I am sorry. I cannot believe this has happened. I am shrill.
Iraq Proconsul L. Paul Bremer, October 26, 2003:
The New Republic Online: Iraq'd: From "Face The Nation," October 26, 2003: AMB. BREMER: Yes, but it--it--security is not a question of the number of boots on the ground. I've talked to all of our commanders and I've--and I've talked to General Abizaid and the commanders do say they have enough troops on the ground. You know, 9/11 happened here. It wasn't a question of not having enough troops on the ground. These are terrorists and we're going to have to find ways to get better intelligence to go out and get them before they come and get us. We are on the front line of the war on terrorism in Iraq. It's not a comfortable place to be, but that's where we are...
Former Iraq Proconsul L. Paul Bremer, September 17, 2004:
washingtonpost.com: Bremer Criticizes Troop Levels: "We paid a big price for not stopping it because it established an atmosphere of lawlessness," he said yesterday in a speech at an insurance conference in White Sulphur Springs, W.Va. "We never had enough troops on the ground."... In a Sept. 17 speech at DePauw University, Bremer said he frequently raised the issue within the administration and "should have been even more insistent" when his advice was spurned because the situation in Iraq might be different today. "The single most important change -- the one thing that would have improved the situation -- would have been having more troops in Iraq at the beginning and throughout" the occupation, Bremer said...
Insufficient forces--the Rumsfeld Doctrine: commit too few forces to win.
Is there any doubt that the "support" the Bush administration has given our troops in Iraq is better described as a stab in the back?
Posted by DeLong at October 5, 2004 11:37 AM | TrackBackI wish the facts mattered. The few polls I read on the subject all say something like "Kerry reduces Bush's advantage among the military and veterans."
Never: "a majority of the military and veterans support Kerry in this election."
This can't be driven by logic. It can only be driven by propaganda and ignorance. But that's the hand we get dealt. Kerry will win and fix many things for the military, and they will hate him because he is not a patriotic Republican.
Posted by: Alan at October 5, 2004 11:50 AMBremer ("L. Paul" to his friends, I suppose) said both things, and he was right yesterday and Sept 17.
But I must add in fairness that the Post is quoting him out of context. He actually defended Administration policy, for the most part.
Therefore, this would probably make a suitable "Why Can't We Have A Better Press Corps" piece, too.
Watch Rummy/Cheney turn it around on us.
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Posted by: fatbear at October 5, 2004 12:12 PMThere is, of course, a swarm of press handlers who are making sure everybody knows that Jerry never asked for more troops. It is pretty clear that he was a good soldier (as a diplomat), saying what he believed in private, what he was told to say in public.
This is the sort of thing we could read at several different points early in his time in Iraq:
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/6214287.htm
This is what he was instructed to say in public:
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/special/iraq/2063894
This pattern not only keeps inconvenient information away from a public that doesn't need to know what is really going on. It also serves to provide semi-plausible deniability to the Rumsfeld's and Bush's of the world. 'Bremer never asked for more troops. Just look at his public statements.'
Posted by: kharris at October 5, 2004 12:42 PMBremer is not the first guy who has come out too late to do any good in one situation - getting enough troops into Iraq to make success a possibility - but still coming out in time to fix the root problem. Bremer is not a high-minded guy, but he may not be all bad. He is certainly smart enough to know that Bush is not up to the job of getting Iraq, or US security, right.
Do we think a guy like Bremer, who has been playing the Washington game as long as he has, made inflammatory comments about troop strength in a closed-door meeting and didn't know they would come out? It was a closed-door meeting of insurance brokers, by the way. This is Bremer's little version of plausible deniability - "I would never publically contradict my former boss on a matter of policy ... really ... I didn't think this one little innocent statement would get out."
Posted by: kharris at October 5, 2004 12:50 PMI agree that it looks like we committed too few troops, but I think you should tone down your language. "Stab in the back" has unfortunate historical associations. I favor emphasizing incompetence.
Posted by: Frank at October 5, 2004 01:04 PMA good read that discusses Bremer and his CPA is Naomi Klein's article "Bhagdad Year Zero" which can be found at
http://www.harpers.org/BaghdadYearZero.html
In it she discusses how the insurgencies are a direct result of the neo-con dream of turning Iraq into a perfect lassiez-faire capitalist state.
She counter the conventional wisdom two ways:
1.) Contrary to the notion that the Bush administration had no plan to "win the peace," it had a very radical plan to win the peace which involved subjecting post-war Iraq to economic "shock and awe" in order to quickly implement lassiez-faire capitalism.
2.) Contrary to the notion that there were (are) not enough post war troops on the ground, the insurgencies are a mostly a result of the administration's economic plans for Iraq and could have been avoided.
I realize that the idea of not enough troops on the ground can't be dismissed as a contributing factor.
Brad DeLong: 'Is there any doubt that the "support" the Bush administration has given our troops in Iraq is better described as a stab in the back?'
Not in my mind. And yet Kerry and Bush are running neck and neck in the current campaign. What can the Bush supporters be thinking? It seems to represent the growing triumph of muthos over logos in our society.
Posted by: Mushinronsha at October 5, 2004 01:33 PMI have my doubts that it will matter much unless you can really make the public believe that it was due to more than Bush making poor decisions.
I was in NH canvesing this weekend and the argument I ran into time and time again was that people that considered security most important is that hey did not trust Kerry. Some just said they attacked us and the conversation did not go any futher. But some who were knes about the facts on the ground still were going to vote for Bush because they do not trust kerry and that is a big thing to overcome. I managed to relate to one vietnam era vet that when Kerry was antiwar he was not saying bad things about the troops that had to blow away women and children, rather he was complaining about the policy that put the grunts into a position whee they had no choice to blow away women and children. But getting to that level of understanding is extremely rare.
I just heard an ad where Bush was claiming Kerry and other liberal voted against flak jackets and other equipment for the troops in Iraq. I think Edwards should start the debate tonight by demanding that Cheney apologize to the american people about lying to them about the vote. If he doesn't apologize, explain how there were two bills and they voted against borrowing from out children to finance the war, not against equipment for the men. He should then walk out of the debate because he refuses to debate with a liar.
Posted by: spencer at October 5, 2004 01:37 PMHas anybody else noticed J.K. Galbraith's opinion piece in Salon where he asserts that part of the discussions Cheney was having with his "secret energy taskforce" included plans for dealing with Iraq's oil, post-US invasion?
It seems to me that if this is indeed public information the press has ignored its implications completely. If it is not public information, it is now. If true, Bush can no longer get a free pass from the press on his claim that plans for invading Iraq were not in place prior to Sept. 11.
Posted by: Garth at October 5, 2004 02:15 PMPersonally, I am not quite sure how seriously to take Bremer here. Now, I'm the last person to claim that Rumsfeld is a good, or even adequate, Secretary of Defense, but saying "there weren't enough troops," while true, is also a convenient deflection of blame to higher ups, when Bremer's CPA hugely mismanaged affairs even given the resources they were given. If Bremer objected to his staff of Heritage Foundation hacks, I never heard about it. It seems like an attempt to dodge accountability for his own ****-ups to me.
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