Page 2 of 2 FirstFirst 12
Results 21 to 32 of 32

Thread: Say It Ain't So, Joe!

  1. #21
    Council Member wm's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2006
    Location
    On the Lunatic Fringe
    Posts
    1,237

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Gian P Gentile View Post
    the early doing of history (a prediction by a student of history)Watch for short articles by neo-conservative magazines that will start to provide a counterfactual explanation tied to the current Surge with the idea of resurrecting the former Secretary from mistakes made during the early months of the war. The counterfactual will pose that if the American Army would have had a better command team in place with a better understanding of Coin doctrine, cultural awareness, HTT teams, etc then the policy goals that the former Secretary was trying to accomplish could have been achieved. These writers will use the current and apparent successes of the Surge to show how things might have been different back in 03. All of this with the idea in mind to resurrect the former Secretary and detach him from purported mistakes made by the American Army earlier in the War.
    Gian,
    As another student of history (and historiography to boot), I have a different name for what you are describing. But, I will be polite and just call it revisionist history, which in accounting is known as "cooking the books." Congress jumped on the bandwagon after the Enron debacle and created Sarbanes-Oxley. Is there any hope that they will every legislate full and open discosure of political policy-making? I think not.

  2. #22
    Moderator Steve Blair's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2005
    Location
    Montana
    Posts
    3,195

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by wm View Post
    Gian,
    As another student of history (and historiography to boot), I have a different name for what you are describing. But, I will be polite and just call it revisionist history, which in accounting is known as "cooking the books." Congress jumped on the bandwagon after the Enron debacle and created Sarbanes-Oxley. Is there any hope that they will every legislate full and open discosure of political policy-making? I think not.
    Nothing new in most of this. Take a look at the stuff that came out about Vietnam and the various twists and turns the history of that conflict has taken at the hands of instant pundits and "scholars" with agendas. We'll see the same thing here, too. Or the constant efforts by some to paint JFK as a saint and Nixon as the devil, no matter what the actual record shows.
    "On the plains and mountains of the American West, the United States Army had once learned everything there was to learn about hit-and-run tactics and guerrilla warfare."
    T.R. Fehrenbach This Kind of War

  3. #23
    Council Member kehenry1's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2007
    Location
    Kansas City, Missouri
    Posts
    89

    Default Choosing War

    In Clauswitzian fashion I believe we had done just the opposite with regards to Iraq since 1991. GEN Zinni had it right when he stood up and said we do not need to take down Baghdad. We had Saddam effectively contained.
    Packer best relates the pressures of the neocons and their maneuvers to implement a dreamer's ideas on changing the Middle East. The confluence with 9-11 and the fevered thinking afterward will keep historians employed for the next 100 years.
    I think my point was not about whether a decade of politics led to war or if containment was fine, but that a decade of politics, once we decided to go to war, effected our decisions on how we would prosecute it, what we would call it and our objectives. Of course, I could have played that better by selecting some other quote about political objectives in war, but I think Clausewitz was pretty straightforward. War is politics by another name. One shapes the other and vis-a-versa.

    I have further thoughts on the whys and wherefores that are not so limited as to imagine it was simply the wants of some conspiratorial, rabid, warmongering kabal within the administration. Of course, I wasn't an insider nor do I have any allegiances to any particular political or military leader's views on the "right strategy". But, I am pretty familiar with creating "buy in" with large groups who are not in the military and you can't simply order by fiat. In which case, what you start out with as the "objective" and "plan" is not what you end with, nor does it necessarily reflect your own idea of optimal outcome.

    Yet, it functions and might even be more successful than thought.

    The "we" which insisted that it would be a liberation was a very select group, none of whom know a damn thing about the Middle East in general or Iraq specifically.
    Possibly the "we" was select, but it doesn't mean that past decade did not color their views on conducting the war.

    In any case, widespread destruction would not have served our purpose in the "plan" as it existed. From my take I see that plan as more a series of assumptions about getting the Army and the Iraqi government up and running that Bremer ultimately obviated.
    Yes. I believe the failure was in having assumptions, watching them fail, being slow to recognize they failed and slow to change course. Then again, I don't believe we control every body and every reaction. It's simply a matter of who can react effectively.

    by the way, I always liked Tommy Frank's "catastrophic victory" (culmination point?), but I thought it applied to Afghanistan the most.
    Kat-Missouri

  4. #24
    Council Member 120mm's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2006
    Location
    Wonderland
    Posts
    1,284

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by SteveMetz View Post
    SECARMY White was fired after backing Shinseki. But again, this was just the straw that broke the camel's back. The myth that the congressional testimony got Shinkseki fired has been repeated by people like Nancy Pelosi and John Kerry (Pelosi on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show," November 30, 2005; Kerry, Press Conference, Tipton, IA, October 5, 2004).

    Tom Ricks, Bob Woodward and Mike Gordon have covered the issue extensively. Also useful is David Rieff, "Blueprint for a Mess," New York Times Magazine, November 2, 2003, and Jim Fallows, "Blind Into Bagdad," Atlantic, January/February 2004 touch on it.
    Having worked for Shinseki, albeit indirectly, twice, I thought he was fired because there actually IS a God in the world.

  5. #25
    Council Member Tacitus's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2007
    Location
    Bristol, Tennessee
    Posts
    146

    Default How about "The Iraq War will pay for itself?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ken White View Post
    I think you'll also find that the name and the footprint were predicated on being out of there by the fall of 2003 -- and that in early May of 2003, something (and I have no clue what) happened to change the plan.
    I'm glad Ken brought this up. I've never quite understood how we made/make key decisions in this ongoing democracy project in Mesopotamia, or for that matter, who is making the decisions.

    This amounted to a pretty significant change of plans...by somebody.

    I'm just amazed that Mr. Wolfowitz seems to be unfazed about how wrong he has been proven to be on various things. My personal favorite is his plan for paying for the Iraq War:

    On March 27, 2003, Wolfowitz told a Congressional panel that oil revenue earned by Iraq alone would pay for Iraq's reconstruction after the Iraq war; he testified: "The oil revenues of that country could bring between $50 and $100 billion over the course of the next two or three years. Now, there are a lot of claims on that money, but … We are dealing with a country that can really finance its own reconstruction and relatively soon.” By March 2005, two years later, oil revenues were not paying for the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq, Wolfowitz's estimation of 50 to 100 billion US dollars had not materialized, and, in light of his miscalculation, detractors criticized his appointment to head of the World Bank.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Wo...o_the_Iraq_War
    No signature required, my handshake is good enough.

  6. #26
    Council Member Tacitus's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2007
    Location
    Bristol, Tennessee
    Posts
    146

    Default Author Tom Clancy on Mr. Wolfowitz

    In June 2004, as reported on the MSNBC television program Deborah Norville Tonight, Tom Clancy asked about Paul Wolfowitz: "Is he really on our side?", narrating the context: "I sat in on—I was in the Pentagon in '01 for a red team operation and he came in and briefed us. And after the brief, I just thought, is he really on our side? Sorry."[74]

    ^ Qtd. on Deborah Norville Tonight, MSNBC, June 3, 2004, accessed April 18, 2007.


    Now there is a thought for you. He is an Al Qaeda mole?? That would explain a few things in retrospect. Just have to wonder what that briefing was that he gave Tom Clancy.
    No signature required, my handshake is good enough.

  7. #27
    Moderator Steve Blair's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2005
    Location
    Montana
    Posts
    3,195

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Tacitus View Post
    In June 2004, as reported on the MSNBC television program Deborah Norville Tonight, Tom Clancy asked about Paul Wolfowitz: "Is he really on our side?", narrating the context: "I sat in on—I was in the Pentagon in '01 for a red team operation and he came in and briefed us. And after the brief, I just thought, is he really on our side? Sorry."[74]

    ^ Qtd. on Deborah Norville Tonight, MSNBC, June 3, 2004, accessed April 18, 2007.


    Now there is a thought for you. He is an Al Qaeda mole?? That would explain a few things in retrospect. Just have to wonder what that briefing was that he gave Tom Clancy.
    Clancy could be a mole too...you never know.....
    "On the plains and mountains of the American West, the United States Army had once learned everything there was to learn about hit-and-run tactics and guerrilla warfare."
    T.R. Fehrenbach This Kind of War

  8. #28
    Council Member Tom Odom's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2005
    Location
    DeRidder LA
    Posts
    3,949

    Default

    My favorite was the 2002 testimony to Congress during which he dismissed ethnic schisms in Iraq as being much less serious than they were in the Balkans.

    Although I doubt he is an AQ mole, there is probably a caveat in AQ targeting guidance which says, "whatever you do, do not hurt this guy."

    Tom

  9. #29
    Council Member Ken White's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2007
    Location
    Florida
    Posts
    8,060

    Default I'm sure you're right...

    Quote Originally Posted by Tom Odom View Post
    . . .
    Although I doubt he is an AQ mole, there is probably a caveat in AQ targeting guidance which says, "whatever you do, do not hurt this guy."

    Tom
    Along that line, just ran across this LINK. I'm personally convinced Feith, like Wolfotwits, is one of those super intelligent idiots that abound and should never be in charge of anything but in this case, I think the evidence I've seen backs his version as stated at the link rather than the Bremer version.

    I've always thought Bremer sold the Admin a bill of goods, got himself an ego-trip job and proceeded to screw it up totally.

    Now Bremer as mole...

  10. #30
    Council Member Tom Odom's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2005
    Location
    DeRidder LA
    Posts
    3,949

    Default

    The speech reunited Iraq hawks, with former Pentagon official Richard Perle introducing Feith, as former deputy defense secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz sat in the front. After Feith's talk, Wolfowitz commented that he thought it was "pretty much on the mark."
    Oh what a gathering of stellar intellects; only at AEI.

    And the books just keep coming...

  11. #31
    Council Member bourbon's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2007
    Location
    Boston, MA
    Posts
    903

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Tacitus View Post
    Now there is a thought for you. He is an Al Qaeda mole?? That would explain a few things in retrospect. Just have to wonder what that briefing was that he gave Tom Clancy.
    I imagine Mr. Clancy had a particular country, of which we have a special relationship with, in mind when he made that comment. It has been reported that questions of Mr. Wolfowitz’s security risk go back to his Arms Control and Disarmament Agency days.

  12. #32
    Council Member redbullets's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2007
    Location
    Springfield, Virginia
    Posts
    61

    Default

    I'm sorry I came in late to this one. My personal favorite is from Ricks' Fiasco. My friend Paul Arcangeli on page 17:

    " 'I actually was surpised to find, the first time I met him, that he was pretty likeable, which surprised me, because I hate him,' said Paul Arcangeli, who served as an Army officer in Iraq before being medically retired. (His loathing, he explained, is a policy matter: 'I blame him for all this s@#t in Iraq. Even more than Rumsfeld, I blame him.' His bottom line on Wolfowitz: 'Dangerously idealistic. And crack-smoking stupid.')"

    Cheers,
    Joe

    Just because you haven't been hit yet does NOT mean you're doing it right.

    "In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist." President Dwight D. Eisenhower

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •