NYT: For Once, President and His Generals See the Same War

For Once, President and His Generals See the Same War
By JOHN F. BURNS and DEXTER FILKINS
Published: December 1, 2005


BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 30 - For anyone who has spent time in the field with American officers here, President Bush's speech on Wednesday was a watershed: for the first time in the two years since the conflict here turned brutal, the war Mr. Bush described sounded much like the one his generals grapple with every day.

The president acknowledged problems that have hobbled the American enterprise since the 2003 invasion: An American effort to build up Iraqi forces that went through a top-to-bottom makeover after early deployments of Iraqi troops saw them "running from the fight." Iraqi units that are "still uneven," despite the new American effort to train and equip them that has cost more than $10 billion. A Sunni Arab community that remains largely unyielding, despite months of efforts by Americans seeking to draw them back into the corridors of power.

Mr. Bush closed with a vow to "settle for nothing less than complete victory," without saying how that squared with the plan to hand over the main burden of the war to the newly trained Iraqi troops who, American field commanders say, have done well in some recent battles but much less impressively in others. Nor did the president say how his rejection of "artificial timetables" would be sustained politically if the plan for American troops to step back decisively in 2006, and for Iraqi units to step forward, falters in the face of the unrelenting insurgency.

But for all that, Mr. Bush, in some passages of his speech, came much closer than he has before to matching the hard-nosed assessments of the war that have long been made by American commanders here, at least among themselves. While maintaining a stoic confidence in public, many of these commanders, over the past 18 months, have pressed behind the scenes for the Pentagon to move toward a more realistic appraisal of the war than has been common among major administration figures in Washington.

These generals contend the war is winnable, though they do not says so with the tone of certainty that Mr. Bush mustered Wednesday at Annapolis. But they recognize, privately, that for winning to be an achievable goal within the time frame that American politics is likely to allow, things that have rarely gone America's way so far will have to improve steadily over the next 6 to 12 months....


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/01/international/worldspecial/01baghdad.html?hp&ex=1133499600&en=cbeccac5de8fc26e&ei=5094&partner=homepage

What does that mean "winnable"? Does it mean that we leave the Sunni's out of power, break up the country, catch Zarqawi? What in the Sam Hell would be a win for the US?

This war has always been about 2 things: a) secure the oil. b) set up a police station in Iraq so we can establish a military presence in the Middle East.

The U.S. desperately needs foreign oil. Without it, we go back to the Stone Age. The Middle East is a powder keg, ready to blow. We needed to move in there, and Iraq was always seen as the weakest link.

So the Pentagon, the military commanders, Bush & Cheney know DAMN WELL what "Victory" is to them. The problem is, how do they convey that to the American public. Believe me, Americans would be pissed if they told the real reason.

So they have to use vague phrases, like "Democracy", "Winnable", "We won't leave until we have complete victory".

Personal note to Dick: it's not the oil that will kill you, it's the people sitting on top of it.

Is Judy Miller back using a fake name?