[Vision2020] Neoconservatives Decry Execution of Iraq War

[Tom Hansen]

>From CNN.com -

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Neoconservatives decry execution of Iraq war

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A leading conservative proponent of the U.S.-led invasion
of Iraq now says dysfunction within the Bush administration has turned U.S.
policy there into a disaster.

Richard Perle, who chaired a committee of Pentagon policy advisers early in
the Bush administration, said had he seen at the start of the war in 2003
where it would go, he probably would not have advocated an invasion to
depose Saddam Hussein. Perle was an assistant secretary of defense under
President Reagan.

"I probably would have said, 'Let's consider other strategies for dealing
with the thing that concerns us most, which is Saddam supplying weapons of
mass destruction to terrorists,'" he told Vanity Fair magazine in its
upcoming January issue.

Asked about the article, White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said, "We
appreciate the Monday-morning quarterbacking, but the president has a plan
to succeed in Iraq, and we are going forward with it."

Other prominent conservatives criticized the administration's conduct of the
war in the article, including Kenneth Adelman, who also served on the
Defense Policy Board that informally advised President Bush. Adelman said he
was "crushed" by the performance of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

Adelman also said that neoconservatism, "the idea of using our power for
moral good in the world," has been discredited with the public. After Iraq,
he told Vanity Fair, "it's not going to sell."

Meanwhile, the Military Times Media Group, a Gannett Co. subsidiary that
publishes Army Times and other military-oriented periodicals, said Friday it
was calling for Bush to fire Rumsfeld. (Full story)

The critiques in Vanity Fair come as growing numbers of Republicans have
criticized Bush's policies on Iraq. The war, unpopular with many Americans,
has become a top-tier issue in next week's congressional elections.

Perle said "you have to hold the president responsible" because he didn't
recognize "disloyalty" by some in the administration. He said the White
House's National Security Council, then run by now-Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice, did not serve Bush properly.

A year before the war, Adelman predicted demolishing Saddam's military power
and liberating Iraq would be a "cakewalk." But he told the magazine he was
mistaken in his high opinion of Bush's national security .

"They turned out to be among the most incompetent teams in the postwar era,"
he said. "Not only did each of them, individually, have enormous flaws, but
together they were deadly, dysfunctional."

The Military Times Media Group editorial, to be published Monday in four
periodicals, says active-duty military leaders were beginning to voice
misgivings about the war's planning, execution and dimming prospects for
success.

"Rumsfeld has lost credibility with the uniformed leadership, with the
troops, with Congress and with the public at large," the editorial says.
"His strategy has failed, and his ability to lead is compromised. And
although the blame for our failures in Iraq rests with the secretary, it
will be the troops who bear its brunt."

The editorial concludes: "Regardless of which party wins Nov. 7, the time
has come, Mr. President, to face the hard bruising truth: Donald Rumsfeld
must go."

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Seeya at the polls, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

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"In America, anybody can become president.  
That's one of the risks you take . . ."

- Adlai Stevenson

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