Today's well-publicized Army Times editorial calling for Donald Rumsfeld's resignation as Secretary of Defense prompts our reluctant agreement.
We affirm that Rumsfeld is an honorable and diligent man of exceptional ability. We furthermore deny that anyone can know that the war would have gone better had it been prosecuted with more soldiers. It's easier to know how it has gone wrong than to say how it would have gone right.
But calling for Rumsfeld's resignation is the only rational response to a situation where his credibility with the uniformed military is so seriously in question. Even if that were not the case, he has still served over five difficult years, and the situation that the military faces could use a fresh set of eyes at the top.
As far as his subordinates are concerned, Bush is, as we have said before, the loyalest of loyalists. He demands loyalty, and he gives it in return. Often that is an asset. If he does not relent on this issue, it will be a liability.
5 comments:
As I am not fully aware of what I am allowed to say according to the UCMJ on this matter, I will just say that I would have no problem if someone else took his position.
The war has gone wrong? Is SWNID finally admitting the obvious after years of denial?
Anonymous, I think SWNID's point is not that the war has gone entirely wrong, but that the parts of it, considerable ones at that, that have gone wrong aren't likely to be fixed by Rummy. Don't attribute to him your own logical error.
What's with all the logical errors in the comments on this blog, anyway? Without logical errors, there would be hardly comments. Commenters either make logical errors or point them out.
Jim shoes,
I think you need to switch to Air Jordans.
Your logic hasn't left the jim floor.
Since SWNID's exact words were: "It's easier to know how it has gone wrong than to say how it would have gone right," and since SWNID has defended almost every aspect of the war over the last 2 years (in unwavering fashion), I believe you are projecting.
I didn't say that SWNID said the war has gone entirely wrong. I merely quoted his exact words in perfect context.
I find it shocking that he would assume such a statement in his argument on Rummy, after repeated treatises defending the success of the war.
I called him on it.
His gentle readers deserve a post letting us know when he changed his mind and why, and whether he believes all of his previous defenses were correct (and something has changed only recently with the war).
It's unlikely we'll get it, because it won't be very funny.
Anonymous, I'll break my recently self-imposed rule and address a commenter.
Shoes is right in his reading of my prose. You're not.
My general assessment of the war is the same as it's always been. War, to paraphrase Sherman, is always at least heck. There hasn't ever been one that went well. Life does not go well, least of all when it involves war. You'll see this as a recurring theme in lots of posts on the war, should you have the leisure (and who does?) to go back and read them.
In talking about the necessity and justification for the war, I have sought to bring perspective to the discussion that has been dominated by reborn pacifists, 60s holdovers, no-nothing isolationists, and political opportunists who don't know history well enough to assess the present.
Which is to say, the war was, in my ongoing view, preferable morally and politically to the status quo in Iraq. Its justification stands as much today as it did then.
The problem in bringing it to a satisfactory conclusion has been both the difficulty of adapting to the developing insurgency and more particularly the problems created by the complete vacuum of effective leadership among Iraqis. This weekend's events are a perfect illustration. Frankly, I think that this is mostly what has caused the problem, though one might reasonably aver that Rummy and company should have anticipated this problem.
The leadership issue, what with factions fighting over who gets what, will probably necessitate the partitioning of the country, necessitating a new strategy on the ground, mostly to limit the damage (we note again that one million people died in the partitioning of India in 1948). Again, we've noted that before.
We call for Rumsfeld's replacement not because we believe him disgraced by failure but because it's time for new leadership so that the military can adapt to this new reality. There's nothing especially dramatic about a cabinet shakeup at midterm. Bush is actually exceptional in not doing it. It's standard procedure, and for good reason. These are hard jobs, and people get tired in them. We called for fresh eyes, not rolling heads.
You didn't quote my words in the first instance, and you didn't consider their context. You lifted them to make them imply something that I didn't imply, and that no one who reads carefully would infer.
Sorry, no Damascus Road here. Just an observation about the nature of leadership in life's most difficult situations.
Sorry to spoil your fun.
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