| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Harry Hope" |
| Date: |
11 Sep 2007 05:32:19 PM |
| Object: |
From Bush/Petraeus/Crocker nothing but charts and excuses. |
From a New York Times editorial, 9/11/07:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/11/opinion/11tue1.html?hp
Empty Calories
For months, President Bush has been promising an honest accounting of
the situation in Iraq, a fresh look at the war strategy and a new plan
for how to extricate the United States from the death spiral of the
Iraqi civil war.
The nation got none of that yesterday from the Congressional testimony
by Gen. David Petraeus, the top military commander in Iraq, and
Ambassador Ryan Crocker.
It got more excuses for delaying serious decisions for many more
months, keeping the war going into 2008 and probably well beyond.
It was just another of the broken promises and false claims of success
that we’ve heard from Mr. Bush for years, from shock and awe, to
bouquets of roses, to mission accomplished and, most recently, to a
major escalation that was supposed to buy Iraqi leaders time to unify
their nation.
We hope Congress is not fooled by the silver stars, charts and
rhetoric of yesterday’s hearing.
Even if the so-called surge had created breathing room, Iraq’s
sectarian leaders show neither the ability nor the intent to take
advantage of it.
The headline out of General Petraeus’s testimony was a prediction that
the United States should be able to reduce its forces from 160,000 to
130,000 by next summer.
That sounds like a big number, but it would only bring American troops
to the level that were in Iraq when Mr. Bush announced his “surge”
last January.
And it’s the rough equivalent of dropping an object and taking credit
for gravity.
The military does not have the troops to sustain these high levels
without further weakening the overstretched Army and denying soldiers
their 15 months of home leave before going back to war.
The general claimed a significant and steady decline in killings and
deaths in the past three months, but even he admitted that the number
of attacks is still too high.
Recent independent studies are much more skeptical about the decrease
in violence.
The main success General Petraeus cited was in the previously
all-but-lost Anbar Province where local sheiks, having decided that
they hate Al Qaeda more than they hate the United States, have joined
forces with American troops to combat insurgents.
That development — which may be ephemeral — was not a goal of the
surge and surprised American officials.
To claim it as a success of the troop buildup is, to be generous,
disingenuous.
The chief objective of the surge was to reduce violence enough that
political leaders in Iraq could learn to work together, build a viable
government and take decisions to improve Iraqi society, including
sharing oil resources.
Congress set benchmarks that Mr. Bush accepted.
But after independent investigators last week said that Baghdad had
failed to meet most of those markers, Mr. Crocker dismissed them.
The biggest achievement he had to trumpet was a communiqué in which
Iraqi leaders promised to talk more.
General Petraeus admitted success in Iraq would be neither quick nor
easy.
Mr. Crocker claimed that success is attainable, but made no guarantee.
With that much wiggle room in the prognosis, one would think American
leaders would start looking at serious alternative strategies — like
the early, prudent withdrawal of troops that we favor.
The American people deserve more than what the general and the
diplomat offered them yesterday.
__________________________________________________
Harry
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| User: "" |
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| Title: Re: From Bush/Petraeus/Crocker nothing but charts and excuses. |
11 Sep 2007 05:44:16 PM |
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On Sep 11, 6:32 pm, Harry Hope <riv...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting
different results. Albert Einstein
At least Petraeus know staying the course will make us safer:
Sen. John Warner (R-VA) questions Gen. David Petraeus:
WARNER: I hope in the recesses of your heart that you know that
strategy will continue the casualties, stress on our forces, stress on
military families, stress on all Americans. Are you able to say at
this time, if we continue what you have laid before the Congress, this
strategy, that if you continue, you are making America safer?
PETRAEUS: Sir, I believe that this is indeed the best course of action
to achieve our objections in Iraq.
WARNER: Does that make America safer?
PETRAEUS: Sir, I don't know actually. I have not sat down and sorted
out in my own mind. What I have focused on and been riveted on is how
to accomplish the mission of the Multinational Force in Iraq.
Topset72
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/09/11/petraeus-i-dont-know-_n_63982.html
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