THE GENERALS' REVOLT :Pat Buchanan

[jbfam4]

THE GENERALS' REVOLT
Pat Buchanan
http://www.creators.com/opinion_show.cfm?columnsName=pbu



As of Good Friday, the Generals' Revolt has created a crisis for President Bush. If he stands by Rumsfeld, he will have taken his stand against generals whose credibility today is higher than his own.

But if he bows to the Generals' Revolt and dismisses Rumsfeld, the generals will have effected a Pentagon putsch. An alumni association of retired generals will have dethroned civilian leadership and forced the commander in chief to fire the architect of a war upon which not only Bush's place in history depends, but the U.S. position in the Middle East and the world. The commander in chief will have been emasculated by retired generals. The stakes could scarcely be higher.

Whatever one thinks of the Iraq war, dismissal of Rumsfeld in response to a clamor created by ex-generals would mark Bush as a weak if not fatally compromised president. He will have capitulated to a generals' coup. Will he then have to clear Rumsfeld's successor with them?


And there is an unstated message of the Generals' Revolt. If Iraq collapses in chaos and sectarian war, and is perceived as another U.S. defeat, they are saying: We are not going to carry the can. The first volley in a "Who Lost Iraq?" war of recriminations has been fired.


In the last analysis, the Generals' Revolt is not just against Rumsfeld, but is aimed at the man who appointed him and has stood by him for three years of a guerrilla war the Pentagon did not predict or expect.

[seemslikeadream]

1. "Who Lost Iraq?"

bush, but that's kind of hard to prove, since he didn't know where it was in the first place!

[yurbud]

2. K & R

[Orrin_73]

3. Did they ever own Iraq!!!!

[oblivious]

5. I guess it's a less direct way of saying "Who lost the Iraq WAR?"

[leveymg]

4. If Bush persists, it won't be the ex-Generals he has to worry about.

There's a coda behind these messages. This isn't about Iraq; it's about Iran. The uniformed military is more aware than anyone that any strike against Iran is going to fail militarily, short of a full strategic strike, just as surely as it would fail politically to bring about "regime change". They also know that a preemptive strike -- particularly a nuclear first-strike -- will brand everyone involved as a war criminal.

The General's Revolt has the potential to result in another sort of coup, if BushCo and the neocons don't heed the warnings.

[Skittles]

6. a pissing contest between bush and the generals

perhaps the troops should be priorty one

[Vidar]

7. For all the curses I leveled at Pat on Crossfire, I never thought I'd

agree with him so often as I have this year.