Thursday, May 05, 2005

Rand Bitchslaps Rumsfeld

A recent study from the Rand Corporation slams Donald Rumsfeld and the Pentagon for fucking up the Iraq war. The report calls for "a case for change, and even urgency" in our Iraq policy. The report rips Rumsfeld for not planning for post war security because Rumsfeld thought it would be a walk in the park.

Rumsfeld has fucked up virtually every single thing he has ever touched since Bush made him Defense Secretary. Remember when he wanted to reduce the size of the Army by two divisions? I shudder to think how bad off we would be now if he would have succeeded.

This war is going exactly like I said it would before it started. If I sat in a bar in Columbus, OH, with none of the intelligence available to Rumsfeld, and got this right, Rummy should have been able to get it right. The Rand Corporation's assessment validates my views. While its nice to hear people who actually know what they're talking about proves me right, I still wish I were wrong.

So, what's next? I think this was a one shot deal that we fucked up. The civil war has already begun. I'm not saying we should bail, but we must prepare ourselves for the fact that one way or another, the Shia are going to enforce their will on the Sunni minority (who will go down fighting) with possibly the Kurds breaking away to form their own country. A real peace there is ten years away and will take thousands of deaths to achieve, and that’s only with no further foreign intervention in the region.

Note: I found this report via Juan Cole. If you want to learn a lot about what is going on in the Middle East, check out his site.

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