Careful preparation, rather than expensive weapons, took out Osama Bin Laden

Emotionally, the Bush administration—and the country—felt the need for a major military response after the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. But although Iraq may still come right in the end, was it the best use of our money and resources? Afghanistan may eventually become stable—but haven't we just learned, if we didn't know it already, that the real and more complicated threat now comes from Pakistan? In 2008, the U.S. ambassador to Kabul told me, in effect, that Pakistan was none of his business. Perhaps it should have been.

Are you kidding me William Braucher Wood? Pakistan was none of your business? No wonder it took almost 10 years to get bin Laden. I bet Ronald Neumann, ambassador from 2005 to 2007, felt the same way.

In Testimony, Brown Says Iraq War Was ‘Right Decision’

Well played, Mr. Brown, well-played.

The Blackwater Question

Blackwater is now known as Xe

I highly recommend listening to the episode of NPR's On Point with Tom Ashbrook linked to above. It addresses many of the topics I have previously written about on this blog. It highlights the errors of the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld thinking that outsourcing military functions to private companies is the best way to wage war, especially in the "all-volunteer" military era.

I'll never forget the conversations these cowboys would have about their time outside the wire in the dining facility, surrounded by Soldiers that could hear them. They did all of the things that our Soldiers were prevented from doing because they were trying to execute a counterinsurgency strategy in its infancy. We took two steps forward and Blackwater's rogue cowboy actions would set us backwards... All they cared about was going home alive with their gigantic paycheck (many of them at least). It is a sad situation.

And He Shall Be Judged

Great piece detailing former SECDEF Rumsfeld's obstructionism.

"What Rumsfeld was most effective in doing," says a former senior White House official, "was not so much undermining a decision that had yet to be made as finding every way possible to delay the implementation of a decision that had been made and that he didn't like." At meetings, he'd throw up every obstacle he could. "Rumsfeld would say, 'Golly, we haven't had time to read all of these documents! I mean, this is radical change!'" the official adds. "And then, if you suggested that maybe he should've read all the documents when everyone first got them a week ago, he'd say: 'Well! I've been all over the world since then! What have you been doing?'"

At times, this my-way-or-no-way approach could even come at the expense of his soldiers. Shortly before the Iraq invasion, King Abdullah II of Jordan decreed that warplanes could not overfly his country if they had previously flown over Israel. The king's demand meant that U.S. fighters would need to make a multiple-hour detour before proceeding to their targets. Rumsfeld had himself been a fighter pilot and presumably recognized the absurdity of the detour, and so one NSC aide approached him during a meeting in the Situation Room as the matter was being discussed.

"Excuse me, Mr. Secretary," said the aide. "I want you to know that Dr. Rice is prepared to call the king to get that restriction removed so that our kids don't have to fly the extra two and a half or three hours."

Rumsfeld looked up from his coffee. "When I need your help," he said, "I'll ask."

The secretary did not ask for the help, and so his soldiers went the extra distance, unnecessarily. This seemingly instinctive stubbornness adds to the growing consensus that Rumsfeld's obduracy - on increasing troop levels, on recognizing the insurgency - was a primary cause of mishap in Iraq.

Bush's 'Ultimate Exit Interview'

I do agree with President Bush that the press corps "sometimes misunderestimated" him. Bush has not been wrong all of the time. My main complaint with him remains his rush to war in Iraq with too few troops. Why hasn't the press corps owned up to their almost outright support for politicians who disagreed with the surge strategy? Why hasn't the press corps treated the Yale/Harvard educated Bush the same way they treat President-elect Obama (Columbia/Harvard) and his wife, Michelle (Princeton/Harvard)? Bush is painted as a dumb frat boy who got into Ivy league schools because of legacy and entitlement. Meanwhile, the Obamas are painted as geniuses who worked their way into Ivy league schools. No doubt, they did, however they too were undoubtedly aided by law schools' desires to enroll underrepresented minorities. Both the outgoing president and incoming president were aided, but neither would have gained acceptance to any of these institutions if they were braindead. Both are products of America's best learning institutions... neither of them are idiots.

"Fine, Mr. President. You're the president."

A dysfunctional family

While I have not yet read Bob Woodward's latest installment on the presidency of George W. Bush, The War Within: A Secret White House History 2006-2008, The Washington Post's excerpt from September 8, 2008, gave me new faith in the military officer corps (well, at least the service chiefs).

While reading this piece, my jaw dropped - I never expected that so much opposition to the surge had been voiced by the senior brass. It seemed as if Woodward was describing a dysfunctional family... This dysfunctional family included the uncle that just wouldn't go away, retired General Jack Keane, former Army vice chief of staff, who circumvented the Joint Chiefs of Staff to pitch his "plans" to the president.
A well-meaning, but ineffective General Peter Pace, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who laments about having no fallback plan on the surge... if it doesn't work, he laments, "then you are forced into conscription, which no one wants to talk about." He appeared to be the flag officer equivalent of Beaver Cleaver telling W. Cleaver, "Gee, Dad, I have enough trouble keeping myself in line with your plans without keeping all the other chiefs in line."
A brazenly outspoken General Peter Schoomaker, then Army Chief of Staff, who criticized General Pace, and was always thinking of the future. "Folks keep talking about the readiness of U.S. forces. Ready to do what? We need to look at our strategic depth for handling other threats. How do we get bigger? And how do we make what we have today more ready? This is not just about Iraq! I feel like Nero did when Rome was burning. It just worries the hell out of me," Schoomaker said doing his best impression of always contrary Alex P. Keaton.
A forward thinking chipmunk named Simon, played by Admiral Mike Mullen, then Chief of Naval Operations, questioning, "How does a five-brigade surge over the next few months fit into the larger picture? We have so many other issues and challenges: Afghanistan, Pakistan, North Korea, and places we are not even thinking about today."
And finally, General John Abizaid, then CENTCOM commander, and General George Casey, then commander of Multi-National Force-Iraq, who had lost control of the war (which was quite obvious to the servicemembers on the ground during his reign...). They were the equivalents of Statler and Waldorf of Muppets' fame watching the play unfold from their palatial balcony.

General Pace explaining to then MNF-I commander, General Casey, what his new strategy is... as directed by Condoleezza Rice, Stephen Hadley, and Meghan O'Sullivan

The scene culminates with the surge being briefed to the service chiefs. President Bush came "armed with what Hadley called 'sweeteners' - more budget money and a promise to increase the size of the active-duty Army and Marine Corps." General Schoomaker fought the president arguing that the Army was at its breaking point saying, "I don't think you have the time to surge and generate enough forces for this thing to continue to go."
The conversation ended with, "Pete, I'm the president," Bush said. "And I've got the time."
"Fine, Mr. President. You're the president," Schoomaker replied.

I have not had this much faith in the Army Officer Corps since I was a cadet. It appears that General Schoomaker and Admiral Mullen fought the good fight, and General Pace attempted to at his level, albeit with little success. I am proud that the service chiefs are thinking 20-30 years down the road... Unfortunately, they lost. I have a feeling that they see the same thing I am seeing in my crystal ball - emerging regional hegemons that are near peer competitors and a broken Army and Marine Corps with a hollowed out officer corps unable to fight and win America's wars in the relatively near future.

We helped in Iraq - now help us, beg Georgians

This is just a sad story all around. We train a former Soviet republic's army and happily accept their troops in Iraq, then said former Soviet republic is attacked by an entire armored field army and we do nothing.

Why did we not react? Undoubtedly we fear an official Russian-Iranian defensive pact (the unofficial one has been in place for years). We also fear the outbreak of a world war when our troops are already overstretched, highlighting the problems with our foreign policy in general - why are our troops overstretched to begin with? What if Georgia and Ukraine had been fast tracked to NATO membership in April and this happened? Could we have washed our hands of the situation and allowed President Bush to play volleyball with Misty May in Beijing during the outbreak of a war? Could we have helped Georgia if we weren't overstretched? Would American military response even be a question if there wasn't a binding alliance such as NATO drawing us into conflicts? America can no longer complain about Germany, France, et al, not helping enough in the GWOT; a small former Soviet republic gave us a brigade of their finest in Iraq and now are under attack... and we are looking the other way.

This action undoubtedly was planned beforehand by Russia. With the Russian Army's equipment in disrepair, how could Russia quickly field and execute a mission with an armored field army on such short notice? The answer is simple - they had been planning for this invasion for quite some time and were just waiting for President Mikheil Saakashvili to make the first move (which he did on August 7th).

Don't think that this doesn't have anything to do with oil or Iraq either. Russia will undoutedly regain control of another Black Sea pipeline (meaning price gauging ala Turkmenistan and Ukraine) or badly damage it (cutting down on efficiency and perhaps raising price). Either way, Turkey, a NATO ally, will be quite angry since the pipeline runs into Turkey. In addition, Georgia's 2,000 troops in Iraq are being sent home to Georgia to fight the Russian hordes funneling into Georgia.

Finally, perhaps we could pay close attention to the Russian Army's use of overwhelming force in order to break the will of anyone thinking about resisting. They aren't fighting a war on the cheap, they are ensuring victory. Also, where is the international community's outrage at the loss of civilian life in this conflict?