Democrats to Bush: No more troops to Iraq

[C1ay]

In a letter to President Bush on Friday, leaders of the new Democratic Congress said increasing troop levels in Iraq would be a "serious mistake."

 

The open letter comes as Bush considers a new war strategy, shuffles his Iraq commanders and moves his spy chief to handle Iraqi diplomacy.

 

Sources with knowledge of the president's deliberations have told CNN that Bush may temporarily bolster the roughly 140,000 U.S. troops now in Iraq by an additional 20,000 to 40,000 -- a move loudly rejected in the letter.

 

More at CNN...

 

Opinions?

[Buffy]

Its notable that in this process he had to fire Army Chief of Staff George Casey and CENTCOM General Abizaid, because they refused to tell him what he wanted to hear: that adding more troops would mean they could "win." Apparently no senior Army staff is willing to do so either, because Abizaid's replacement is Navy Admiral Fallon: CENTCOM has never been led by an Admiral because so little of this region is amenable to naval action (his previous post was head of Pacific Fleet Ops), and as we know, the problem in Iraq is land ops. Does this make any sense to anyone?

 

Why is it that the DoD staff is being so disobedient? I thought Bush wanted to just do what they said so he could let them take the blame, er, get the best advice from the experts?

 

As several have said in the milanalyst community: "more troops" is a tactic, not a strategy, we need a strategy...

 

Horse first, cart afterward,

Buffy

[Buffy]

Oh and also "winning" is a goal, also not a strategy.

 

"Surge" was a tactic advocated by the General Staff back in January-March 2003, *before* the invasion, and again, Bush/Rummy meddled and said no.

 

I think its good to listen to experts!

 

Timing is everything,

Buffy

[InfiniteNow]

It's frustrating how consistently he changes positions and refuses to accept alternatives. I listen to my genrills... that is, of course, until they push back against my ideas. :eek:

 

Funny how the issue of flip flopping helped him beat Kerry... How many more people have to die before we decide it's time to change our position?

 

At what point does the captain of the ship realize it's not a mutany, and the crew members are actually correct?

[infamous]

 

At what point does the captain of the ship realize it's not a mutany, and the crew members are actually correct?

Truly Infynow............I've supported Bush thru most of his presidency, but of late, I've lost faith in his agenda. Not only is Bush looking very suspect presently, but I'm feeling very stupid for offering my former support............................Infy

[Buffy]

...I'm feeling very stupid for offering my former support.....

You shouldn't feel stupid. Those of us on the liberal side may have never seen any reason to support him, but I see lots of reasons why many of my friends did support him in the past, and I find no fault in this. Its people like you abandoning that support though that's causing the seachange, which unfortunately the folks in the administration are blind to.

 

Listening to Tony Snow today, it sounds like the belief in the White House is that "the American people" want to win no matter what, its just that they want to know how that's going to be accomplished. If that's the answer we're going to get from the speech next week, we're all going to be disappointed. I hope the "strategy" is not, as Sen. Biden indicated today, to simply "keep doing stuff" until the next administration comes along so that they get the blame for "not having the resolve to win."

 

Democracy means compromise, not "I won, I get to do whatever I want,"

Buffy

[Freddy]

Bush likes 'yes' people. Colin Powell stopped being one on Iraq early on and was gone. It is not surprising that Bush is shopping around for new people to follow his mindless tragedy in Iraq. He will never stop this war until he leaves office. Two more freakin' years of Bush! Just think of the damage he can do until then?

[C1ay]

I personally don't think sending more troops is going to end the conflicts that are going on now. Current conflicts are over disagreements those people have fought about for a 1000 years.

 

I do have a problem with Congress playing Commander In Chief though. Perhaps it is just the way the media has portrayed the message as some kind of threat if the President acts within his powers. I don't like the precedent this could lead to.

[Buffy]

I do have a problem with Congress playing Commander In Chief though.

But they're not: they're being very careful to stick within their constitutional role of approving the *budget* and approving acts of war; all they're saying is "no, you may not spend the money on more troops." But Tony Snow really destroyed this complaint you describe (which was in the loyalist blogosphere yesterday) in the press briefing today when he tried to say that they should come forward with their "alternative plan:"

And, again, Senator Reid, who has put together this letter -- and there's the implicit offer that they think that they may have a way for figuring out how to help Iraq succeed, look, that can be a very constructive contribution to the debate. So we're looking forward to hearing it.

You can read the letter yourself and decide for yourself if that's what they've implied....

 

Of course the complaints are bipartisan:

Democrats and Republicans voiced deep reservations about any plan that would send more troops to Iraq.

 

They also complained about how little they knew of the president's plans, warning that the lack of information further impeded congressional support.

 

"The president will need strong friends," said Indiana Sen. Richard G. Lugar, the senior Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee. Complaining that he had heard nothing from Bush, he added: "There need to be some informed persons if there is to be support for the president's proposal…. You need people on the takeoff if they are going to be there on the landing."

 

Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain,

Buffy

[TheBigDog]

The Iraq commission calls for more troops in the short term - and the President is expected to follow this recommendation. The congress calls for less troops - and the President is expected to follow this recommendation. It is unfortunate that you cannot please all the critics.

 

Since the very beginning we have been told that this was going to be a long and difficult process. It has been. Those who say that there were no plans are unfamiliar with the US military. They have plans for everything. That is what they do. Not all of the plans work out the way we with that they would. And they adapt and change their tactics on a daily basis. That is what they do. Anyone who is under the impression that our tactics and strategies in Iraq have gone unchanged for the past 3+ years is simply mistaken.

 

The fact is that we don't have military issues. We have policing issues. Where the Iraqis are weak is in providing domestic security. They have had corruption issues in that part of the world in police forces forever. It is inherent in the culture. Police officers are often are on the take. They often don't show up or stay on post. There is little discipline in following chain of command from elected officials. Police in many cases are just the militia of the local warlord. What the country needs is a good strong police force to help the honest citizens feel protected from the small minority of scum who have no value for human life and randomly kill in the name of a political cause. We can train all the military in the world, but what they need are good cops in the big city. And that is what they don't have.

 

We know that we can force peaceful streets with more US troops. So my understanding is that is the plan, but we are at the same time going to apply more pressure on the Iraqi's to begin taking over that job in the future. The elected officials in Iraq need to walk a fine line of keeping support of the Clerics and warlords, and curbing the power that they possess. We can either ignore all of these local sensibilities, and just try and dictate terms (something the US has not done, but is the solution suggested in many criticisms of the US policy), or we can work with the growing government and help it develop in its own fashion.

 

Bill

[Buffy]

The Iraq commission calls for more troops in the short term - and the President is expected to follow this recommendation.

Lets go to the source:

More Troops for Iraq: Sustained increases in U.S. troop levels would not solve the fundamental cause of violence in Iraq, which is the absence of national reconciliation. A senior American general told us that adding U.S. troops might temporarily help limit violence in a highly localized area. However, past experience indicates that the violence would simply rekindle as soon as U.S. forces are moved to another area.

Fallujah after just such a surge has once again become ungovernable, so says the military command in Iraq.

We could, however, support a short-term redeployment or surge of American combat forces to stabilize Baghdad, or to speed up the training and equipping mission, if the U.S. commander in Iraq determines that such steps would be effective.

Isn't it convenient to ignore the bolded caveat, when you have those uppity generals who won't listen to the man "who has more information than anyone else?" (Tony Snow on the President)

The congress calls for less troops - and the President is expected to follow this recommendation. It is unfortunate that you cannot please all the critics.

True dat. The problem is that saying this is "trying to please his critics" is stretching things a bit: You can easily also claim that he's doing the exact *opposite* of what these two groups desire, because he's doing a surge *in spite* of the military commander's opposition, and he'll *only* withdraw once we have "won". That's not exactly a "middle road".

Since the very beginning we have been told that this was going to be a long and difficult process.

No, its we were going to be "greeted as liberators" (Cheney), "a slam dunk" (Tenet), it was in its "last throes" 18 months ago (Cheney), we didn't need the 500,000 troops requested by the military commanders for policing because the military doesn't do police work (Rumsfeld), and there was no post-victory contingency plan whatsoever either military or political. There is every indication that no one thought any of this was necessary, despite the fact that all of these parties believed that Al Quaeda had a massive presence there. Why?

Anyone who is under the impression that our tactics and strategies in Iraq have gone unchanged for the past 3+ years is simply mistaken.

Sure the tactics have changed, but there's been no strategy which has led to these tactics being made under extreme pressure to not increase troop levels which would have shown that the initial strategy was wrong. This is not intelligent consideration: this is major CYA.

We have policing issues. Where the Iraqis are weak is in providing domestic security. They have had corruption issues in that part of the world in police forces forever....

This is all true and I agree with it, but the problem is that 1) the power structure that could have stepped into the void--the existing Iraqi forces and police--were all by definition Baathists, and our policy was to disallow any former Baathists from participating, thus eliminating most of the people who could do the job, and 2) With the US prepared to stay "as long as it takes" there's no pressure on the Iraqi Government to do anything about it when they'd rather engage in their petty squabbles.

We know that we can force peaceful streets with more US troops. So my understanding is that is the plan, but we are at the same time going to apply more pressure on the Iraqi's to begin taking over that job in the future.

See the quote above. The bottom line that the Iraq group saw from the experts that to do this successfully would take up to 200,000 additional troops, and we have no way to get that many into readiness for *years*. Even Bush would not go along with that kind of number.

The elected officials in Iraq need to walk a fine line of keeping support of the Clerics and warlords, and curbing the power that they possess. We can either ignore all of these local sensibilities, and just try and dictate terms (something the US has not done, but is the solution suggested in many criticisms of the US policy), or we can work with the growing government and help it develop in its own fashion.

Please note that the "elected officials" are almost all "Clerics and warlords," although "warlords" really don't exist beyond the insurgents (mostly Saddam's army really), and the Clerically-led Shiite militias. For the most part we *are* ignoring these sensibilities, and Cheney has pushed very hard for a strategy of backing the Shiites almost exclusively, which is why he was "summoned" to Saudi Arabia last month and read the riot act, basically being told "you do that and we'll have no choice but to start arming the Sunni insurgents."

 

This is not a strategy, its lunacy. I, and I think most Americans, don't care *who* comes up with the ideas as long as the ideas work, and the current and past ideas clearly have not. Sure we've been willing to wait, but this thing has now gone on longer than World War II with an economy that is hundreds of times richer than the post depression US. With all those resources, this is the best we can do? Are you serious?

 

As I've said before, if Bush was a CEO, his board would have fired him years ago. So much for running a government like a business.

 

Results,

Buffy

[IDMclean]

We know that we can force peaceful streets with more US troops. So my understanding is that is the plan, but we are at the same time going to apply more pressure on the Iraqi's to begin taking over that job in the future.

 

This only holds true if each of those soliders(Ideally), or a significant fraction(Minimally) spoke the local language, and understood the local customs (ideally), or just one of the two (minimally).

 

The truth is, Americans are terrible tourist when it comes to travelling abroad, and for the majority of soldiers (I will kill for my country) this is doubly true.

 

What does that have to do with anything? Americans tend to speak one language, American, and understand one set of local customs, the American's hometown.

 

As such American Soldiers, on a whole, would make a highly inefficient policing force(Domestic Law). Though I will admit they make a wonderful suppressive force(Marshal Law).

 

Soldiers are not trained to deal with people. They are trained to kill enemy people. To keep their people alive, and to maintain their equipment. They are as is advertised a "Highly Specialized, Highly Trained Elite Army Force".

 

They can not, and should not be used in a policing capacity.

 

That's like using a sledgehammer where you need a wrench.

[TheBigDog]

The truth is, Americans are A-holes when it comes to travelling abroad,

Thank you.

and for the majority of soldiers (I will kill for my country) this is doubly true.

I will forward this message to all my military friends who have served overseas with pride and honor. I am sure they will appreciate it.

 

Bill

[IDMclean]

Do what you will with it.

 

I am not saying all soldiers or americans fit the bill, I am just saying that it is generally true, and that the rule is. Americans generally know one language, and one set of customs. We aren't well versed in the ways of other cultures, or other languages.

 

This of course is compared to other nationalities.

 

I know my comments regarding the quality of the average american have been interpreted as hateful or even racist, an interpretation I find amusing, given that would imply that I am self-hating.

 

However, I am merely commenting on what I have come to understand as true from various sources. News paper, media, travel guides (My mom worked for a publishing company called Moon Travel Handbooks, and the advice they gave was that if you are American and travelling abroad identify yourself as canadian if possible).

 

Americans have incurred a bad reputation amongst other things in other parts of the world.

 

Now why I comment on all of this is because for a policing force to be effective they must be able to communicate with the people they are policing. If they are unable to communicate and a crisis situation occurs (like an arab man yelling at a soldier for instance in an aggressive or aggitated manner), the most likely outcome will be one of violence.

 

I say this because it is important to note that this has happened and continues to happen in Iraq. The soldiers are not arabic, have on the majority never studied in depth the arabic culture, religions, and associated customs and history. Worse is that the American Soldier is trained to use violence as the first measure.

 

This methodology is good for suppressive forces. That is marshal law style policing. However this is a stop gap measure and what they are talking about in reference to policing in Iraq is a more permenant measure. They are talking about a policing force. Domestic law style.

 

So a soldier is on average (as the rule not the exception) not trained to deal with civilian issues. Furthermore, your average soldier is practically incapable of communicating with your average Iraqi.

 

So when it comes to crisis, where a soldier has an irrate Iraqi yelling at him what is the soldier to do? The traditional answer in a combat zone is to defend oneself, pre-emptive action. What amounts to "shoot first, ask questions later".

 

I don't feel that I am getting this tremendous difference across. The US Military is not a police force, nor can they be, nor should they be. The difference of objectives of a police officer and a soldier are tremendous. As Boersuen said about science and religion, they can not be compared, they are different molds.

 

You can not shoehorn an average soldier into the job of a police officer, particularly a foriegn police officer. They serve different functions, operate on different paradigms and use different methodologies.

 

So what my ealier post is meant to convey is that military troops lack essential qualities to be police officiers. Now cross training is possible, but that is the exception not the rule. A soldier is not a police officer, is not a translator, is not a foreign cultures specialist, is not a social worker.

 

They are trained to live and kill for their country. That is the major purpose of the soldier. They serve other functions as necessary to supplement that purpose, but those are secondary functions.

 

As such there is a very limited pool of people in the military who would have the essential qualities to act as an Iraqi Police officer; of sufficient proficiency to train Iraqis to be police officers.

 

So like I said, it's like trying to use a sledgehammer to fix a leaky faucet. You need a wrench, and you really can't shape a sledgehammer to do the job.

[Freddy]

It looks like Bush will increase troop numbers in Iraq going against what the majority of members of Congress and Americans believe. Bush has to move top generals/admirals around in order to find ones who will agree with his plan. We should have never invaded, but once we had we should have gotten out after we destroyed Iraq's army and toppled Saddam. Now, we cannot get out even when most Iraqis and Americans want us out. However, one man will not conceed to a failed strategy or admit to a mistake after 3,000 Americans and 10's of thousands of Iraqis have died. Bush ran and hid from Vietnam. He has found his own one now, but refuses to run or hide!

[HydrogenBond]

The problem in Iraq is connected to military philosophy. Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator, but his methods got the job done and resulted in his govenment having complete monopoly over killing. The problem is that nice human beings can not justify America using Saddam's methods to win the day. If and when America leaves, the odds are someone internal will apply Saddam's methods and get the job done.

 

Personally, I like the idea of America showing restraint. American is like someone how plays by good sportmen's rules. But if the opponent wants to cheat, the rules of the game should be modified so both teams are playing by the same rules. I would prefer the terrorists learn to be good sportmen but if they wish to cheat to win, and the refs are not making any calls, then it is only fair that the rules be modified.

 

The percieved results of the war in Iraq is based loopsided data collection. Most of the men and women in the armed force, see all the good that has been done for 90% of the Iraqi people. The media focuses its data collection and on only the 10% that is out of wack, creating a picture of failure, while ignorrring any success stories. Is anyone aware that there was a higher per capita murder rate in Washington DC than Bagdad even if one includes the killed American soldiers in the total. Maybe the Democrats are correct in withdrawing troops, they are needed in DC. The media won't stress this data because it makes their slight of hand ldata ess believeable.

[Buffy]

...Is anyone aware that there was a higher per capita murder rate in Washington DC than Bagdad even if one includes the killed American soldiers in the total....The media won't stress this data because it makes their slight of hand ldata ess believeable.

Or maybe because its not true. You keep saying this, and I know that Rush tries to repeat it, but the numbers don't add up as I replied in this post the last time you mentioned it. If you'd like to respond to this analysis, great, but don't keep repeating it if you're not going to deal with the data refuting your "fact."

 

Thanks!

Buffy