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Well, I like the following commentary from the WSJ.
REVIEW & OUTLOOK
<http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif> <http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif> <http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif> <http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif>
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Rumsfeld's Second Front
An unbending rule of Washington life is that the one thing critics can never forgive you for is being right. This is worth keeping in mind amid the obloquy now being heaped on Donald Rumsfeld.
Judging by all of the blind-quote vituperation the Secretary of Defense is receiving, a casual reader might be surprised to learn that we haven't yet lost the Iraq war. U.S. troops are within 50 miles of Baghdad, probing Republican Guard lines that are being shredded from the air. The surrounded enemy has suicide bombers, guerrilla harassment and Peter Arnett left as an offensive strategy. We can hit the enemy, he can't much hit us.
Yet Mr. Rumsfeld is being assailed for having given the "bum advice" to President Bush that has brought our troops this far this fast. The main substantive accusation seems to be that Mr. Rumsfeld forced the military chiefs to come up with a war plan that did more than repeat the 500,000-man deployment and strategy of the Gulf War. This has offended some of the armchair generals who are claiming through the fog of television that we should have had more troops on the ground.
These are of course the same generals fond of saying that no battle plan ever survives its first meeting with the enemy. Perhaps they've forgotten how complicated it is to move an artillery battery in battle or to fly an Apache helicopter at night, let alone move a division 300 miles in four days. Confusion and mistakes are the norm in war, the issue is how well they are handled. For example, there now seem to be fewer Fedayeen harassing U.S. supply lines than there were last week. Why? We've killed many of them.
Yes, it would have been better had the Turks agreed to allow the armored 4th Infantry to march from the north, as the original war plan envisioned. But the Turkey failure was diplomatic, not military. Last time we looked, the State Department was in charge of diplomacy.
The Rumsfeld war plan also had to be designed with a far smaller military than we had in 1991. To refresh some memories, defense spending fell in absolute terms in seven of eight years of the Clinton Presidency. At the time this was called the "peace dividend," believe it or not. Colin Powell was able to deploy the Ronald Reagan war machine in 1991; Mr. Rumsfeld inherited the rump Clinton model, about 40% smaller in troops, older planes and ships.
Mr. Rumsfeld is a payback target now precisely because he bucked the military status quo. He has fought for more (and smarter) defense spending against a Congress that would rather build more highways and subsidize more corn fields. He has challenged the Army brass to do as well as the Marines in introducing technology and mobility into their strategic doctrine. Note that most of the critical TV generals are retired Army, not Air Force.
As for the war on terror, the Defense Secretary is among those who believe the best homeland security is to pursue terrorists in their havens. This is what the Iraq expedition is all about. The opponents of the Rumsfeld strategy have been horrified to discover that Mr. Bush agrees with this; or even worse, that Mr. Bush is driving the strategy that Mr. Rumsfeld is implementing. Thus the piling on Mr. Rumsfeld now in the hope of dividing the President from his Defense chief. Yesterday's Washington Post article quoting highly critical "former senior Republican government officials and party leaders," though none by name, was especially cowardly.
With American troops poised near Baghdad, there are difficult war calls to come. One is how long to soften up the Republican Guard from the air before going for the kill on the ground. That is a decision best made by military commanders in theater, in consultation with the Pentagon, not by the White House and certainly not by TV commentators.
It might be possible to repeat the Gulf War luxury of weeks of preparatory bombing. But this war is not taking place in a vacuum, and there is a problem with the stability of our Arab allies. The faster the war is over the better for Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the Iraqi people. Defense secretaries are paid to consider those political factors when they work with commanders on such military decisions as when to take Baghdad.
All in all the Rumsfeld war plan seems to be succeeding very well. Angered by Saddam's criminal tactics, and determined now that American lives are at stake, public support is firming behind it. The one fatal attraction would be to fall now for a "diplomatic pause" or cease fire. As we heard Mr. Rumsfeld say on Sunday, that isn't part of his plan.
REVIEW & OUTLOOK
<http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif> <http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif> <http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif> <http://online.wsj.com/img/b.gif>
advertisement
<a><img></a><br>
Rumsfeld's Second Front
An unbending rule of Washington life is that the one thing critics can never forgive you for is being right. This is worth keeping in mind amid the obloquy now being heaped on Donald Rumsfeld.
Judging by all of the blind-quote vituperation the Secretary of Defense is receiving, a casual reader might be surprised to learn that we haven't yet lost the Iraq war. U.S. troops are within 50 miles of Baghdad, probing Republican Guard lines that are being shredded from the air. The surrounded enemy has suicide bombers, guerrilla harassment and Peter Arnett left as an offensive strategy. We can hit the enemy, he can't much hit us.
Yet Mr. Rumsfeld is being assailed for having given the "bum advice" to President Bush that has brought our troops this far this fast. The main substantive accusation seems to be that Mr. Rumsfeld forced the military chiefs to come up with a war plan that did more than repeat the 500,000-man deployment and strategy of the Gulf War. This has offended some of the armchair generals who are claiming through the fog of television that we should have had more troops on the ground.
These are of course the same generals fond of saying that no battle plan ever survives its first meeting with the enemy. Perhaps they've forgotten how complicated it is to move an artillery battery in battle or to fly an Apache helicopter at night, let alone move a division 300 miles in four days. Confusion and mistakes are the norm in war, the issue is how well they are handled. For example, there now seem to be fewer Fedayeen harassing U.S. supply lines than there were last week. Why? We've killed many of them.
Yes, it would have been better had the Turks agreed to allow the armored 4th Infantry to march from the north, as the original war plan envisioned. But the Turkey failure was diplomatic, not military. Last time we looked, the State Department was in charge of diplomacy.
The Rumsfeld war plan also had to be designed with a far smaller military than we had in 1991. To refresh some memories, defense spending fell in absolute terms in seven of eight years of the Clinton Presidency. At the time this was called the "peace dividend," believe it or not. Colin Powell was able to deploy the Ronald Reagan war machine in 1991; Mr. Rumsfeld inherited the rump Clinton model, about 40% smaller in troops, older planes and ships.
Mr. Rumsfeld is a payback target now precisely because he bucked the military status quo. He has fought for more (and smarter) defense spending against a Congress that would rather build more highways and subsidize more corn fields. He has challenged the Army brass to do as well as the Marines in introducing technology and mobility into their strategic doctrine. Note that most of the critical TV generals are retired Army, not Air Force.
As for the war on terror, the Defense Secretary is among those who believe the best homeland security is to pursue terrorists in their havens. This is what the Iraq expedition is all about. The opponents of the Rumsfeld strategy have been horrified to discover that Mr. Bush agrees with this; or even worse, that Mr. Bush is driving the strategy that Mr. Rumsfeld is implementing. Thus the piling on Mr. Rumsfeld now in the hope of dividing the President from his Defense chief. Yesterday's Washington Post article quoting highly critical "former senior Republican government officials and party leaders," though none by name, was especially cowardly.
With American troops poised near Baghdad, there are difficult war calls to come. One is how long to soften up the Republican Guard from the air before going for the kill on the ground. That is a decision best made by military commanders in theater, in consultation with the Pentagon, not by the White House and certainly not by TV commentators.
It might be possible to repeat the Gulf War luxury of weeks of preparatory bombing. But this war is not taking place in a vacuum, and there is a problem with the stability of our Arab allies. The faster the war is over the better for Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the Iraqi people. Defense secretaries are paid to consider those political factors when they work with commanders on such military decisions as when to take Baghdad.
All in all the Rumsfeld war plan seems to be succeeding very well. Angered by Saddam's criminal tactics, and determined now that American lives are at stake, public support is firming behind it. The one fatal attraction would be to fall now for a "diplomatic pause" or cease fire. As we heard Mr. Rumsfeld say on Sunday, that isn't part of his plan.
- One of the cartoons in todays Augusta Chronicle had Rumsfeld in the driver's seat of a car with a bunch of screaming kids in the back saying "Is it vietnam yet?"....... 
