Professor Bainbridge...on law, politics, religion, culture & food

It frightens me that these magazines and newspapers have taken this long to realize that Rummy must go.  It was clear six months after the invasion that there were not enough troops.  His arrogance over the last three years in not listening to Powell and other generals has led to the deaths of thousands of American soldiers.

REPUBLICANS are urging President George W Bush to dump Dick Cheney as vice-president and replace him with Condoleezza Rice

Disturbing, if true. It would indicate that some “republicans” don’t know the constitution very well. The VP is elected to his office, and the president cannot dump him even if he wants to. He can ask Cheney to quit, but the decision is entirely up to the VP.

It frightens me that we have so many armchair generals. Look back at every war this country has fought, or that any country has fought. Have any been flawless? Have any of the greatest generals been perfect? Hannibal? Napolean? Lee? MacArthur? None of the alleged mistakes Rumsfeld has made were clearly mistaken at the time, and at this time, plausible counterfactuals can be constructed that show a worse result than our current position, for example: 
More troops on the ground and more active policing following the fall of Baghdad? Might that have led to a greater resentment by Iraqis at the strong US presence in their country and a more widespread insurgency?

This decline of this country will not be caused by the Bush administration or by Rumsfeld’s alleged mistakes, but by the impossibiilty of fighting a large scale ground war ever again, which will have been caused by those who have used the inevitable setbacks in Iraq for political purposes and their eagerness to second guess our president in setting foreign and military policy.  This goes for conservatives as well as liberals.

I find the arrogance and smugness of this column appalling.

Hey, I can see the appeal of this type of criticism. Its quick and effortless and requires no actual thought.

But I’d expect a little better from a law prof.

For you younger folks, this is starting to sound a lot like 1967 - 1969.

I remember “if you criticise the war you hurt the troops.”

About more 28,000 Americans died for that lie.

Bush is an empty suit who does what his sponsors tell him. We went to war under false pretenses and now we have no way to win.

Perhaps Iraq is the Arabic name for Viet Nam.

Bush will not finish his second term.  It’s over.

Defending Rumsfeld is a fools act. There are enough people who will support the Iraq affair if for no other reason than there is no other choice. However that does not mean the war can continue to be mismanaged. We who support the mission, even though against it (or questioning of it) in the beginning, require it be carried out well. Can you really say Rumsfeld is doing that?

Even assuming that everything Rumsfeld and his people thought was going to work had no forwarning of failure.(Not true but it doesn’t matter) hindsight is 20/20 and the war is being mishandled both in reality and in perception. Rumsfeld is only the tip of the iceberg but he is the head guy in charge and he must go, now, if for no other reason than he has guessed wrong or has been unlucky. (I think there are better reasons, but why bother with the debate they engender. There is no debate that this has not gone as well as he predicted on his watch. Hence he has failed and is still failing and must go.)

The problem is, who comes into the mess he created and how does he or she help us to end it with the modicum of success the troops and their fallen brethern deserve.

America could have been sold on the war on the ground that Saddam had to go with or without 9-11 because he was a poor leader in an unstable area. I would have prefered the truth, but that might not have carried the day. Howevere the administration has to acknowledge that if America had embarked on Iraq knowing what we now know, Americans would have asked different questions in the beginning. Even members of his own party. Those questions would have addressed the issues we now tire of asking. Once we were misled, even if by accident, the administration had to know we were going to hold it to a higher standard of conduct. Rumsfeld knew it. In great part that is why administration lackeys get so angry when there little games get found out or leaked. Yes, Abu Gharib, torture, the Palme affair, the generals speaking out, NSA Spying, erode support for the war. Yes, the administration should have known that. The answer should have been we won’t do it. Not we will hide it and hope the electorate won’t find out.

I can still be conservative and Pro troops and even pro this military action, and still be very anti Rumsfeld. It is getting harder and harder to support the mission without a clearer idea of what the boundries of the mission are and how they will be implemented. If Rumsfeld leaving is just an empty gesture well right now it is better than nothing. If it were to happen and things got better, then it would be great. I guess it is hard to see how it could get worse, unless the President appoints Kerry as his new Sec’y of Defense.

I laugh, albeit bitterly, every time some talking point defender blames perception for all the problems Bush has had.

One one level, Bush is right: as executive, he’s “the decider” for some things. But that’s really the one of the smaller roles the office plays. Much more important is the role of “persuader” - the President has a megaphone pretty much unrivaled. Good presidents persuade. This one has ruled via division, and careful control. That’s great for campaigning; too bad for the nation that skill there does very little for those boring parts after you’ve won, things like policy, diplomacy, etc. To be such a screwup as an advocate for one’s one policies and then lashing out about it just makes one look like a spoiled little brat that never managed to grow up, seeking to assign blame for one’s own failures, rather than attempting to fix them. Sad and pathetic, really.

Another bitterly amusing thing: the historic take on Bush would likely have been much more positive, or at least spinnable, had he not won his second term. Letting Kerry, already a fairly laughable person, be percieved as responsible for all of the messes Bush put in motion, I think, will be looked back at as a strategic opportunity missed by the Republican Hindsight Committee.

Just admit you are a Democrat now.

More troops ? Where should he have found those, if not in a general draft ?

And the complaint about disbanding the Iraqi army is either foolish or plain obnoxious.  That army was a Sunni dominated organization whose only strong point was in killing lots of Shia and Kurds.  It was not the kind of armed force Iraq needs if its power structure is to reflect the actual composition of its population.  But Sunni chauvinism and traditional western filo-arabic “realism” go very well together, as they both loath the unwashed masses, whether red staters in the US or Shia Arabs in Iraq or elsewhere in the Arab world.

Rumsfeld is not without faults, but a defense secretary who lets the Cold War nostalgics run the show at the Pentagon would be far worse.

One last thing, Mr Schwartz : the good professor is a reactionary, which naturally attracts him to the positions of the reactionary party in American politics…

"More troops ? Where should he have found those, if not in a general draft?”

In the months after 9-11, knowing that he intended to embark on a major war, he could have asked Congress to raise troop limits, and then made a serious PR push for people to enlist. Which would have worked quite effectively in the climate at that time, and the trained soldiers would have been available about the time they were needed.

His failure to do so was one of his earliest mistakes as a wartime President, and made it glaringly obvious even then that he wasn’t approaching things seriously.

Remind me, which of the war critics before the war were saying “we’ll support the war if there are more troops involved”.

Instead, the argument is “can’t do both Iraq and Afghanistan”.  In that context, “more troops” is simply cover for “no war in Iraq”.

There are four possibilities.  Neither Iraq or Afghanistan, one of the two, or both.  Pick one.

Prof B., I don’t think the commentors understood your allusion

“You have sat too long for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!”

I’m left uncertain too. The quote is from general Cromwell as he made himself an absolute dictator by disbanding Parliament, right?  So is your implication that those who approve of ex-military criticism of Cheney and Rumsfeld also favor a a military coup by a general more talented than the squabbling politicians he replaces?

ps-- perhaps I should add that I have nothing against retired generals criticizing their former bosses, though I am skeptical of their motives (see http://www.rasmusen.org/x/2006/04/18/1145/)

I don’t think your baseball analogy works.

While not perfect, Rummy is the general manager; the generals and soldiers are the players. GWB would be the Commish.

Cheney does not fit in the analogy at all.

Andy:  /* Remind me, which of the war critics before the war were saying “we’ll support the war if there are more troops involved”.
*/

Thanks for that one.

save the rustbelt:  /* For you younger folks, this is starting to sound a lot like 1967 - 1969.

I remember “if you criticise the war you hurt the troops.”

About more 28,000 Americans died for that lie.
*/

At this point in the Vietnam war, we had about 15,000 deaths (that is, 5,00 per year time 3 years).  Today (in Iraq) we have about 3500.  Iraq, of course, is much larger landwise.  Tell me again why you think this is more like Vietnam than like Korea?

Save the Rustbelt said: “For you younger folks, this is starting to sound a lot like 1967 - 1969.I remember “if you criticise the war you hurt the troops.” About more 28,000 Americans died for that lie.”

How many millions of vietnamese died because the criticism brought the troops home with the job unfinished?

It would be interesting to compare the proportion of casualties to the number of US forces in Iraq with that of casualties in proportion to the number of US forces in Vietnam.

I haven’t done the research, but http://members.aol.com/warlibrary/vwatl.htm claims the all-time high for Vietnam was about 500,000 troops.  They lost 5,000 troops a year pretty consistently, for a total of 58,000 +/- dead.

All time high for Iraq is 300,000.  We’ve lost an average of about 1,100 troops/year.  Iraq is a much larger landmass as well.

The critics claiming the Iraq war is mismanaged would like to increase our troop levels, and claim that it would actually decrease casualties.  However, if we accept that twice the troops would have twice the casualties, then we’re still looking at a casualty rate of less than half of Vietnam.  If twice the troops led to fewer casualties, well, then the comparison would be even more favorable to staying.  Unless of course the reason we have such a low casualty rate is that we aren’t relying on a general draft, but that’s another discussion for another time.

Overall, however, I have a hard time believing any kind of comparison between Iraq and Vietnam that doesn’t at least discuss why Iraq is more like Vietnam than Korea, or the WWII Pacific campaign, or Israeli incursions into the West Bank, or operations in Bosnia, or ... etc.  Yes, I know that my list includes wars that aren’t at all like Iraq. However, something tells me most of the people drawing parallels between Iraq and Vietnam really only have two wars to go by.  Their parallels are very superficial and usually rise to the level of “people died in Vietnam,people are dying in Iraq, Q.E.D.” Sorry, but that’s not going to cut it.

Another mistake is that he failed to take into account a long term strategy to maintain troop levels.  I am a living example.

After serving 6 years active duty, I left to go to law school.  After 1 year in the inactive Reserve, I was tranferred into the Army Reserve under dubious circumstances.  After completeing my contractual 8-year obligation, I resigned--twice.  Both have been denied.  I am not stop-lossed as allowed under certain circumstances by the statutes, nor am I in a unit mobilizing for deployment.  Yet the 3-star general in charge of the reserves unilaterally (without and political oversight) denied my resignations.

I am in the midst of litigation and I have posted a great deal of information including court doucments on my website ( http://militaryinjustice.homestead.com ).  If you want to see the results of recent failed military policy in recent years, please visit.  It is further evidence of lack of foresight.

/* Another mistake is that he failed to take into account a long term strategy to maintain troop levels.
*/

Or perhaps, he failed to take into account the long-term liberal strategy to complain that people keep dying in the war until US citizens started to think there was something fishy about violence in a war zone.

Please don’t get me wrong.  I don’t know the circumstances of your particular case, and I am immensely grateful for your service.  In fact, what I’m about to say goes on top of that.

One of Bush’s biggest mistakes was trying to sell the wars (both Iraq and Afghanistan) as slightly bigger commitments than what the military was going to be doing anyway.  He may not have said things explicitly, but it was clear that we weren’t going to see WWII-style food rationing, or requests to turn in cooking grease for use in bombs, or steel pennies so that more copper could be available for bullet casings (I know pennies today are made out of zinc, I’m getting there), or anything else of the sort.  Instead, we’d simply need to tie yellow ribbons around our trees until the troops came home.

I remember various candlelight vigils on September 12, 13, 14, etc.  I remember several banks, companies, and nonprofits began accepting charitable donations.  I know that if you ask for something from Americans, not only will you get it, but you’ll get incredible support as a by-product.

If Bush had asked for more than “moral support” I don’t think the constant drip of bad news would have led to flagging support.  Even in the darkest days of Vietnam, polls showed that families with soldiers in the war (that is, families that were doing more than pontificating about the merits of the war) overwhelmingly supported the military.  If we’d asked more of the people then, we’d have more support today.

Brad, after looking at your website, and the legal documents posted there, I can see you’re going to have an uphill battle fighting a lawsuit against the government.  I don’t know the laws well enough to say who’s got the better argument, but I do know that the DOJ has pretty unlimited resources for your case.

It’s not common, but I do know that my father fell on the flip side of your case.  His active duty term expired just as the military was drawing down its presence in Vietnam.  His commission didn’t expire until at least six months after he got back to the states.  However, the Army didn’t want him to re-enlist, and all the other guys in his situation had already joined the Reserve and National Guard, so he was effectively told he couldn’t stay even if he wanted to.

Anyhow, you have my best wishes in your suit.  Not that it will help much, but you have them.