General Sanchez and the Blame Game
Time magazine ran an excerpt from ret. Lt. Gen. Sanchez's memoir, Wiser in Battle: A Soldier's Story.
Quote:
To say I was shocked would be an understatement. I had never seen any approved CENTCOM campaign plan, either conceptual or detailed, for the post�major combat operations phase. When I was on the ground in Iraq and saw what was going on, I assumed they had done zero Phase IV planning. Now, three years later, I was learning for the first time that my assumption was not completely accurate. In fact, CENTCOM had originally called for twelve to eighteen months of Phase IV activity with active troop deployments. But then CENTCOM had completely walked away by simply stating that the war was over and Phase IV was not their job.
That decision set up the United States for a failed first year in Iraq. There is no question about it. And I was supposed to believe that neither the Secretary of Defense nor anybody above him knew anything about it? Impossible! Rumsfeld knew about it. Everybody on the NSC knew about it, including Condoleezza Rice, George Tenet, and Colin Powell. Vice President Cheney knew about it. And President Bush knew about it.
Quote:
In the meantime, hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars were unnecessarily spent, and worse yet, too many of our most precious military resource, our American soldiers, were unnecessarily wounded, maimed, and killed as a result. In my mind, this action by the Bush administration amounts to gross incompetence and dereliction of duty.
Here's the link: http://www.time.com/time/nation/arti...te-cnn-partner
Boy, you got that right...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Tom Odom
...that all have at their core a defense for incompetence based on ignorance. They did no wrong because they did not know.
Tom
Unfortunately, it seems to be true -- incompetence due to ignorance, I mean -- what's wrong with that picture??? :mad:
So I'm Trying to Read the Sanchez Book
...or, at least, the OIF parts. So far after about 20 pages, it's worthless. At least Feith sprinkled some new information and important points into the spew of alibis. Sanchez offers an equal dose of alibis without any redeeming insights or information.
Steve, seek help. This masochism
is not good for you... ;)
Not that I'm complaining too loudly, mind you -- you're saving me from having to buy two books and I appreciate that.
I'm with you, Kat -- I didn't know either
and I'm not at all sure just how much better off I am now that I do know... ;)
I'm looking forward to it
Something about listening to someone directly that adds value to any opinions you have of them. I know what I expect to hear but I hope I'm wrong. We'll see
Couldn't We Get One of These Someday?
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...6L._SS500_.jpg
Wouldn't that be refreshing? "I f*ed up royally, here's why." Now where is Steve's image of hell freezing over?
Honestly, doesn't he realize he could save a whole lot of dignity just by doing that? Does he think people actually will buy into his version of what happened? Or do we think he (or Feith) himself actually believes this apologetic swill?
I'm glad Steve's reading it and not me, because these things generally make my blood pressure resemble that of somebody four times my age. . .I was having palpitations while reading Fiasco. . .
Regards,
Matt
To digress wildly from the main topic of this thread….
Quote:
Van posted: Article 5 of the NATO treaty states that if any member is attacked, all the NATO members will individually and collectively counter-attack. Failure by any NATO member (except France, 'cause they're special and have an exemption) to counter-attack the AQ base in Afghanistan after 9-11 was a violation of the treaty.
I mean no offence, Van, but your comment invokes an all too common misperception that I feel compelled to rectify. I am being overly pedantic here, but Art 5 does not require that, if invoked, all NATO members are legally required to use military force (or counterattack, as you say). What Art 5 says is, to quote (italics added);
Quote:
The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, ….. will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.
(Excerpted from Art 5 of The Washington Treaty 4 April 1949)
Simply put, a member state ‘could deem necessary only sending a get well card and sending the card would legally fulfill its Treaty obligations’ (this quote is from a NATO legal officer – so thanks to the LtCol for allowing me to use it). This ‘get out’ phrasing, so I have been given to understand, was used to facilitate the Truman Admin convincing the Senate to agree to the Treaty back in 1949 – so it was originally intended as a ‘get out’ for the US rather than for the Europeans. Of course, in ’49 the expectation was of Soviet aggression against NATO’s European member, not a direct attack against the US itself.
Much more important, however, in defence of the Europeans, many of them were willing to send combat forces to fight in Afghanistan in 2001 under Art 5. As one example, the Schroeder gov’t went to the Bundestag (due to German constitution requirements relating to sending German forces abroad) where it pushed through a successful vote, which if it had lost would have been a ‘vote of no confidence’ for Schroeder (and the vote barely passed), to send German combat forces (around 2000 in number, IIRC) to fight in Afghanistan with the US and NATO. The response of the Bush Admin was ‘Don’t call us, we will call you’ –and we all know the Bush Admin did not call. The Italians had a similar experience and the French were eager to be involved (they eventually were allowed send air forces and did [were allowed to?] drop ‘a’ bomb somewhere in the vicinity of Mazar-i-sharif in the north).
Simply put, the Bush admin decided to operate in Afghanistan with a ‘coalition of the willing’ rather than through NATO under Art 5 (which would have made it a NATO rather than US led operation) – and most European militaries were not invited to participate except in supporting roles (if that).
So, that NATO’s European members did not contribute combat forces was not a violation of the Treaty, primarily because the Bush admin decided in essence not to accept the help many of them offered under the invocation of Art 5 with respect to combat operations in Afghanistan (NATO did, for example, furnish a range of supporting activities, such as sending 5 of its AWACs to the US to provide air protection in 2001, to free up US AWACs for Central Asia). Worth noting in passing, I suppose, is that current NATO led ops in Afghanistan have not been authorized by the alliance under the aegis of the Art 5 invocation of 2001.
I’ll get off my hobby horse now. :o My deep apologies to all for being pedantic, way off topic.
