Neocon Division: are they aiming for Rumsfeld as scapegoat?

[LittleApple81]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EI16Ak03.html

The hawks fall out

WASHINGTON - Faced with the rising costs and complications of occupying Iraq, the hardline coalition around US President George W Bush that led the drive to war with Iraq appears to be suffering serious internal strains.

Snip…
The article , "America's responsibility", argued that it was illusory to believe that foreign troops from India, Pakistan or Turkey, which would presumably be made available under a new UN resolution, were capable of doing what was required in Iraq. Recent CPA initiatives to bring former Iraqi intelligence and police officers back into service risked "catastrophe", it added.

"If we lose , we will leave behind us not blue helmets but radicalism and chaos, a haven for terrorists, and a perception of American weakness and lack of resolve in the Middle East and reckless blundering around the world," they warned.

snip…

But Washington's difficulties in stabilizing Iraq have forced the difference into the open, especially since many lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are seeking scapegoats for the administration's failure to anticipate the postwar challenges.

Bush's request that Congress approve a jaw-dropping US$87 billion to fund US operations in Iraq and Afghanistan in the coming year has spurred the hunt for a scapegoat, which is currently centered on Rumsfeld and his neo-con deputies, Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith.

In such an atmosphere, the divide between the two forces will be difficult to bridge.

[FlashHarry]

1. If somebody does actually take the fall, it'll be Rummy or Wolfie

I don't think the public would accept anybody lower in the food chain. But, should that happen, it would be a HUGE admission of failure on Bush's part--something he's incredibly loath to do. So, I doubt it. Remember folks, Saddam gassed the Kurds--THAT'S the reason we went to war...

[KharmaTrain]

3. Loyalty = Admission Of Guilt

This regime loathes the concept of accepting responsibility and those who have been given the petard have been low level hacks who hope to "rehabilitate" in some high paid CONservative think tank.

Von Rumsfeldt is too much of a right wing/fund raising darling that RoveCo. can't cast him off like O'Neill or Whitman. If he goes, it's because Dubya has "gone soft" or not "staying the course" in Iraq or elsewhere. And that I consider highly unlikely. Rummy might call it quits if WhistleAss steals another 4 years, but that's too far in the future to speculate.

My bets are on Wolfie...ideal red meat. He's well enough known that it'll be the buzz of the News Channels for a couple days (if this occurs, expect it to cover up bad economic or corruption news). Rove hasn't had to play a big player up for this war fiasco, yet...but my bets are he already has the pecking order set and Wolfie's head looks the most expendable. Next out is Tenet at CIA (he was a Clinton hire...thanks for nothing...anyway), then possibly Bremmer. Last in line Colin Powell (Dubya's can't live with him, can't live without him) and Condi.

RoveCo. knows that the war is going to be a sticky issue...they need to keep their "troops" in line with the "war on terror" "9/11 = Iraq" and "anti-Bush is Anti-American" mantra and make it roar next year to get the most of his "red state" rednecks into the church busses and to the polls.

Out the window now is the possibility of winning an honest election with any sort of a plurality...now it's covering ass in the Executive (and why so much money's being raised).

[shirlden]

2. To get that much money,

there has to be a temple sacrifice. Shall we start a "betting pool" here at DU ?? My bet is for Powell, Rice, or some no body at the Pentagon.

:bounce:

[teryang]

4. There's no failure like a military failure

The interests of the defense contractors, represented by Cheney and Rumsfeld, differ significantly from the ideological idiots. The idiots with their religious bias for Israel will do anything no matter how harmful to the national interest. Cheney and Rumsfeld only do it for money. The motives of Feith and Wolfowitz, Zakheim are pro-Israel. Anyone who believed their propaganda about building a democracy in Iraq and remaking the middle east needs to have their head examined for falling for something akin to utopian socialism. The oil companies pushing their views in the press, are unwilling to give up their newly discovered reserves in Iraq.

As for the neocons in the press, giving McCain a forum for foreign policy views should give some hint of their credibility. This is the man who for years criticized any war with an unclear purpose and no exit strategy. It seems as if he has gotten Alzheimer's disease or a case of McNesia. McCain simply does not have the intellectual equipment or ability to distance himself from the Vietnam experience. Faced with a military failure he supported, he has a psychological need to prove we could have won in Vietnam. He is wrong on all counts.

[radwriter0555]

5. Rumsfeld is the CULPRIT, make NO mistake about it. His 1998 Security

Commission Report is THE SINGLE SOURCE for all attacks on iraq SINCE 1998.

HE is the liar here. He completely manufactured every piece of crap in that damned report, that is still USED to this day. IT is THE report on which clinton based HIS attack of iraq.

We ALL got duped.