The neo-cons have had their day. Now it's time for a clean sweep

http://www.larouchepub.com/other/interviews/2004/3120gen_joe_hoar.html

Larouche?????


Gen. Joseph P. Hoar (USMC-ret.), a four-star general, was Commander in Chief, U.S. Central Command (1991-94), commanding the U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf after the 1991 war. He also served in the Vietnam War, as a battalion and brigade advisor with the Vietnamese Marines. He was interviewed by Jeffrey Steinberg on May 6, 2004.

<<EIR: You were one of the people who had been critical before the outbreak of fighting, over whether or not the situation warranted going to war. I believe you also had some rather accurate warnings about what might happen, as the war unfolded, especially after the hot phase. What's your thinking on these issues now, in hindsight, as we're over a year past the formal fighting phase?

Hoar: There's small comfort in realizing that perhaps you were closer to reality than the elected and appointed figures in the civilian government. Those of us that have had some experience in the region over the years, and don't necessarily have ulterior motivations, particularly people that know very much about Iraq—and I don't necessarily put myself in that category; specifically, I know a fair amount about the political-military situation in the region, but know enough about Iraq to know that any military operation and any subsequent reconstruction efforts, to include the interjection of democracy, were going to be extremely difficult, and perhaps impossible.

But, my major concern, Jeff, really was, that while I was in favor of regime change, I was not in favor of it a year and a half or two years ago, and certainly not these means. And the reason, of course, was the much higher priorities: the protection of the United States through the development of the Homeland Securities activities; the completion, successfully, of the Afghanistan campaign; and the destruction of al-Qaeda; all seem to me to be much higher priorities than going after Iraq. And you know the arguments as well as I do: the weapons of mass destruction, the threat to the United States, the connection between al-Qaeda, and then finally, the reason was indicated that this was a rogue regime, that punished its citizens, and its human rights record was abysmal and so forth. We all know that story. The fact remains, that this would have been a very difficult undertaking under the best of circumstances, and unfortunately, with the exception of the Phase I military operation, which terminated essentially with the end of organized resistance over a year ago, the rest of it has been a disaster.

EIR: I was at an event, where both Gen. Zinni and Chas Freeman, former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, spoke, and this was about eight months before the outbreak of fighting, in March 2003, and they both basically thought that the real troubles would begin after the "hot phase" of combat, when American forces would be there as an occupying force. And they rejected the neo-con and Cheney thesis, that this would be a cakewalk and we'd be greeted as liberators.>>
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EIR does amazingly good research on many things. Their best work has been on Bush I (unauthorized bio, thoroughly documented), the neocons and Leo Strauss, and the DLC.

When they're not insisting that the Queen of England owns America, they often do excellent work.