September 17, 2007 - And the War drags on

Reality check from April 2007: The Iraq War Makes Terrorism Worse, Al Qaeda Strikes Back, Tenet Took the Fall But Bush will cite his failure in Iraq as reasons the US must stay and be bled. The prestigious Foreign Affairs magazine declares that "rushing into Iraq instead of finishing off the hunt for Osama bin Laden" has made terrorism worse, emboldened Al Qaeda, and taken the focus off the "War on Terrorism". Washington unwittingly helped its enemies, Author Bruce O. Riedel states, adding: "... al Qaeda has more bases, more partners, and more followers today than it did on the eve of 9/11."

Now the reality check nearly 6 months later:

Will Iraq Kick Out Blackwater?

The Iraqi government announced Monday it was ordering Blackwater USA, the security firm that protects U.S. diplomats, to leave the country after what it said was the fatal shooting of eight Iraqi civilians following a car bomb attack against a State Department convoy.

OK, leaving aside the rationale used to convince the United States to go to war, something that has bothered me from before we did is the fact that when the Congress asked the Army about what it would take to win, General Eric Shinseki stated what the Army had concluded from a considerable amount of analysis that it would take , well here (from wikipedia):

"Shinseki is famous for his remarks to the U.S. Senate Armed Services committee before the war in Iraq in which he said "something in the order of several hundred thousand soldiers" would probably be required for post-war Iraq. Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz publicly disagreed with his estimate.^[1]

When the insurgency took hold in post-war Iraq, Shinseki's comments and their public rejection by the civilian leadership were often cited by those who felt the Bush administration deployed too few troops to Iraq. On November 15, 2006, in testimony before Congress, CENTCOM Commander Gen. John Abizaid said that General Shinseki's estimate had proved correct. "

If I recall, Shinseki had stated that following a rapid deployment of armor heavy troops to decimate the opposing force, the follow-on would need to include "several brigade of military police and other support units" to restore the country to normalcy, which the Wolfowitz-Rumsfeld numb nuts disagreed with. Part of that, in my humble opinion, a desire by the current administration to privatize with contractors, including the security forces traditionally filled by the Army.

I am keenly aware of the peace dividend from the end of the Cold War, because California saw the demise of Fort Ord, Mather AFB, McClellan AFB, Alameda Naval Air Station, Hunters Point, and of course Mare Island Naval Shipyard in just northern California.

Without these based, the next logical step would be to downsize the military, which the US did. Then 9/11 happened, and America realized that even if our ideological opponents of the Cold War were now not so menacing, that didn't necessarily translate to universal peace love and understanding; to the contrary, it promoted the USA to singular superpower status and left us as the focal point for distrust and hatred by those needing an enemy. These are my opinions, at any rate. I shared these views with a colleague from India, and surprisingly, he agreed.

He says in his country there was a anxiety over US intentions, which is in part why his country was so closely bound by military purchases to the former USSR; to offset the influence of the US in the region, particularly when the US sold arms to Pakistan. Now they are even more nervous that we pose a global threat, especially when we focus our war on terror not where we knew it resided, in Afghanistan, but made some weird rationale to oust Saddam. Don't get me wrong on this, I think Saddam was likely one of the worst rulers on earth, probably a close second to Kim in North Korea . He deserved to go. Since our government was determined to get him, why didn't we just do that in a way that made some logical sense, instead of the "oh, we can do it on the cheap and hire it out" means we have been stuck with.

I have friends that have served in Afghanistan and Iraq, my cousin is likely at this moment in Iraq for the 3rd time( or is it his 4th tour?), and one of my close friends at work had her son blown up in a IED explosion in Iraq( he survived, due to them recently being assigned a new armored vehicle, instead of the "up armored" HUMVEE they had...

Oh yeah, I read Stars and Stripes, Marine Corps Gazette and the Journal of the Association of the United States Army; nearly every issue has some new complaints about how the current leadership in the military is unwilling to confront their civilian masters for fear of being "insubordinate" . I don't know, when I went to work for the government back in the 70's , I had to swear an oath to the Constitution of the United States, not party or particular leader?

Sorry about the rant, but I have been steadily getting more frustrated with these issues, and needed to vent...