A Weblog of Centrist Voices in American Politics
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A Weblog of Centrist Voices in American Politics | |
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August 23, 2007More Encouraging Petraeus News (to me)I read a Petraeus post, which included the following quote that encourages me.
Petraeus put it, using an Army phrase, “We are not letting the Shiite militias take a knee.” Since we did exactly that for years, ignoring the gathering mistreatment of Iraqis by Shia militias, and feel that's maybe the biggest problem in Iraq currently, I find that encouraging. The post is a little uncritical for my taste, and long, but interesting. You know, I see no sign that Bush, or almost anybody else high in DC, would understand that comment. Rarther alarming. That has two bad consequences. First, it means that he has to play to his boss' misperceptions. Worse is that the Bush public predictions of swift radical improvements aren't coming true. The improvments are slow, because the Shia militias grew horribly big and are taking time, whereas we've been taking a real toll on al'Qaeda and other opposing Sunni militias the whole time. He's losing Petraeus and the occupation alot of credibility with these mispredictions. Posted by Jon Kay at August 23, 2007 09:43 PMComments
Well, the military had a chance in 2002 to take a tougher line on Phase Four planning amd misconceptions. I think there is alot of meat to FIASCO. The misconceptions should have been dealt with years ago by both Republicans in Congress and the DOD. The new Intelligence Report does warn that withdrawal now would create a mess and I think Warner's 5,000 withdrawal idea will not send a message to Maliki. So he thinks his idea eases his conscience? Where the hell was he three years ago? Part of the problem are some of those benchmarks. The Kirkuk referendum in giving AQ a chance to make gains by attacking the North. False Flag strikes against Turkish troops also increase dangers. Thanks for the good link and I'll drop you a line about posting. The next few weeks are vacation time followed by lots of work. Still, balanced blogs must go on lest the extremists advance...... Posted by: Maxtrue at August 24, 2007 11:43 AM |
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