4. The Troops: Too Few, Too Constricted
On Feb. 25, the Army's chief of staff, Gen. Eric Shinseki, warned Congress that postwar Iraq would require a commitment of ''several hundred thousand'' U.S. troops. Shinseki's estimate was dismissed out of hand by Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and other civilian officials at the Pentagon,
Why would Rummy listen to anyone wearing a uniform? Like his predecessor Robert MacNamara, he knows more than they do. Just ask him.
In WWII the Army had Civil Affairs personnel to replace combat troops when the fighting stopped. Civil Affairs personnel were trained in keeping cities functioning, in restoring essential services, law and order, and so forth.
army.mil
It's apparent that Rummy and Company decided to use combat troops as Civil Affairs personnel, a job they aren't trained to do. But hey, it's cheaper this way, and in order to have a civil affairs section you'd have to have far larger Army than we are willing to pay for. At the end of WWII there were 15 million people in uniform, out of a population of 140 million. Today we field less than 1 million from a population double that. |
