For Bush, Same Goal in Iraq, New Tactics

Two months before its self-imposed deadline to give Iraqis limited power to run their country, the Bush administration is showing an increased willingness to reverse or alter elements of its occupation tactics, and a new hesitation to engage in military confrontations that could inflame the Iraqis, government officials say.

Always reluctant to acknowledge publicly that events are not unfolding as expected, President Bush's senior aides are characterizing the moves as course corrections en route to an unchanging goal, even if they involve scrapping or rewriting plans that the White House or the head of the American occupation in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, announced months ago.

The new tactics include ceding substantial power to the United Nations to pull together a transitional government; easing the ban on Baath Party members in the new government; and reopening the question of whether the United States should have disbanded the Iraqi Army.

Pressed to explain the changes, a senior administration official who is playing a central role told reporters on Friday, "I'm not going to look in the rear-view mirror here," adding that the focus now was on making the transfer of sovereignty work. "We have a strategy and we have a plan and we are doing our best to implement it," the official said. "And it runs into bumps in the road, as all plans do."

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/02/international/middleeast/02DIPL.html

The only time they are willing to engage in a confrontation is when it's a guaranteed win with nominal US losses. Otherwise they give up and turn things over to some brutal dictator.

could be quite a bump in the road for Bushco's "plan/no plan".

The show about absolutely nothing

They had difficulty pitching that to the networks too

"clusterfuck" :shrug: Same ol', same ol'.