The Secrets Clark Kept: What the General Never told Us (V. Voice)

What the General Never Told Us About the Bush Plan for Serial War. by Sydney H. Schanberg
September 29th, 2003 7:30 PM

This seems like a fair article to me. I know that more Left-wing sources are frowned on at DU lately, particularly when they are about Clark--but I think this article points out FACTS, not smears, and offers a suggestion for Clark that may work.

snip//
Wesley Clark, the retired four-star general who is one of 10 candidates for the Democratic nomination for president, has written a new book that is just arriving on bookstore shelves. Called Winning Modern Wars, it’s mostly about the Iraq war and terrorism—and it is laced with powerful new information that he held back from the public when he was a CNN military commentator during the Bush administration’s preparations for the war.

For example, he says he learned from military sources at the Pentagon in November 2001, just two months after the September 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, that serious planning for the war on Iraq had already begun and that, in addition to Iraq, the administration had drawn up a list of six other nations to be targeted over a period of five years.

Here’s what he writes on page 130:

"As I went back through the Pentagon in November 2001, one of the senior military staff officers had time for a chat. Yes, we were still on track for going against Iraq, he said. But there was more. This was being discussed as part of a five-year campaign plan, he said, and there were a total of seven countries, beginning with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iran, Somalia, and Sudan." Clark adds, "I left the Pentagon that afternoon deeply concerned."

He never disclosed anything like this information in any of his CNN commentaries or in the opinion columns he wrote for print media at the time. If Americans had known such things, and if the information is accurate, would they have supported the White House’s march to war? Would Congress have passed the war resolution the White House asked for?

snip// more at:
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0340/schanberg.php

So you now lack credibility and trust.

The gotch'ya game is only pulled on Dems - not the GOP - so screw the media.

They are trying the same game with the treason of outing a CIA operative - Because you did not complain and riot 2 months ago when it became known - the media will feel free to call it political now and to dismiss it - after all it might not make Bush look good.

What Bull.

If I thought that "valid" explanations would be accepted by our right wing controlled media, I'd worry about this and indeed hope he would try put them out there - the "views are conclusions that evolved over a period of time", or "these are my current views based a current review of the information" - neither tells you much about credibility and trust, but I dare say both are "valid" explanations.

Now we throw up the term "Inconsistencies between old and new remarks" and ignore Bush lies - the common right wing media approach to a Dem/GOP discussion. The left handed "just admit to "sloppy thinking" and all will be well" is bull.

If the media wants to hear what is being said as a valid explanation, it will - and if a Dem is speaking it is likely the media will get on its high horse and say that whatever the Dem said was not a valid explanation - just more sloppy thinking.

Yes the press will nibble you to death - but only if you are a Dem.

NBS Today Show had Matt Lauer acting like the 2 months between Novak treason and today’s comments means what a Dem says today is all political - illogical - but a valid for the right wing GOP ass kissing media.

The Voice notes that Bush and Cheney have "misspoken"—in particular about Iraq’s nuclear capabilities where they even acknowledged that they had "misspoken" - and says that this is an errant way that Dems should not follow - but then the voice does not note how the media has not given a damn about GOP "misspoken".

The voice is correct about credibility and trust, and about Americans being cynical, but maybe a fair media might find the Clark current opinion/thought not so errant if it compared it to Bush/Cheney thought.

In my humble opinion, the article does not make a good case in questioning why General Clark didn't "speak up" leading to the Iraq war.

First, Clark felt he would be no more effective than Scott Ritter had been. Ritter, we recall, was sent into the land of the banished at the time of the "let's get our Bush war on" fever was going on. General Clark had not real proof....was not even a weapon inspector! His word that some people had told him things was nto going to quite do it...for goodness sake!

Since the war resolution had passed, and the Media was singing it's war songs....Wesley Clark would have only gotten fired and retired to the looney bin ASAP (he'd already gone through both of those doors the last time he stood up). If Sydney H. Schanberg think that Clark, singlehandedly could have stopped the war....he is dreaming.

General Clark did testify to congress and he did make a case to the need to take it slow, deal with the problem with via the UN and not rush to war. However, I believe that if he would have said...."some of my sources told me".....they would have said...so you want to discuss some heresay then?

The author of the article then writes....Why didn't he share these opinions with us then, when an informed public might have raised its voice and demanded more answers from the White House?

Is this fantasy land or what?...I remember marching in two peace marches. The Village voice's Sydney H. Schanberg must have been on a different planet to think that anything that Wesley Clark would have said prior to the war about what he heard or thought would have made one bit of difference.

If one can recall what happened when Clark attempted to talk about the phone call he said he received on 9/11 by a Canadian Middle East think tank.....urging Clark to go on Television and try to pin the the blame on Iraq? he was laughted at, ridiculed, and called crazy.....I remember the reporters saying "there are no middle east think tanks in canada"...hahhahah

I think that General Clark did what he felt was the most effective attack against what he knew...he wrote a book as the war was ocurring (in which one is allowed to ones own opinions and can share heresay) and decided to run for President.....to get the American EVILDOERS out of power, hopefully for good!

He didn't speak up. In November 2001, he knew this Bush cabal was planning to go to war with a series of countries.

Knowing this, how could he advise Katrina Swett to vote YES on the IWR.

I don't understand this man. Where is his judgment? Where are his convictions?

I just shake my head.

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

dd123 says..."He didn't speak up. In November 2001, he knew this Bush cabal was planning to go to war with a series of countries."

I said "clark told more than once, including Meet the Press about the phone call he got on 9/11 telling him to go on TV and blame the Iraqis. General Clark told many an audience about that phone call...and was called crazy....that's where the "he's crazy" tag came from.

dd123, you almost sound like that hate radio I am forced to listen to.....Too bad that I find the same type of distrust, dislike and cynicism on the DU as well.

Must be that you donated to another campaign and feel "hurt" that the newcomer is getting some play!

who doesn't have a horse in this race yet.

Call me "distrustful", call me "cynical", call me full of "dislike" - whatever.

There are many of us here who rightfully and with reason have questions about the candidacy of Gen. Clark.

I saw Clark on television talking about that phone call asking him to finger the Iraqis and his refusal to do so. I respected him for that. But I did NOT see him exposing what he had discovered about the full extend of the Bush plan.

For a long time the one person I kind of trusted in this administration was Colin Powell, because of his military background. When it was clear to everyone the administration was asking State to sell bullshit information on 9/11, Iraq, and Saddam's WMDs capabilities, I had really hoped that, as a military man, he would have refused to do so knowing it would lead to the endangerment of American troops. But he didn't. He stooged himself, and he is to be despised for it.

With regards to Gen. Clark, I too would have hoped that he would have raised a bigger stink about the FULL extent of what he knew was to come. That he didn't, is just one more thing I will file away when making my final decision about whether or not to vote for him in the primaries.

As for being "shot down", there are dozens of people out there (including writers here on DU) who also knew what was coming, and they never one stopped shouting the truth using every venue they has access to, even though they were "shot down" as crazy, leftist, unpatriotic, anti-military, commie, hippy, blah blah blah, fill in the RW slur.

For that, they have my eternal gratitude.

"If Americans had known such things, and if the information is accurate, would they have supported the White House’s march to war? Would Congress have passed the war resolution the White House asked for?"

Yep, they would have. Let's be realistic. You really think if Clark, then pretty much unknown, said something would've prevented the tide of media prostitution?

Besides, many Americans did know such things. Millions of 'em, and millions of people that took to the streets around the world. And it happened anyway.

Now you're REALLY grasping at straws.