he is out of office, Rumsfeld will start to learn, and without having to get up at 4 a.m. to be driven into the Pentagon, to work all day without ever taking the time that he long ago should have taken, and so should they all, to study quietly, to read quietly, about Islam -- starting let's say with Bat Ye'or's "The Dhimmi" and "Islam and Dhimmitude" (he can read them, he's the smartest of the lot), and the books intended for a mass audience by Robert Spencer, including "The Myth of Islamic Tolerance" and "Onward, Muslim Soldiers" and his "Muhammad," and Ibn Warraq's "Why I Am Not a Muslim," and then to the anthology "The Legacy of Jihad" and to keep going, not to stop, until finally the scales fall from his eyes, and he sees that the goal should never have been Iraq the Model, Iraq the Light Unto the Muslim Nations, but rather a single and unswerving goal by the Americans and its remaining allies and others that might be allies yet again: to weaken the Camp of Islam, and to do it by dividing and demoralizing that camp, playing upon the p4re-existing divisions, the three main ones being sectarian (Sunni and Shi'a), and ethnic (Arab and non-Arab) and economic (the Muslims with vast unmerited wealth, and the Muslims who have no oil or gas deposits). Two of these divisions present themselves in Iraq today. The Administration -- whose smartest member was Rumsfeld, remember -- keeps taking as its goal, declaring as its definition of "victory" -- exactly the wrong thing.
Rumsfeld now has time to learn all that, and to start with a little mea culpa, mea maxima culpa, about this, and then to go around and explain, in the corridors of power, just how wrong he -- and all the others -- were. He is much more intelligent and articulate than Bush. He owes the country, after his participation in this Big (and nearly universal, because the assumptions about the nature and severity of the threat were, and remain, also completely misunderstood by the opposition to Bush) Mistake, a Big Correction.
Rumsfeld was not to be faulted for this or that tactical error. Those who like those chocolate soldiers Kristol and Kagan (the egg on their faces cannot be wiped off, and shouldn't be) keep arguing for more troops to be sent now, or those who keep saying that "if only" Rumsfeld had sent a half-million men earlier on, everything would have gone according to Bush's plan, are wrong. Once the Sunni despotism of Saddam Hussein was removed, there was never a chance that the Shi'a would accept anything but what they have steadily been achieving, and which, by rights, they deserve: control of the political and economic resources of a country in which they constitute 65% of the population, and under whose territories all of the Arab oil wealth (the rest belongs, or should, to the Kurds) in Iraq can be found. And once that occurred, it was also inevitable, and would not have been changed by a larger American force (such a force might have seemed, at first, to "defeat the insurgency" but that "insurgency" was endlessly replenishable unless the Americans were somehow, without a draft, to send several million men and to remain for several generations. It makes and made no sense).
It is not on tactics that Donald Rumseld should be faulted. It is on not even on his initial trust in others who impressed him but should not have impressed him, such as Paul Wolfowitz, someone who never understsood the significance of culture and ideology, and who, for reasons that may also have to do with a sentimentalism exhibited by too many of those "supporters of Israel" who did not want to believe that Islam was the problem, and who took such pride in their own friendships with utterly unrepresentative Muslims, Muslims of the Muslim-for-identification-purposes Muslims, such as Chalabi, Ambassador Francke, or in Wolfowitz's case, a great and good female friend who represented, for him -- so misleadingly -- the world of Islamic "reform" and Islamic "possibilities" that stand in the way of an unsentimental appproach to the matter, which requires that Islam itself be seen, unblinkered, as the problem.
Rumsfeld, free of those meetings and all that hectic vacancy, can now turn his attention to learning that he made not so much a tactical mistake as a strategic one. He agreed with the others. He didn't see, sufficiently, that Bush has turned into what he always was, an inflexible, because not nearly intelligent enough, Capt. Queeg on a listing ship of state. Rumsfeld, out of office, can now study and utter, not the way McNamara did a quarter-century later, but in a few months, even early next year, a Mea Culpa about his own ignorance of Islam and of Iraq (including the Sunni-Shi'a divide that would not, could not, conceivably be healed by the Americans, nor should the Americans, if they had their wits about them, wish to do so).
Those who continiue to argue that more troops would have made a difference, or would so now -- such as Generals Kristol and Kagan -- also miss the point about both the proper goal to be sought, the victory to be plucked from Tarbaby Iraq, and about out of the Iraq tarbaby. Those who merely argue for a "course correction" are also off. Something entirely different, based on an entirley different comprehension of what is going on with the world-wide Jihad, and on an understanding of what needs to be done to provide a Demonstration Project or two of a country, or people, on Islam, in order to remedy the palpable, perceived weakeness of the West, held in check, especially in its domestic arrangements, by its own mind-forged manacles.
Something needs to be done beyond a mere "course correction." Something much bigger. Despite being demonized, Rumsfeld is one of the few who, one suspects, still has his wits intact. He can help. He should try. He owes it to the country.
Posted by: Hugh at December 3, 2006 9:14 AM
I can't believe that top military advisers don't understand what's going wrong. They have studied military tactics, haven't they?
Yes. They have warned repeated about repeating
mistakes of Vietnam.
So what stops them from fixing the problems?
Globalist mentality. Wars such as WW2, are no longer "won." Rather, enemies are "contained" and "managed" instead of "defeated."
If you want a real shock listen to some of the old "We interrupt this program..." bulletins for Sunday, Dec 7, 1941 radio programs that ran about 1:00 - 2:00 pm CST across either CBS or NBC radio networks; then, listen to ANYTHING related to Korea, Vietnam, all the way up to and including today.
The reason why we have effectively "lost" every war (many battles are won, but ....) since Korea becomes painfully clear.
"Winning" in the WW2 sense, is simply not an option.
Instead, these conflagrations are nothing but limited engagement, UN police actions, and nation-building excercises.
As long as casulties are 10% or lower, you can "economically" engage in endless nation building excercises -- for decades. However, you won't win a war.
Every military officer know it, and so did Rumsey and George, and everyone in Congress knew it as well.
If you listen to Roosevelt's firside chat on Dec 8 1941 and hear how he talks about the coming war; then listen to any speech made by say, Bush, you will hear WHY the problems are not fixed.
Simply put, the world views of the society and leaders back then is opposite of anything we know today.
Posted by: witness at December 3, 2006 9:29 AM
My, oh, my how Rumsfeld sounds suspiciously like another speech from a bygone era:
"But now the war has lasted for nearly four years. Despite the best that has been done by everyone -- the gallant fighting of the military and naval forces, the diligence and assiduity of Our servants of the State and the devoted service of Our one hundred million people, the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantage..."
Emperor Hirohito's surrender speech, broadcast August 15, 1945.
Posted by: Seymour Paine at December 3, 2006 9:32 AM
Its like the scene from ‘Mr. Roberts’ when the ship’s doctor tries to demonstrate reflexes by tapping on Ensign Pulver’s knee. Ensign Pulver has no reflexes, and after three or four tries, Doc pulls back, confused.
Rumsfeld has pulled back, confused, and has had the ‘public’ yoke removed from his shoulders. He’s probably resentful of the administration, and the Muslims who have made him the laughing stock of late night TV. He could be powerful.
at December 3, 2006 10:15 AM
It's not so much about what US forces are doing as being enough to be effective. It's more about the Iraqi bloodlust where killing each other is more important than building a nation. The US can stay in Iraq for a century and accomplish nothing as long as the Iraqis remain bent on proving who's the most pious Muslim via murder and mayhem. Offering help to anyone not interested in it is just pointless.
Posted by: ISLAMSFORLOSERS at December 3, 2006 10:35 AM
Bush keeps saying: "We're gonna stay in there as long as the Iraqi government wants us"
Yes. The Iraqi government will want us as long as we tell them to do so. The "staying the course" is for public consumption.
Can anybody tell me why, since we're helping the Iraqis (supposedly) with their new democracy, WHY is Talabani suddenly buddy-buddy with the monkey in Iran?
Because we lost the war. Again.
Understand, this NOT a military defeat. Turn loose the military with the notion of winning the war and Iraq, Iran, and the entire Middle-East is toast.
There is nothing that the EU or Russia or China or N. Korea could do to stop the US military.
The defeat, the lose of this war, is for the same reasons we lost in Vietnam, Korea, Somalia, Kosovo, and on, and on, and on.
In short -- our political leaders do NOT believe that America is a sovereign state, and therefore has NO RIGHT to win a war for national survival.
As the political leaders see it, the rights for existance of any nation, are those rights vouchsafed by the UN and the so-called "rule of law."
Until the day comes that those who run the government believe that we are a soverign nation with inherent rights granted by God and bestowed upon the people -- we will continue to lose every war in which we engage.
Why?
Because in spite of the courage and strength of those in the front engaged in actual combat -- or leaders do not have the collective will to win.
This lack of will and resolve on the part of our own leaders in the all three branches of our own government is more powerful than all the nuclear bombs that Russia. China, N. Korea, Pakistan, Iran, and shortly Iraq -- have put together.
Rumsfield failed because the objectives were wrong in the first place -- we need to defeat and destroy the enemy. Rumsfield and company could not even identify who or what the enemy is.
Israel, no following the American script for disaster, will also be wipped out for the same reasons.
Unless, they sober up and start deciding to win.
Finally, winning battles in the field is one thing -- winning the war is a whole different animal.
The men and women in the field have NOT failed -- their leaders let them down as always!
Posted by: witness at December 3, 2006 11:29 AM
In the end George W. Bush must take the partial blame for this failure. He was in command and it was his choice to make. He surrounded himself with his people.
We the American people must take the other half of the blame for voting for him. He never should have been the republican choice. As mush as I dislike McCain and thin he is also ignorant on Islam he at least would understand military strategy and tactics. We would not be in as deep as we are now. Hopefully the next election we will make a better choice. Men like Newt Gingrich or Rudy would be good choices for now.
Check out the Newt Gingrich site. I must admit he has come along way on Islam. In fact I can't name you another political leader who is this far down the line. He is not at Mr. Spencers level yet but he is getting there (could he be reading this site?). He is a historian not a lawyer and that is what we need now.
check it out at: http://www.newt.org/
at December 3, 2006 11:46 AM
We can't win a war where we cooperate with our enemies on one hand, and fight them on the other, and never name them -- ever.
Posted by: Foehammer at December 3, 2006 11:52 AM
When will "victory" be defined correctly? When will this nonsense about abhorring "instability" and about the need to "avoid the catastrophe of civil war" stop, and sensible people see how this is not to be deplored, but to be received with grim, and growing, satisfaction." [Posted by Hugh at November 10, 2006]
There is nothing in Rumsfeld's memo that suggests that we are any closer to what Hugh (and the rest of us) are waiting for. He (Rumsfeld) is suggesting "a drastic change of course", but again, AGAIN, AGAIN it's in the wrong direction.
Telling the Iraqis to "pull up their socks", when instead we should be pulling their socks down, or giving them a metaphorical wedgie. The threat to withhold rebuilding funding in "hostile" areas instead of pulling every last dime and nickle out of Iraq, this f'n minute. The complete and utter inability to see that the vast majority of the Iraqi people, not Saddam Hussein, was and is the enemy. The fact that Saddam was mistreating the Iraqi people did not magically transform them, like lead to gold, to our "staunch allies in the War on Extremist Religionists", or into our "friends". We were, for a few days, appreciated by the Shi'ites for overthrowing their enemy the Sunnis. Nothing more than that, we were expedient allies in their 1,300 year old war.
I see the memo as a big FU to the Administration for his forced resignation. I don't see any of his supposed intelligence, or commitment to the good of the nation, in this memo. Even if Rumsfeld became an avid JW/DW reader in his retirement, GWB and Co. are not going to accept advice from a persona non-grata like him. Nothing and no-one is going to get them to give up their self-appointed role as saviour of the Islamic world, whether Iraqi or "Palestinian" or Saudi or Emirati or Pakistani. They're going to save them all, so we just need to shut up and watch as peace, freedom, and tolerance begin blossoming. Any day now. Right around the corner.
The Administration doesn't get it, Rumsfeld doesn't get it, the Republicans don't get it, the Democrats don't get it, the only people who seem to be getting it are we the public, we are the ones waking up to the reality of jihad.
Hugh, if Rumsfeld is really as intelligent as you say (wish?), that after 5-plus years of looking the jihad square in the face and with full access to the resources of the intelligence community, that he will in the future finally get some small inkling of reality, what does that make you?
Posted by: special_guest at December 3, 2006 12:05 PM
What is a good defensive posture against jihadis? Retreating to "secure" bases into which they can just lob a few mortar shells every once in a while? How does that help keep the jihadis in check? No, we need to be engaged with the enemy.
We're fighting them where they don't want us -- in their home lands.
This war is not conventional -- it is not winnable (a War on Terror is a war on an idea which can never be fully removed from the hearts and minds of our adversaries); the last enemy will never surrender. But our intent in such a war cannot be to defeat the enemy, it must be (as our President originally intended) to render the enemy incapable of attacking our unarmed civilians.
The problem with nation building during a time of war is that you wind up feeding the money to your enemies. All these IEDs our soldiers now face cost the enemy no casualties -- because they are stand-off weapons driven by a cellphone network we reconstructed. All that oil which was supposed to stabilize the new government -- siphoned by the jihadis for hard cash. All that imported gasoline designed to bootstrap the Iraqi economy -- similarly siphoned by the jihadis.
If the defeat of our enemies means acting like Sherman's march, so be it.
Posted by: unclesmrgol at December 3, 2006 12:09 PM
This reminds me of the Marianne Faithfull song, "Broken English": "What are you fighting for?"
I used to think that everyone wanted freedom but now I see that most Muslim countries don't want freedom, they want Sharia. So the basic premise of bringing freedom to freedom-loving folks is faulty.
Are we invited in soley to help one Muslim group fight against, and eventually dominate, another Muslim group? Are we misled into thinking we are fighting for their freedom when we are just being used as bullet-catchers? I hope not.
It seems that we have made assumptions about their goals and desires: we have projected our own onto them, to their benefit and our detriment.
And when we depart, will they thank us by becoming a peace-loving, free country, with equality for all? Or will they say, "Don't let the door hit you in the a** when you leave," and vote in yet another hardliner Muslim government?
Posted by: Josephine at December 3, 2006 12:33 PM
Perhaps I was too kind and too hopeful about Rumsfeld. I have read the memo. It does not, as you remark, offer an inkling of understanding the real thing. Yet for some reason I keep thinking Rumsfeld, alone among those lumped together as supporters of the war, and certainly made into a bogey-man for reasons I cannot fathom (surely the main problem is Bush himself; he's the Captain Queeg on this listing ship, while Rumsfeld was only first or at times second or even, when Rice came along, third mate).
Kindness, sweetness, hopefulness -- these are my problems. I possess far too much of them for my own good. Clearly. I'll try not to in the future.
Posted by: Hugh at December 3, 2006 12:43 PM
But our intent in such a war cannot be to defeat the enemy, it must be (as our President originally intended) to render the enemy incapable of attacking our unarmed civilians...
Gawd, I hope you never take command of anything remotely related to military ops.
It was this kind of thinking that lead to Perl Harbor; thank heavens, the commander's woke up and decided to defeat the enemy.
BTW, we have been in Bagdad longer than we were engaged in WW2 in three major theaters!
The Japanese Imperial Navy and The NAZI war machines are distant historical memories; the jihadists all contained, and managed, are STILL with us, as we approach the looming pre-ISLAMIC era that is coming to be as a result of what you and Bush have proposed.
Posted by: witness at December 3, 2006 1:31 PM
Nah, I've got to tone down my "sky is falling" rhetoric. I want to have hope, just as much as anybody. Maybe Rumsfeld will get it. Maybe Pelosi will get it. And writing those words makes me want to start crying all over again.
BTW, please add modesty to the list, it prevented you from answering the question.
Posted by: special_guest at December 3, 2006 1:47 PM
to be fair- the admin and commanders HAD to try to keep as small a footprint as possible in the initial stages in order to keep the civilians from feeling overwhelmed by American presence & thus feeling like htey were all being held captive by us. This would have only incited further violence against us by those we're trying to help. I beleive President Bush in good faith tried this proceedure and gave it his all in hopes it would work, but fully understood that at some point more troops would be needed if thigns got totally out of hand- The reports ocmming back to him were somewhat positive about the progreesses being made & I beleive he really hoped to maintain public trust in Iraq until it was clear it wouldn't happen.
The press made it out that President Bush was an idiot & didn't know how to govern a war but yet they offered NO alternatives except -'Overwhelm them with firepower' which of course the MSM would have jumped all over us had we done so & caused too many civilian casualties.
Anyways, the stinkin press has tried to run this war from day one by deciets and lies and misrepresentations, and they have failed to present the real facts such as trying to keep as low a profile in Iraq for the sake of public relations, yet a big enough presence to deal with outright situations that requirted it. http://sacredscoop.com
Posted by: CottShop at December 3, 2006 1:53 PM
Bush should have 'won' the war when he 'won' it. Because he did not...Hugh is right. Had Bush won the war when he won it, the conversation here might be quite different...
Posted by: duh_swami at December 3, 2006 2:02 PM
If this war cannot be won militarily (only because we are not fighting a military) it can be won economically. Their ability to hurt us will dry up when the money stops flowing to them. If we created a super weapon in a crash program during WWII, we can certainly create a substitute for petroleum fuel. The money we are spending trying to duplicate our system of government where it isn't wanted, or even understood, could be put to better use.
Posted by: pismopal at December 3, 2006 2:03 PM
NO alternatives except -'Overwhelm them with firepower' which of course the MSM would have jumped all over us had we done so & caused too many civilian casualties.
That's war; as in Dresden. If you don't have a strong enough or compelling reason to inflict casualities; you have not strong or compelling reason to go to war in the first place; media or no media.
at December 3, 2006 2:55 PM
I would suggest that the invasion of Iraq is not the abject failure as it is currently characterized by a broad spectrum of political opinion. Was Iraq behaving as an enemy to the US prior to the invasion? I think so. Was Saddam Hussein supporting terrorism? Yes. Was he the worst example? No. He was, however, politically and morally weaker than some other worse, more dangerous enemies, (e.g. Iran.)
So what happened in Iraq? The country was severely damaged by the US invasion. Saddam's sons were killed and their bodies displayed. Saddam himself is under death sentence. There are US military bases all through Iraq. Supressed minorities are taking over.Chaos reigns.
Perhaps this mess in Iraq and the devastation of the Saddam government may give other enemies pause before supporting a terror attack on the US. As the UK Polonium case reveals, modern forensics makes it difficult to conceal terrorist actions even if by proxies.
Would the Mullahs in Iran like to kill 50,000 Americans with ebola or a nuclear weapon? Probably so. Will they consider America's reponse to a much lesser attack in NYC? Despite the bluster, I think they will.
Posted by: Alek at December 3, 2006 3:01 PM
One of the dumbest items in the still undisclosed Baker Commission report is the idea that American Firms be given reconstruction contracts..two problems with that.
This was the agenda at the outset, and it accounts for a lot of the Islamic terrorism (aka resistance).
Firms like Haliburton and Blackwater were given no bid cost plus contracts, and even then have defrauded you and I out of our money.. it is a terrible, terrible scandal..aggravated by the fact that those given contracts were chosen on the basis of having a politically correct ideology and leadership (e.g. against abortion, gay marriage and adamantly Christian and Republican).
If the insane desire to fatten the wallets of cronies continues, not only will America be bankrupted by Iraq passions will be further inflamed..and more Jihadis will be recruited and more people (Americans) will die.
The only solution.. is to evacuate Iraq now, and let the Iraqi's sort it out and bootstrap their economy.. that they won't (a fair prediction) is proof that Muslims cannot take care of themselves or build (on their own) a productive economy..the ideology produces a mindset and set of expectations that interferes with economic productivity and wealth.
Iran with all of it's oil wealth is still a beggar nation.
Iraqi's, Saudis, Kuwaits, Palestinians, Lebanese, Egyptians, Libyans, Sudanese and I bet all Muslims are wards of the state.. I know that Iraqi's, Saudis and Kuwaiti's, food, shelter, utilities were subsidized and/or given away free. Oil revenues provided the means to subsidize life for the peoples, absent oil revenues (like Palestine and Lebanon) they depend on Jizyah payments (foreign aid) from the U.S., Israel, the U.N., E.U. and NGO's.
There is no Islamic nation that is capable of self sustenance, they can't even feed themselves.
Islam is a beggars ideology, and where there is none to beg from, it obtains sustenance by threats (terrorism), booty and the mafia (Maehfil) protection racket called Jizyah.
Posted by: Nariz at December 3, 2006 3:02 PM
Some play Fantasy Sports, I play Fantasy Politics. And, with the recent addition of pismopal (headed up by Robert and Hugh) to my fantasy roster, my Fantasy team has extricated us from Iraq, developed non-petroleum based fuel sources, isolated jihadist regimes, stopped jihadist immigration to the West, deported the jihadists already here legally or illegally, and has started educating the public about the reality of what Islam teaches.
Posted by: special_guest at December 3, 2006 3:44 PM
Leaving the toilet to the turds is the best course of action. Enough of this foolishness about nation building and stopping civil wars. These cukoos are addicted to murder and have been ever since Mr. Perfect announced that he had a direct line to his god. These hatreds have been going on for a lot longer than the US has been around and they will continue to be there until Islam itself is finally gone. The US needs to pack up its stuff and leave by the end of next year at the latest.
Posted by: ISLAMSFORLOSERS at December 3, 2006 5:13 PM
First problem arose when Bush called it a war on terrorism, just like Reagans "War on Drugs".
A war necessitates two identifiable sides, identifiable armies and combatants and to win a war there needs to be someone who can surrender and admit defeat.
What we are engaged in is not a war, and it hasn't been a war.. there is no one to surrender, and there is no mission to complete, because there is no mission spoken or feasible.
If war is declared, then it has to be declared on Islam, and to win a war on Islam will demand stomach and strength that America doesn't have, that even Pat Robertson doesn't have..it will require the elimination of all Imam's, Jurisprudents, scholars and the annhilation of all resistance.. the only model for conquering Islam is that of Genghis Khan, leave mountains of skulls where once there were cities.
If the west isn't ready or able to engage in such actions,..then by tenacity and fecundity Islam will prevail.. despite all of the ill conceived rants against "liberals", leftists, multiculturalists and political correctness.
(And By the way, the more you morons rant against those, the more sympathy and allies you create for Islam... not exactly brilliant tactic is it? An intelligent person would engage and cozen up to "liberals" and "leftists", pull them over to your side, not demonize and alienate them.. and the "Culture War" against gays and women, only alienates people who should be allies, and creates sympathy for the muslims...ranting and demanding that "liberals", gays and women are treated worse under Islam doesn't hack it.. these folk see Islam as a distant threat, not an immediate threat, and they see you (the Christian Right, the Dominionists, etc) as an immediate threat. And as I said the rhetoric, policies and actions of the radical right as regards non muslims only creates allies and sympathy for the muslims.
And FYI, at the very best, the radical right constitutes at most 38% of the total population, and a good percentage of them have second thoughts and are not as radical as the hardcore base of the Republican party. Hardly the forces you need to win in an all out, or a protacted war with Islam.
Leave the epithets and rhetoric in the closet, including the temptation to depict papers as The New Duranty Times and the Bandar Beacon..them be turn offs and hurt your cause.
Posted by: Nariz at December 3, 2006 6:20 PM
well rumsfeld has finally got it right what the USA is going through in Iraq almost replay of Vietnam, and like in Vietnam our elected officials and resident are making the same mistakes. And our media is the same thing they do in Vietnam chasing ratings at the expense of our troops, and the Islamist mullahs know it. They are using our own news media against us just as veit cong did and the American public will do not stand for in shots of Iraq where the women and children of Iraq are injured when car bombs blow up next to our troops and of course the news media always seems to imply that if our troops were not there their would be no bombing. And unfortunately unlike Switzerland and where service is mandatory only a very small percentageof our people have ever puta uniformon and gone through military service and frankly I think most of them are too scared to risktheir skins in military service they really have zero concept of the armed forces really go through it very easy to protest againsta unpopular war, check out how hamos is using propaganda shots of injured and dead Palestinian women and children showing a horrible that the Jews are to so called innocent Palestinian women and children while not mentioning their deaths are caused by Hamas rocket attacks on Israel and Israelis fighting back of course the Palestinian terrorist think that the Israelis had no right to bite back when they're attacked because Arabs are so much better than Jews the Jews existing to pay jizha to the Arabs so the Arabs do not have to work
Posted by: islamakapigeaters at December 3, 2006 6:54 PM
"Leave the epithets and rhetoric in the closet, including the temptation to depict papers as The New Duranty Times and the Bandar Beacon.."
-- from a posting above
I like these names. They are my invention. They express what I want them to express.
Posted by: Hugh at December 3, 2006 10:10 PM
Not too long ago, Rumsfeld pointed his finger at Charlie Rose's craggy mug and said "The vast majority of Muslims are moderates!"
at December 3, 2006 11:15 PM
This is an interesting thread, especially Hugh and Nariz.
But to the person who said we should not be fighting in their homelands, please read Sun Tzu, would you prefer that American troops were fighting in the US homeland, like the Europeans will soon be doing.
Iraq should teach those that who are not blinkered by PC rubbish that Islamic culture is anti-democratic, that Islam is the issue, perhaps they are not saying it, but I sense a change, perhaps even Baker is offering a bit of political expediency for doing the right think as Hugh sees it, because that is now happening in front of our eyes, the Saudi Arabians and others are now realising that Iran is now a real threat to their control of the Islamic world and the Shi vs Sunni war will soon start in earnest.
America, tired will withdraw and the fun starts and of course we protect Saudi Arabia who cuts the oil price in half and that sorts out the economy of the USA in the West. If I did not know better I would think that this was planned or was that the other way around, pure lucky chance?
Just in time for the defensive move by the West to limit Islamic influence in the West. As their money is used for internal conflict and dries up. Those people who have been brought will have their begging bowls out elsewhere, such delicious irony.
And Nariz, you talk about the war having to be on Islam and your right and yes it may well require a mountain of skulls, but perhaps we should test out Khomeni's view that without Imams Islam would die out in 5 to 10 years.
I was a multi-culturist and damn that I still am, but at this point to get to one planet and one people, Islam needs to be destroyed. And do you know what I look at and see as multi-culturist, its America.
I was depressed before, but there are things happening now that almost seem like an accident, it is a series of events that is moving in the right direction. That in spite of ourselves we seem to have done the right things by accident, I hope the USA pulls out PDQ, but is ready to jump in when it is needed, at just the right time to stop the development of nukes, or at just the right time to prevent Saudi Arabia from being unable to supply the oil.
Posted by: Daffersd at December 4, 2006 6:37 AM
Quite right, Daff'...Sun Tzu is still widely accepted today, and for good reason.
Problem #1 is eliminate political correctness, using it to fight a war is suicide, let alone anything else in realityland.
Rumsfeld should have known this long before now.
PC is the biggest enemy of all and is destroying from within, not from without.
Military has but two functions:
1) kill the enemy
2) destroy their stuff
3) NOTHING ELSE.
Once we realize this and get back to reality, the rest will be a lot easier to accomplish.
Posted by: jcom972 at December 4, 2006 4:08 PM
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