WP's Thomas Ricks, author of "Fiasco," with Olbermann on "Countdown"

Run time: 05:34 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lO6F-RPl60c   Posted on YouTube: July 19, 2007 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: July 19, 2007 By DU Member: DeepModem Mom Views on DU: 1343

 

If you want to know what Bush, Cheney and Rummy thought about the troops, read it now!

I haven't gotten to CobraII yet-that seems to be basically an AfterActionReview but Fiasco spells out how badly this thing was from the beginning. I found the part about how everyone -at the command level-knew not only about AbuGharib but how bad it was both from a humanity level but from a informational level (people disappearing).

Great read.

Ricks confirmed what I've been saying for a while, that B*shCo doesn't understand the difference between strategy and tactics. That is a fatal misunderstanding. Tactics are a commander's plan to win a battle. Strategy is a commander's plan to win a war. "Shock and Awe", for example, was a tactic, and a highly successful one. The "surge" is also a tactic, not necessarily a good one. But as Ricks points out, an army can recover from bad tactics, if there is a sound strategy. But no army can recover from inadequate strategy, even if they have outstanding tactics. Petraeus had a strategy, at least as far as his initial command in the early days of the occupetion was concerned, but his strategy was not adopted at higher levels. By calling the "surge" a strategy, B*shCo proves that they have no good strategy. To paraphrase a bumper sticker I see more and more often, Optimism is not a strategy.

the author reinforces the point that Bush does something bad, then blames other people for his acts, and continues to act as though he is in the right; the basic definition of a full-blown sociopath. Jeez, can't we impeach this guy on the grounds of mental incapacity already?