Reveille for Rumsfeld
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Editorial
The Sacramento Bee
Published 2:15 am PST Saturday, December 11, 2004
sacbee.com
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Troops pose awkward, pertinent questions
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has signed on for another tour of duty at the Pentagon - in military jargon, "re-upping." But his decision was voluntary - and mutual: President Bush asked him to stay. However, it's different for thousands of soldiers in America's all-volunteer military whose tours of duty in Iraq have been extended beyond what they signed up for.
In some circles that might be called breach of contract. In the military, it's called "stop-loss," and it appears to be perfectly legal.
But the secretary had a rude awakening during a visit with Iraq-bound troops in Kuwait, most of them Reserve and National Guard members. They wanted to know why, 20 months after U.S. forces occupied Iraq, they still don't have enough armor for their vehicles, which are highly vulnerable to deadly roadside bombs; why some other equipment is antiquated; and why those who signed up for fixed tours of duty are being re-upped once, twice, even three times.
Rumsfeld, rarely at a loss for words, was taken aback. When he recovered, his answers amounted to variations on "stuff happens," his blithe explanation in April last year when rioting, looting and vandalism erupted in Baghdad as U.S. troops looked on and did nothing to stop it.
While the exigencies of wartime may require hanging onto termed-out volunteers, the Pentagon could have planned better. Now the Army is ordering an increase in production of armored Humvees from 450 to 550 a month.
Good, if a bit late. But astonishingly, a Pentagon spokesman offers the lame defense that, once a war begins, "then we start to mobilize." We always thought you mobilized before the war.
Besides playing catch-up in Iraq, the Pentagon still has failed to give a credible explanation of how the top brass, including Rumsfeld, didn't know about the abuses at U.S.-run prisons in Iraq, Afghanistan and at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, when there's growing evidence of the widespread extent of the abuses and at least tacit top-level assent.
Of course Rumsfeld has bigger things on his mind, grand plans for making America's fighting forces leaner and more flexible for coping with all potential threats in a dangerous world. We wonder, though, how he and his aides will be able to foresee the multitude of possible scenarios if they can't put enough troops in Iraq and give them what they need to protect themselves. Why is this man still working for the government?
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IMO, Mr. Bush has NEVER learned how to fire those who need to be fired (e.g. Cheney, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld)...Bush continues to demonstrate that he is a CEO who is in over his head and has too much to learn on the job...Our boys are getting killed in Iraq while Karl Rove's kids try to get things right in Washington -- it's down right embarassing. |
