Former Reagan SecNav Lehman: We're Not Winning This War

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/30/AR2006083002730.html

Are we winning the war? The first question to ask is, what war? The Bush administration continues to muddle a national understanding of the conflict we are in by calling it the "war on terror." This political correctness presumably seeks to avoid hurting the feelings of the Saudis and other Muslims, but it comes at high cost. This not a war against terror any more than World War II was a war against kamikazes.

<snip>

The indoctrination and recruiting of jihadists from Indonesia, South Asia and the Middle East are carried out through religious establishments that are supported overwhelmingly by the Saudi and Iranian governments. Even in the United States, some 80 percent of Islamic mosques and schools are closely aligned with the Wahhabist sect and heavily dependent on Saudi funding. Five years after Sept. 11, nothing has been done to materially affect this root source of jihadism. The movement continues to grow, fueled by an ever-increasing flow of petrodollars from the Persian Gulf.

There is no evidence that the administration has ever raised this matter with the Saudi government as a high-level issue, and -- just as damaging -- it has never acknowledged it as an issue to the American people. Thus Rumsfeld's question -- are we killing, capturing or deterring jihadists faster than they are being produced? -- must be answered with an emphatic no.

In reviewing progress on the three fronts of this war, even the most sanguine optimist cannot yet conclude that we are winning or that we can win without some significant changes of policy.

[babylonsister]

1. Well, no shit, Sherlock! nt

[Sherman A1]

6. Well Said

[opihimoimoi]

2. When we have Simpltons in charge....we get FK'D Up results

Its a Mathematical Probability...ie....High Odds of Failure.

Bush and his GOP CROP do not read enough to escape the title of Simpleton Level....L1

[saltpoint]

3. I hate it when someone from the Reagan administration makes sense.

But there it is.

"Without a change of policy" indeed.

[Erika]

4. Kerry was right. This should be an intelligence matter

But W went scurrying off to Iraq who had never been a threat to us. Capable intelligence would have doomed 9/11 terrorists.

W's war against Iraqis is insane.

[teryang]

5. Lehman fails to address the war in Iraq

<The military occupation in Iraq is consuming practically the entire defense budget and stretching the Army to its operational limits. This is understood quite clearly by both our friends and our enemies, and as a result, our ability to deter enemies around the world is disintegrating.>

This was perfectly foreseeable before our "brilliantly successful" (and illegal) invasion. What's his proposed solution? Here's a hint John: withdraw.

The international threat of "jihadists" against the US is a bunch of claptrap. Lehman favors "Army lite" but wants a six hundred ship Navy, again.

He is one of the authors of our current diaster.

Turning on Saudi Arabia at this point would be remarkably stupid. There is no "homefront" in this so-called war. Maybe the FBI out of institutional tradition is insisting on compliance with constitutional guarantees before targeting specific ethnic or religious groups by illegal means. Imagine that!

What amazes me is that these spokesman for the defense contractors never discuss the decline in American manufacturing or our untenable financial position as world's greatest debtor of all time. Perhaps if the Pentagon cut down on its spending and commitments, other more productive and competitive pursuits might be undertaken to address our declining national power.

I would like to have seen this pompous self styled iconoclast address the transformation of national defense doctrine from protecting the lines of communication from locations where strategic resources are located to simply seizing those resources by force. This degeneration of national defense policy to an outright fascist belligerence is compensation for the decline in our economic competitiveness and the doctrinaire exportation of capital overseas to exploit cheap labor. The over emphasis on defense spending in the national budget combined with ideological orthodoxy concering so called "free trade" has resulted in financial exhaustion of our national resources and the concommitant impulse to invade and seize the resources of other nations by force.

[POAS]

7. A so called war against terror is

the "perfect storm" scenario for the war mongers. A terrorist attack, unless they get really lucky in terms of weapons and timing, is very unlikely to threaten the power structure or the powerful. Terrorist targets will most likely be highly visible and destructive in the way of 9/11 but no such attack is likely to cause the US government to suddenly surrender.

What such attacks will do, or at least the neocons hoped for result, is to galvanize the populace into fear, enough fear that the voters will continue to support whatever adventure the war mongers tell them will lead to the ultimate victory, no matter how ill advised that adventure may be.

The goal is to foment enough ill will on both sides that the profiteers can continue their looting, the end timers will continue to see Christ's second coming on the horizon and the power brokers will keep power. Closing down the Wahabiest schools make no more sense to them than shutting up the Pat Robertsons since both serve the neocon agenda.

[Boo Boo]

8. This guy is still in denial

He's right that we're losing the WOT; smarter people than him have said as much, and much sooner too. It is, in fact, the finding of our own government that we are losing the WOT. OTOH, he spends a lot of effort in this piece trying to prop up the incompetents that are responsible for the fact that we are losing.

WRT Rumsfeld: he was not proven correct in his decision to use less troops than recommended. The consequences of having too few troops, with inadequate training, was a problem before Bush even declared "mission accomplished." The only facility they managed to secure was the Oil Ministry. The ensuing chaos began immediately after the fall of Baghdad.

WRT Afghanistan: Lehman forgets to mention Tora Bora, where Rummy's brilliant plan allowed bin Laden to slip the noose due to... that's right, not enough troops. The CIA guy that was tasked with nailing bin Laden's ass asked for enough men to go up to Tora Bora and get the bastard, and his request was denied.

Oh yeah, Rummy's a brilliant guy. Cheney too. Couple of fuckin' geniuses.

:eyes:

[yellowcanine]

9. Why does he hate 'merica and give comfort to the terrists?