Month: December 2006

Fred Kagan at least has a sharp critique of the ISG’s unrealistic realism:

Some of the most important training Iraqi Army units get today comes from operating side-by-side with American combat units in clear-and-hold missions, searches and raids. It is one thing to have trainers tell you what to do and watch you do it. It is another to participate in well-planned and skillfully-executed operations. Ironically, pulling American forces back from combat missions will actually remove one of the most important elements of training Iraqi forces.

A serious strategy to help the Iraqis establish security now would not only embed more American troops with Iraqi forces but increase the number of U.S. combat troops in Baghdad – and work with the Iraqis not just to clear insurgent areas, but to hold them once they’ve been cleared.

But do we have enough troops to do this? And why was this not done years ago? Oh, forget that last question, but rephrase it: given the level of talent in the White House, what are the chances of getting it right this time?

"Some reports are issued and just gather dust. And truth of the matter is, a lot of reports in Washington are never read by anybody. To show you how important this one is, I read it," – George W. Bush today.

Does he have to make Jon Stewart’s job that easy?

Here’s another one from December 7, 2001. I wonder if Garry Trudeau believed then, as I naively did, that this was impossible in America. Or whether he was just more prescient than I was. (Click to enlarge.)

A reader writes:

You missed the biggest flaw in Victor Davis Hanson’s statement, which is its historical inaccuracy. This country did not fight and defeat Germany, Italy and Japan all at once. We defeated Japan with some help from the British Empire and Commonwealth, and China; we defeated Italy with substantial help from the British Empire and Commonwealth, as well as Free French, Polish, Czech and other forces; the Soviet Union defeated Germany, with major help from us as well as the British Empire and Commonwealth, as well as Free French, Polish, Czech and other forces.

Had the Soviet Union not broken the back of the German Wehrmacht and its allies before Moscow, at Stalingrad and at Kursk, and thereafter, there is serious doubt whether even the combined forces of the U.S., the British Empire and Commonwealth, and their allies, could have defeated Germany in northwest Europe. Read Max Hastings.

This is an example of the pride and hubris in an all-powerful U.S. that does not have to resort to mere diplomacy and alliance building as it goes boldly forth to impose its military will abroad – pride and hubris that directly led us to the dire circumstances in which we now find ourselves in Iraq.

A reader writes:

Having been an army linguist, allow me to set the record straight:

1) There is no shortage of individuals who want to become linguists. Linguists are better paid (we got an extra $100+ a month per language for being linguists).  We had far better living conditions, and were generally treated as mini-officers in many circles, as most of us were highly skilled, educated, and generally quite intelligent.  Furthermore, linguists are given Top Secret clearances, which do wonders for post-service employment potential.  The life style and perks for linguists in the army can’t be beat.

2) Depending on one’s DLAB score (Defense Language Aptitude Battery), one is thrown into a suitable language program. Languages come in five levels with languages such as Swahili in level I, Chinese, Arabic, Russian in level IV, with English being the only level V language.  All candidates for the linguist program are sent to DLI (the Defense Language Institute) in Monterey California for six to fourteen months depending on the difficulty of their language. Arabic linguists take about twelve months to train.  To be fair to Snow, the fail rate at DLI is about 50 to 75% per class, so one really can’t claim that they program can be sped up.  And the student to teacher ratio is about one to eight, so it’s well staffed.  After DLI, graduates of the language portion of training are sent to Goodfellow Airforce Base (a joint service base) where they spend three months learning the secret side of their craft.  In total, we’re talking about 15 months to train an Arabic linguist.  That is, if the military really wanted to, they could have flooded the streets of Iraq with Arabic linguists by 2004.

That is: if we had had a halfway competent defense secretary and halfway competent president. We had neither. You want to know who lost Iraq? Bush. Period.

I missed this gem. Ann Althouse speculates that they put U.S. citizen Jose Padilla in blackout goggles and sound-proof ear-muffs to prevent him "blinking in code" in a walk outside his cell. Blinking to whom? After four years in total isolation? This is from his lawyer’s brief:

Mr. Padilla was often put in stress positions for hours at a time. He would be shackled and manacled, with a belly chain, for hours in his cell. Noxious fumes would be introduced to his room causing his eyes and nose to run. The temperature of his cell would be manipulated, making his cell extremely cold for long stretches of time. Mr. Padilla was denied even the smallest, and most personal shreds of human dignity by being deprived of showering for weeks at a time, yet having to endure forced grooming at the whim of his captors…

He was threatened with being cut with a knife and having alcohol poured on the wounds. He was also threatened with imminent execution. He was hooded and forced to stand in stress positions for long durations of time. He was forced to endure exceedingly long interrogation sessions, without adequate sleep, wherein he would be confronted with false information, scenarios, and documents to further disorient him. Often he had to endure multiple interrogators who would scream, shake, and otherwise assault Mr. Padilla.

All of the original headline accusations against Padilla have been dropped. There are no charges of "dirty bomb plots" any more. The indictment is vague about his connections to global jihad, and if this president had had his way, there would never have even been an indictment. The worst he is accused of is being recruited to an Islamist cell linked to conflict in Bosnia and Chechnya. Maybe Padilla is guilty. But nothing he is now charged with can justify either the length of his detention or the sadism meted out to him. After all these years, you think he has anything more to say? You think this defenseless, bare-footed, manacled, disoriented shell still represents a threat so dire he requires three riot police to escort him blind and deaf down a corridor? In the end, as Orwell noted, the point of torture is torture.

As for "blinking in code," Padilla is so traumatized that he no longer fully controls his eye movements or body:

"During questioning, he often exhibits facial tics, unusual eye movements and contortions of his body," Mr. Patel said. "The contortions are particularly poignant since he is usually manacled and bound by a belly chain when he has meetings with counsel."

But let me say this in defense of Althouse. She is at least conceding that the shameful treatment of Padilla is worth discussing. And her defense of the sadism is about as plausible as it will ever get. She sees there is an important principle here – something we once knew as habeas corpus. Here you have a U.S. citizen detained on American soil, kept without charges for 3 and a half years, accused of plotting a dirty bomb attack (an accusation never substantiated in any way), tortured until he may be mentally incapable of standing trial … and the conservative blogosphere is completely, utterly silent. Habeas corpus disappears not with a bang, and not even with a whimper, but with deathly quiet. Well, we know what American conservatism now stands for. You can see the visual above.

Bush’s apparent acceptance of the Blair-Baker position that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is central to resolving Iraq is the end of neoconservatism in the Bush administration. But the new realism is utterly unrealistic, as George Will eloquently explains today. Double-down or get out. Those remain the only real options, in my view. Increasingly, I lean toward getting out completely, and finally giving the region the civil and religious war it so obviously and deeply wants. We had our chance; and we blew it. Bush doesn’t or won’t get this; and it’s pretty clear he has little or no grip on reality. The terrible costs of our withdrawal are primarily on his hands; but they are also on the hands of the Iraqi factions who prefer tearing each other apart to dealing with the modern world.

He may continue – forcing America into a brutal period of political civil war to save his own face. He won’t save his own face – it’s too late for that. And my bet is he will do nothing on the scale necessary to save Iraq. This is the consequence of re-electing a patent incompetent, who is now reduced to enforcing the policies of the man he defeated in 2004, with none of the advantages Kerry would have had. If Bush finds 50,000 to 75,000 troops, we’ll know he’s serious. But I suspect he isn’t. He never has been, has he?

I set up a bunch of posts to self-publish while I went to the shrink and had lunch. Typepad malfunctioned, hence the gap and now the glut. No idea when future publishing will work again – so I’m glued to the laptop.

"In point of fact, we strap people to wooden boards and make them feel like they’re drowning all the time in this country. Mostly at theme parks like Six Flags," – Ann Coulter, Townhall.com.

"I mention this only to show that the Iraq adventure has made fools of many of us bystanders. That is not of much consequence by comparison with the fools it has made of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Rice, and the rest; and that is not of much consequence when set against the brave Americans maimed and killed in this war, and the stupendous waste of national resources and prestige the war has involved. As we bloviators fret over our wounded egos, we should remember that a wounded ego is utterly nothing by comparison with an actual wound, let alone a death, or the humiliating of a great nation in the eyes of her enemies," – John Derbyshire, NRO.