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So these generals and colonels rationalized that it was their job to talk about military operations and cheer for a war victory instead of warning that Iraq was not a threat to the US and that so many American men and women would be involved in a civil war quagmire that would result in terrible death and destruction. Their loyalty was terribly misplaced and still is because they also have supported the surge and passed out the nonsense that we are now winning. Winning what?
RMP, in this graf you've touched something that is so essential to the whole argument, but which I predict no one will ever drag out of this mess and examine, no matter what happens. Winning what, indeed?
Nevermind that the generals may not have been in a position or conceived their role as taking part in a national conversation about whether or not to go to war in Iraq. Assume all of them were on the offensive after 9/11, and wanted to encourage the country to support a 'total war' in response. Fine. Even under that assumption, though, what are they doing cheering on the MAJOR DISTRACTIONS of aggressive action against anyone whom we've ever had a case of the ass at (Saddam, also Hugo Chavez, Assad Jr), who had FUCK ALL to do with it, when we're supposed to be in the middle of a frigging war with al Qaeda and global terrorism networks?
As you know, this isn't just a seminar question, or a matter or academic debate. This is doctrine. This is what they were taught, what they contributed to, what they commanded in accordance with, and what they lived.
They aren't just abandoning some lofty role we might want to assign them, or even an ethical consideration they don't seem to understand (see Allard's and Bateman's responses at links in my previous letters on this thread) --- what they have abandoned is their own professional DNA; in pursuit of ego, advantage, access to power, or financial gain, or whatever. And they've betrayed us --- the American people, the people in uniform who are living out (and dying for) what they unleashed in Iraq, and those of us who served alongside them and kept the faith.
