RUMSFELD admitting DEFEAT in IRAQ?

“(CBS/AP) A senior general and a Republican senator say the United States could lose in Iraq, and are pointing the finger at Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

“I think we are right on the edge in Iraq right now,” says Sen. Chuck Hagel.

Rumsfeld and his staff didn’t listen to military planners, and now the United States is “in a mess,” the Nebraska Republican said on CBS News’ Face The Nation.

“What is our policy? What are we doing? What is the possibility of us winning? That's all still in question,” said Hagel, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “I think it's still in question whether Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and, quite frankly, General [Richard] Myers, [the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,] can command the respect and the trust and the confidence of the military of the American people to lead this country.”

A senior general at the Pentagon tells the Washington Post he believes the United States is on the path to defeat – and Rumsfeld and his advisers are to blame. The Post reports great anger is building at Rumsfeld and his top advisers among career Army officers.

“The current OSD [Office of the Secretary of Defense] refused to listen or adhere to military advice," the general said on the condition his name not be used, in part out of fear of punishment. "It is doubtful we can go on much longer like this," he added. "The American people may not stand for it - and they should not."”

“Rumsfeld step down???

If he didn't think he could be effective (in the Bush Administration) then he'd step down in a heartbeat. Or so he says.”

“If the program is to support smaller armies, why are they calling up another 37,000 troops, and sending orders that those in Iraq will be staying for, perhaps, another year.

I wasn't in support of going into to Iraq, unilaterally, but support the troops. These recent orders have to really lower the morale for these women, men and families.”

“In ten years, the people of the USA will be more like Iraqies than Iraqies will be like us. No winning or losing in this one. Just a long stay for enough military so we don't forget how stupid we were.”

“yow.”

“If Bush was to lose, I don't believe Kerry could or would do anything better. The US is alread in a losing position because the definition of winning is undefined. What we want is all of Iraq to respect us and go back to work so we can pump thier oil for them. Since that will never happen, we are going to lose.”

“Bigpopps - I respectfully disagree. When you elect a President, you elect his people as well. The second reason I'm voting for Kerry is that he wil put Wes Clark in somewhere, hopefully either VP, or Sec. of Defence. Clark would make a huge difference in the situation, as he knows how to deal with what's left of our allies. Clark is a smart military man, and could step in and take care of business.

One big Bush mistake was making Powell Sec of State. His talents are waisted there. He should have made him Sec of Defence....we wouldn't be here at this point right now.”

“Keep your sons in college folks. I think it's gonna get worse. Hang on ...it could be a wild ride this summer. The June 30th turnover in Iraq, the Olympics in Greece, the election heating up. Figures that Iraqi insurgents will keep things hot. Wooeee!”

“Did you not see Clark's analysis of the ongoing war. The guy was a joke. Everything he said about what needed to be done during the war was proved wrong, what makes you think that his strategy would be any better now.”

“How so?

Can you give me an example?”

“I suppose I could go back and search the tape archives of teh war if they are still available and find examples of Clark saying #&%!$ like "This won't work, we need to bring in the 10th mountain, the big red 1, all the marines we can find, plus all the cooks and hand them guns" then the next morning what ever it was that he said wouldn't work, worked.”

“"I suppose I could go back and search the tape archives of teh war if they are still available and find examples of Clark saying #&%!$ like "This won't work, we need to bring in the 10th mountain....."


Well, I would suggest you do. If you bring a point like that, you best be prepared to back it up; otherwise it looks like yer blowing smoke and living off of propaganda.

Please bring you're A-game.


and PS - what's bull#&%!$ about having proper troop size to deal with the problem?”

“Yeah laqtis - can't you see the splendid effects of arrogance and incompetence? What's wrong with you man?”

“Maybe while Rummy is busy shedding crocodile tears over being caught, he could apologize to Generals Shinseki and Zinni.

When one takes full responsibility, doesn’t that mean resigning when it becomes obvious that you’re a total #&%!$-up?”

“Military papers demand Rumsfeld, Myers' resignation

By John Byrne
RAW STORY EDITOR

Today, the Army, Marine, Air Force and Navy Times, civilian-owned papers which are effectively the trade papers of the military, ran editorials calling for the ouster of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Myers.

"General Myers, Rumsfeld and their staffs failed to recognize the impact the scandal would not only have in the United States but around the world," the editorial reads. "On the battlefield, Myers and Rumsfeld's errors would be called a lack of situational awareness — a failure that amounts to professional negligence."

The editorial was acquired by CBS and read Sunday by CBS News Chief Washington correspondent Bob Schieffer.

"This was not only a failure of leadership at the local command level," it continues. "This was a failure that ran straight to the top. Accountability is essential, even if that means relieving top leaders from duty during a time of war."

www.rawstory.com”

“Powell might be the right man for secretary of defense, but that would never fly with the Dubya Junta.

Powell has too much sense to have gotten involved in an unnecessary war.

Rumskull is Dubya/Cheney's go to guy.”

“Sy Hersh will prolly get another Pulitzer out of this coverage:

His latest: CHAIN OF COMMAND How the Department of Defense mishandled the disaster at Abu Ghraib.

Last week's :TORTURE AT ABU GHRAIB American soldiers brutalized Iraqis. How far up does the responsibility go?”

“Whips and chains of command?”

“I don't know about chains....

These are what cracked me up. Scroll down a little, <G>”

“I had a lot of trust in Powell and hoped that he was the one level headed guy America had in the Oval office. My assumption if Powell had a strong voice and opinion with Bush, then he either would have prevented many mistakes or would have been fired for trying to prevent these mistatkes. Since he is not been fired and since we are in a very ugly situation with the rest of the world, Powell appears to becoming a go along guy. I felt I would always here Powell saying something other then what Bush says.”

“Yes -- I'm pretty disappointed in Powell, too. I thought he was a stand-up guy.”

“Can't be a stand up guy, when you don't know what to stand up fer....”

“The article about Powell in GQ this month is very good.”

“I hadn't gotten a chance to read the whole thing yet.

How long till his tell-all book comes out?”

“enough said!”

“You forced my hand again kleety.


”

“"Things aren't getting better; they're getting worse. The White House is completely disconnected from reality," [Republican Sen. Chuck] Hagel tells U.S. News. "It's like they're just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq."

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/050627/27bush.htm”

“General Contradicts Cheney on Iraq
Thursday, June 23, 2005

WASHINGTON — The top American military commander in the Persian Gulf (search) disputed a contention by Vice President Dick Cheney that the Iraqi insurgency was in its "last throes" and told Congress on Thursday its strength was basically undiminished from six months ago.

Furthermore, Gen. John Abizaid (search) told the Senate Armed Services Committee, "I believe there are more foreign fighters coming into Iraq than there were six months ago."

His testimony came as the nation's top defense leaders rejected calls by some lawmakers for the Bush administration to set a timetable for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. "That would be a mistake," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld (search) told the committee.

In a televised interview last month, Cheney said: "The level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline. I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency."

Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan, the committee's senior Democrat, asked Abizaid if he realized he was contradicting Cheney.

"I don't know that I would make any comment about that other than to say there's a lot of work to be done," said Abizaid. "I gave you my opinion."


Levin and other congressional Democrats — and some Republicans as well — have criticized administration officials for painting an unrealistically rosy picture of the situation in Iraq.

For his part, Rumsfeld sought to explain what Cheney meant.

Between now and when an Iraqi constitution is drafted and voted on later this year, "They may very well be in their last throes by their own view cause they recognize how important it will be if the lose," he said.

Of Cheney's words specifically, Rumsfeld added: "While I didn't use them and I might not use them, I think it's understandable that we can expect that kind of a response from the enemy."

Rumsfeld engaged in contentious exchanges with committee Democrats.

"Isn't it time for you to resign?" Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., asked the defense secretary, citing what he called "gross errors and mistakes" in the U.S. military campaign in Iraq.

"I've offered my resignation to the president twice," Rumsfeld shot back, saying that President Bush had decided not to accept it. "That's his call," he said.”

“What are you guys talking about? We already won in Iraq!! Mission is accomplished! We are the victors... hoozah hooozah!! Bush has total grip on reality, he is the greatest militarly minded president ever and Rumsfeld might as well be God.
last edited: 6/23/05 12:35:27 PM”

“These alarmists must be controlled by the liberal media. Everything is GREAT in Iraq. In fact, Disneyland is opening SunniLand in may of 2006. Six flags is going to open its newest ride, "terrorcoaster" at their new park next year.

The only thing your average Iraqi has to worry about these days is whether to vacation with the family in Dubai or Istanbul.”

“the almost 2,000 dead american troops and thousands of more casualties are all figments of the liberal media's imaginiation. Things simply could not be more peachy in Iraq. Bush is doing such a great job. He really understands reality. Thank god he is our president.”

“Is that your breath EAS or are you talking out of your ass again? :)”

“do you ask questions out of you ass Nigal?”

“Only after I have White Catles hamburgers and a bunch of Colt 45.”

“Geopolitical Diary: Thursday, June 23, 2005
 June 23, 2005 04 52 GMT


A CIA report leaked to U.S. media says Iraq may be shaping up as a new
and improved training ground for Islamist militants who could take
their skills in urban combat back to their home countries in the Middle
East and South Asia. This apparently new concern seems a little odd at
this juncture: The National Intelligence Council (NIC), a CIA
think-tank, released similar findings in January, and in December 2004
we also noted that "Iraq is fast becoming a new Afghanistan, an
unstable, lawless breeding ground for a new generation of Islamist
militants who have access to all the on-the-job combat training they
could ever want."

That Iraq is a fertile training ground for Islamist (and perhaps
non-Islamist) militants, then, is not really all that surprising.
Wherever a guerilla conflict springs up, militants from nearby states
and those with similar ideology will take advantage of the real-life
training experiences. And Iraq provides plenty of real-life experience,
unlike the training camps of Afghanistan, which in latter days provided
few opportunities for students to test their skills in combat against
trained foes.

In the case of the Afghan training camps, we now have near-iconic
images aired by U.S. media, showing Islamist recruits jumping ditches
and swinging hand-over-hand on the monkey bars. Videos from Iraq, on
the other hand, show small-unit actions against U.S. and Iraqi forces,
IED operations and suicide bomb attacks.

More interesting, perhaps, is the reception that the idea of militants
training in Iraq receives inside the United States. In January, for
example, a White House spokesman dismissed the NIC report as
"speculation," adding: "That's assuming that terrorists would just be
sitting around and doing nothing if we weren't staying on the
offensive." All too often the administration has appeared late in
recognizing or at least admitting changes in the aspects of the Iraqi
insurgency; only to have the issue arise again much later and much more
clearly.

As a centralized "hot" guerrilla war, Iraq is a location where Islamist
militants, Arab militants and others can come together to learn new
skills and hone existing tactics. It also serves as a sort of focal
point for the establishment of relations among various militant groups
-- which, in turn, facilitates the sharing of various kinds of
knowledge and "best practices." One group may have a good car-bomb
maker; another, a specialist in booby traps; a third, an expert in
small-unit kidnappings, and so on. These groups and individuals need
not share the same organizing leadership, goals or even ideology in
order to practice deadly effectiveness. In essence, Iraq is now a place
where militants of several stripes can populate their curricula vitae
and rolodexes with new skills and contacts that might come in handy in
the future.

In Afghanistan, this potential was exploited by Osama bin Laden and al
Qaeda -- a group that did not try to direct and bring all the militants
into a single unified organization, but rather took advantage of the
commonality of contacts, skills and experiences to build a vast pool of
potential future recruits. For the moment, it does not appear that
there is a similar, centralized entity among the various Iraqi
insurgents and militants, though Abu Musab al-Zarqawi obviously has
attempted to fill that role. But despite the lack of a new bin Laden,
the connections and skills being learned and honed in Iraq will surely
be carried back to other localized militancies.

And if a new bin Laden-type figure does emerge from among the Iraqi
fighters, however, a more globalized network capable of much larger and
geographically diverse operations once again looms.”

“That's great, more business for defense contractors!”

“That one sounds on tartget Mutt.

Are you paying the big bucks to subscribe to that service?”

“One can never pay too much when looking for the source of all his opinions.”

“Actually the one thing that needs to be added to that piece, Mutt is the radicalizing effect that the war has on many people and how the war is taken as proof of Bin Laden's claims about the US's intentions towards the Islami world.”

“(CNN) -- An editorial to be published Monday in independent publications that serve the four main branches of the U.S. military will call for President Bush to replace Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

"Basically, the editorial says, it's clear now, from some of the public statements that military leaders are making, that he's lost the support and respect of the military leadership," said Robert Hodierne, senior managing editor for the publications' parent company Army Times Publications.

"That they're starting to go public with that now, with their disagreements, added up with all of the other missteps we believe he's made, that it's time for him to be replaced," Hodierne.

Army Times Publications publishes the Army Times, Navy Times, Air Force Times and the Marine Corps Times.

It is the second time the publications have called for Rumsfeld to resign.

Bush has maintained that Rumsfeld will stay on the job until 2008.
In May 2004, when the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal broke, an Army Times editorial said, "This was not just a failure of leadership at the local command level. This was a failure that ran straight to the top. Accountability here is essential, even if that means relieving top leaders from duty in a time of war."

The timing of Monday's editorial was prompted not by midterm elections, scheduled for Tuesday, but by Bush's statement earlier this week that he intends to keep Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney in their posts through the end of his term, Hodierne said.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/11/03/rumsfeld.resign/index.html”

“"An editorial"

in

Army Times Publishing Company became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Gannett Co., Inc. on Friday, August 1, 1997. Gannett is a nationwide news and information company that publishes 75 daily newspapers, including USA Today, and USA Weekend, a newspaper magazine. Gannett also operates 21 television stations and cable television systems in major U.S. markets.
last edited: 11/03/06 11:40:32 PM”

“why does moonglo hate the troops?!”

“Maybe von Rumskull has some dirt on Dubya and cain't be fired.

We are dealing with some dirty dogs here.”

“Rumsfeld has tried to resign twice already, but it was not accepted.


http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/02/03/rumsfeld.resign/”

“Hmmm, maybe it was just for show.

We are after all dealing with liars and crooks.”

“Rumsfeld very nice! In Kazaksthan, he made premier gypsy catcher as honor to tortures skills!”

“Bush just doesn't want confirmation hearings for a new Secretary of Defense.

But also, the real problem is the policy, not the man implementing it. So, a new Secretary of Defense will make no difference at all.”