Thursday, September 16, 2004

Vietnam? Or Stalingrad? Take your pick

Far graver than Vietnam

Quotes from senior ex-military guys saying things are horrible in Iraq and not likely to get better. Including:
  • Retired general William Odom, former head of the National Security Agency,
  • Retired general Joseph Hoare, the former marine commandant and head of US Central Comman
  • Jeffrey Record, professor of strategy at the Air War College
  • W Andrew Terrill, professor at the Army War College's strategic studies institute - and the top expert on Iraq there

There are quite a few sobering quotes, but this one hits home with me most (emphasis added):

General Odom remarked that the tension between the Bush administration and the senior military officers over Iraqi was worse than any he has ever seen with any previous government, including Vietnam. "I've never seen it so bad between the office of the secretary of defence and the military. There's a significant majority believing this is a disaster. The two parties whose interests have been advanced have been the Iranians and al-Qaida. Bin Laden could argue with some cogency that our going into Iraq was the equivalent of the Germans in Stalingrad. They defeated themselves by pouring more in there. Tragic."

Disastrous.

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