Joe Galloway: Neocons want someone else blamed for their Iraqi war [View All]

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/10542822.htm

The most curious turn of the worm this season is the attack by the neoconservatives on Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld for the failures in Iraq.

It should be noted that until now Rumsfeld was the darling of that same bunch. He hired a batch of them as his most trusted aides and assistants in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Paul Wolfowitz as his undersecretary. Douglas Feith as his chief of planning. He installed the dean of the pack, Richard Perle, as chairman of the Defense Policy Board for a time.

The doyenne and room mother of the whole bunch, Midge Decter, wrote a fawning biography of Rumsfeld titled Rumsfeld: A Personal Portrait.

Now, suddenly, the voice of the neoconservative movement, William Kristol, editor of The Standard, suggests that Rumsfeld has fouled up everything in Iraq and ought to be fired for his failures. Ditto, writes Tom Donnelly of the right-thinking American Enterprise Institute.

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When Rumsfeld goes, so, too, should every neoconservative who squirmed his way into a Pentagon sinecure. They must also bear responsibility for a war that so far has cost nearly $200 billion and the lives of more than 1,300 U.S. troops and has damaged America's standing in the world.