In a widely leaked/anticipated announcement to be made from the White House, President George W. Bush will again be playing the Emperor who had no clothes.
Announcing an increase of approximately 21,000 more American troops in Iraq, he will tear to shreds the remnants of the Rumsfeld Doctrine which the fired Secretary wanted to leave as his Pentagon legacy. Recall the RMA (Revolution in Military Affairs) - less soldiers, better equipment that might ostensibly be translated into a leaner, meaner fighting machine?
Reverting to the Powell Doctrine he will also reply to James Bakers’ Iraq Study Group Report (also known as Baker-Hamilton Commission.) thus reinforcing the lingering neoconzix influence in his lame duck Presidency. It is suggested that he preferred to listen to Frederick Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute and his plan, titled Choosing Victory: A Plan for Success in Iraq.
Look out for the following from the President’s speech this evening:
* Train and transfer power (and more blame) to the Iraqi soldiers. Let them patrol and let Iraqis kill each other (No the report never said this in as many words - my conjecture.)
* Assign more US Troops in key Baghdad Area. On US Networks, at least the Baghdad area should appear less violent. Embed US troops with Iraqis. Let us show them Iraqis how violence can be curbed.
* Dangle re-establishment of ‘security’ to be followed by economic development and reconstruction of the infrastructure that we destroyed in the first place (no, the report made no such admission, again my conjecture.)
This lame duck President is ‘under the influence’ – not of alcohol which he has reputedly quit – but under the influence of unabated bad advice from the neoconzix. His lack of common sense, his ignorance of ground realities, his ignorance of geopolitics is of imbecilic proportions.
Article comments
1 - Nancy
I get the distinct impression that, in line with the behavior & attitude of his life & performances to date, he really doesn't give a rat's ass what kind of heritage & problems he leaves to anybody, as long as he thinks he can somehow get someone to spin his 'legacy' into that of a combat veteran (perhaps to make up for his spineless desertion when he WAS supposed to be serving) & heroic, successful War Prez - regardless of the costs in American blood or anything else. As I've said elsewhere, he's revealing himself to be a monster of indifference to the price others pay for his stupidity, stubbornness, & incompetence.
2 - D'oh
21,000 troops is NOT the "Powell Doctrine", which calls for overwhelming force. This is more like pissing on a wildfire.
Interesting article, but definitely shows the dangers of pre-emptive strikes in writing as well as military actions.
Also to note, that the Rumsfeld strategy was penned by private military contractors, for the benefits of said military contractors.
The $10 million an hour spent on this fiasco stands in full testament to just how much bullshit that contains.
3 - Nancy
Are there investigations into all this spending, who benefits, etc.? When? Where? I haven't seen a shred of it reported in the WP or NYT or heard it on the various radio stations? And if there is one, will anything come of it, or will it be a farce, like the 9/11 commission findings which plainly laid the blame on BushCo despite all the stonewalling, & yet no heads rolled, in fact, no hairs on any head were disturbed?
4 - D'oh
Give them a bit of time Nancy, the Dems have only been in for a week. They have their "100 hours" stuff to do first, but plenty of the committee chairs have already stated their intent.
Waxman, Levin, and others are almost drooling in anticipation, and the coming months should be quite a show.
5 - Nancy
I asked because it seems to me I read somewhere on this site that they've already started. Was it you who said that?
6 - D'oh
I don't know. I have info that the committee chairs have begun the process, and that staffers are doing the prep work, but nothing formally announced besides intent so far.
But some of those chairs have announced their intent to the media prior to being sworn in last week, check your favorite news sources for details.
7 - Nancy
Mmmm...I'll be happy if I can just sit at the foot of the guillotine with my knitting ....
8 - temporal
nancy:
:)
after a similar trial i hope?
9 - temporal
some digressions:
the US business and politics thrives on adversarial competition….be it internal or external….this is the core that gets overlooked often…(and unfortunately it is embraced in degrees by other western countries too in their external dealings)
after the fall of USSR the US needed an adversary in a hurry
and
the conservative think tanks successfully and almost single handedly managed to manufacture one ….. thanks to an ex cia planted beard
the other long beard had intoned ‘workers of the world, unite’… and it nearly succeeded before failing abysmally in the soviet union…someone could change that to ‘disenfranchised of the world, unite’
if you can visualize " on one side we have laser guided missiles, uranium tipped cluster bombs, night vision, and high tech battle ready troops " and on the other we have ramshackle militias armed with rifles
paint the latter with any color you want " red, green, white
assign them any symbol " hammer, sickle, crescent, axis, cross
in the end this is the realisation - the struggle and the fight is between north and south " between the first and last world " for independence, to be left alone, for dignity, for survival, for existence " nay make it co- existence
the north cannot force the south to become subservient " greenback, force, alliance nothing works or would work
co-existing is the key " if we can learn it in time...or we will all be glowing in the dark
:)