The Truth About Bush's Wars

Lately, some news outlets have been interviewing George W. Bush and asking his opinion on a range of matters.  Personally, I find it incredible that a man that was wrong about almost everything - and who cannot travel overseas for fear of arrest for war crimes - is consulted about anything.  Today, on Veterans Day, it is perhaps most important to remember the disasters that Bush and his evil co-conspirator Dick Cheney brought to America.  I am not anti-military or anti-veteran.  Rather, I believe the worst thing one can do is send our troops on fool's errands and then not properly support them.  Having nearly lost a son-in-law in Afghanistan, this is admittedly very personal to me.  A column in the New York Times authored by a retired general looks at the issue of the need for honesty about America's two failed wars.  Here are highlights:

AS a senior commander in Iraq and Afghanistan, I lost 80 soldiers. Despite their sacrifices, and those of thousands more, all we have to show for it are two failed wars. This fact eats at me every day, and Veterans Day is tougher than most.

As veterans, we tell ourselves it was all worth it. The grim butchery of war hovers out of sight and out of mind, an unwelcome guest at the dignified ceremonies. Instead, we talk of devotion to duty and noble sacrifice. We salute the soldiers at Omaha Beach, the sailors at Leyte Gulf, the airmen in the skies over Berlin and the Marines at the Chosin Reservoir, and we’re not wrong to do so. The military thrives on tales of valor. In our volunteer armed forces, such stirring examples keep bringing young men and women through the recruiters’ door. As we used to say in the First Cavalry Division, they want to “live the legend.” In the military, we love our legends.

Here’s a legend that’s going around these days. In 2003, the United States invaded Iraq and toppled a dictator. We botched the follow-through, and a vicious insurgency erupted. Four years later, we surged in fresh troops, adopted improved counterinsurgency tactics and won the war. And then dithering American politicians squandered the gains. It’s a compelling story. But it’s just that — a story.

The surge in Iraq did not “win” anything. It bought time. It allowed us to kill some more bad guys and feel better about ourselves.
The remnants of Al Qaeda in Iraq and the Sunni insurgents we battled for more than eight years simply re-emerged this year as the Islamic State, also known as ISIS.

The surge legend is soothing, especially for military commanders like me. We can convince ourselves that we did our part, and a few more diplomats or civilian leaders should have done theirs. Similar myths no doubt comforted Americans who fought under the command of Robert E. Lee in the Civil War or William C. Westmoreland in Vietnam. But as a three-star general who spent four years trying to win this thing — and failing — I now know better.

We did not understand the enemy, a guerrilla network embedded in a quarrelsome, suspicious civilian population. We didn’t understand our own forces, which are built for rapid, decisive conventional operations, not lingering, ill-defined counterinsurgencies.

What went wrong in Iraq and in Afghanistan isn’t the stuff of legend. It won’t bring people into the recruiting office, or make for good speeches on Veterans Day. Reserve those honors for the brave men and women who bear the burdens of combat.

That said, those who served deserve an accounting from the generals. What happened? How? And, especially, why? It has to be a public assessment, nonpartisan and not left to the military. (We tend to grade ourselves on the curve.) Something along the lines of the 9/11 Commission is in order. We owe that to our veterans and our fellow citizens.

Such an accounting couldn’t be more timely. Today we are hearing some, including those in uniform, argue for a robust ground offensive against the Islamic State in Iraq. Air attacks aren’t enough, we’re told.

As a veteran, and a general who learned hard lessons in two lost campaigns, I’d like to suggest an alternative. Maybe an incomplete and imperfect effort to contain the Islamic State is as good as it gets. Perhaps the best we can or should do is to keep it busy, “degrade” its forces, harry them or kill them, and seek the long game at the lowest possible cost. It’s not a solution that is likely to spawn a legend. But in the real world, it just may well give us something better than another defeat.

What the author argues for would be really supporting our troops rather than the sound bites especially popular with the GOP.  Will such an accounting actually happen?  Probably not.  Too many have too much to lose if the full truth ever comes out.  Meanwhile, our troops risk betrayal yet again by their leaders. 

Memorial Day Reflections - How to Truly Honor the Fallen

Hampton National Cemetery - Hampton, Virginia

Memorial Day is a day set aside to honor those who gave their lives in the defense of this.  It is due and appropriate to remember those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for their country.  Having nearly lost a son-in-law in Afghanistan, the day touches me even more than once was the case. Sadly, however, Memorial Day is also a day when craven, disingenuous politicians posture and pose claiming to honor the fallen and by extension our troops in uniform.   It is all a ruse, of course, because they very same politician - especially those on the Republican side of the isle, seem only too ready to throw away the lives of American service members on fools errands or situations which in the last analysis have no real bearing on America's vital interests.  

I invite everyone to make a vow to the fallen:  we will never again allow our national leaders to throw away lives on idiot conceived fool's errands like the Iraq War and the still ongoing disaster in Afghanistan.  And let's not forget the thousands who died in Vietnam on a similar fool's errand beginning a nearly a half century ago. If one truly honors the fallen and truly supports our troops, one does not squander their lives and bankrupt the nation in the process.   Better yet, demand accountability for those who threw away American lives and treasure.

Iraq Vetreran with PTDS Kills Three and Self at Fort Hood

The hawks in the GOP who all rubber stamped the Bush/Cheney lead fool's errand/fiascoes in Iraq and Afghanistan blather all the time about "supporting our troops," but when it involves more than a photo op for campaign ads or just insincere talk, they are missing in action.  Indeed, these supposed supporters of our troops would limit benefits and most dangerously do not want to fund treatment of veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder ("PTSD") and other emotional/mental disorders resulting from the horrors they were required to endure.  Yesterday, the consequence of such lip service and lack of action took the lives of three individuals at Fort Hood in Texas, plus the life of a troubled Iraq War veteran.  As noted in previous posts, my son-in-law was one of the "lucky ones" after his serious injuries in Afghanistan, but many are not given what they need.  Here are excerpts from a piece in the New York Times on yesterday's tragedy:

A soldier who was being evaluated for post-traumatic stress disorder opened fire at Fort Hood on Wednesday, killing three people and wounding 16 before killing himself, the authorities said. The shooting set off a huge police response and shut down the sprawling Army base, the same facility where a deadly rampage by an officer resulted in 13 deaths in 2009.

Fort Hood’s commanding general said the gunman, an Army specialist who had served in Iraq and was being treated for behavioral and mental health issues, had died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. The commander, Lt. Gen. Mark A. Milley, told reporters that the soldier’s motive remained unclear, but that the shooting did not appear to be related to terrorism. 

A Pentagon official said the suspected gunman was Army Specialist Ivan Lopez. General Milley, while not identifying Specialist Lopez by name, said the gunman had served four months in Iraq in 2011 and was being evaluated for post-traumatic stress disorder, but had not yet been diagnosed with the condition. There were indications that he had self-reported a traumatic brain injury when he returned from Iraq, General Milley said. 

The episode appeared to have unfolded around 4:30 p.m. at a medical support building. Witnesses described chaos as gunshots rang out. 

The authorities said Specialist Lopez appeared to have walked into one building, then gone inside a vehicle and fired shots from the vehicle with a .45-caliber Smith & Wesson semiautomatic pistol that had recently been bought in the Killeen area. He got out of the vehicle, walked into another building and opened fire again, and then engaged with a female military police officer before shooting himself. 

He put his hands up, General Milley said, then reached under his jacket. The female officer pulled out her weapon, and then Specialist Lopez put his weapon to his head and fired.

We have countless ticking time bombs among our veterans, many of whom have complained of inadequate treatment and support after serving in the hell holes that are Iraq and Afghanistan.  Again, anyone who really supports our troops ought to be demanding funding to address their serious medical and mental health needs - just don't expect to see such action from Republicans who only truly care about the wealthy. 

The Bush/Cheney Betrayal - Falluja’s Fall Stuns Marines Who Fought There

I have a son-in-law who did two deployments to Iraq and one deployment to Afghanistan (where he was severely wounded) and in this area of military installations I know many members of the military who served in Iraq.  Many are stunned to see what they and friends fought for (and that many died for) so quickly unraveling and being for naught.  I suspect that many feel betrayed.  And they were.  By George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and by every member of Congress who voted to invade Iraq.  It was a fool's errand from the start premised on deliberate lies by Bush/Cheney and their sycophants.  Anyone familiar with the history of the region and the religious disputes between the two branches of Islam could have predicted disaster.  As I have said before, "supporting the troops" entails more that voting for defense spending and being rah, rah for the military.  It means not sending the into harms way on a fools errand.  The New York Times looks at the reactions of some who served in Iraq:

Adam Banotai was a 21-year-old sergeant and squad leader in the Marine Corps during the 2004 invasion of Falluja, a restive insurgent-held city in Iraq. His unit — which had seven of 17 men wounded by shrapnel or bullets in the first days of the invasion — seized control of the government center early in the campaign.

So when Sunni insurgents, some with allegiances to Al Qaeda, retook the city this month and raised their black insurgent flag over buildings where he and his men fought, he was transfixed, disbelieving and appalled.

“I texted a couple of friends,” said Mr. Banotai, now a firefighter and registered nurse in Pennsylvania. “Everyone was in disbelief.”

“I don’t think anyone had the grand illusion that Falluja or Ramadi was going to turn into Disneyland, but none of us thought it was going to fall back to a jihadist insurgency,” he said. “It made me sick to my stomach to have that thrown in our face, everything we fought for so blatantly taken away.”

The bloody mission to wrest Falluja from insurgents in November 2004 meant more to the Marines than almost any other battle in the 12 years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many consider it the corps’ biggest and most iconic fight since Vietnam, with nearly 100 Marines and soldiers killed in action and hundreds more wounded.

Some now blame President Obama for not pushing harder to keep some troops in Iraq to maintain the stability. Others express anger at George W. Bush for getting them into a war that they now view as dubious in purpose and even more doubtful in its accomplishments. But either way, the fall of the city to insurgents has set off within the tight-knit community of active and former Marines a wrenching reassessment of a battle that in many ways defined their role in the war.

“This has been a gut punch to the morale of the Marine Corps and painful for a lot of families who are saying, ‘I thought my son died for a reason.’ ”

Ryan Sparks was a platoon commander during a seven-month Falluja deployment in which three men were killed and 57 wounded in his 90-man unit. Now about to take a job in Manhattan after recently leaving the Marines, Mr. Sparks, 39, said many of the younger Falluja veterans are angry “because we lost so many Marines, and it feels like they were sacrificed for nothing.”

He said that the fall of Falluja might finally bring home to the public what he says he and many comrades had long believed about the war. “Lives were wasted, and now everyone back home sees that,” he said. “It was irresponsible to send us over there with no plan, and now to just give it all away.”

Thousands died because of George Bush's hubris and Dick Cheney's megalomania.  Bush and Cheney need to be tried for war crimes and punished severely.  Unless this happens, this kind of fiasco will happen again.  My heart goes out to those who lost loved ones or who were maimed basically for nothing.  When members of the military hear Republicans giving lip service to "supporting the troops," they need to remember this huge betrayal.