I'm just the guy that can't stand cant. ___________

 
BUSH'S "NEW" IRAQ STRATEGY IS NOTHING MORE THAN CHEERLEADING

President Bush's recent Iraq war strategy speech may have been a disappointment to those who were hoping for something substantive, but it now appears that such expectations were unrealistic.

I confess that I was one of those who was disappointed by Bush's speech on Wednesday and the accompanying 35-page strategy document entitled National Strategy For Victory In Iraq. Neither the speech nor the strategy document gives any sign of changing our bumbling approach in Iraq.

Admittedly, though, part my disappointment was due to my originally mistaking a web page that summarized the classic science fiction film Plan Nine From Outer Space for a summary of Bush's plan. After realizing my mistake, I reviewed Bush's actual strategy document, which contained nothing as bold (or even as connected to reality) as Plan Nine's strategy for zombie warfare orchestrated by grave robbers from outer space.

Bush's actual speech and strategy document struck me as little more than Bush returning to his cheerleading roots and shouting V Is For Victory. News reports about the purpose of the speech, however, indicate that the speech and strategy document were not intended to be anything other than cheerleading.

We should not be surprised that Bush's speech and the strategy document that was released with the speech did not present any new substantive approach. As The New York Times reported on Sunday, Bush's new strategy is nothing more than a public relations offensive:

There could be no doubt about the theme of President Bush's Iraq war strategy speech on Wednesday at the Naval Academy. He used the word victory 15 times in the address; "Plan for Victory" signs crowded the podium he spoke on; and the word heavily peppered the accompanying 35-page National Security Council document titled, "Our National Strategy for Victory in Iraq."

Although White House officials said many federal departments had contributed to the document, its relentless focus on the theme of victory strongly reflected a new voice in the administration: Peter D. Feaver, a Duke University political scientist who joined the N.S.C. staff as a special adviser in June and has closely studied public opinion on the war.

Despite the president's oft-stated aversion to polls, Dr. Feaver was recruited after he and Duke colleagues presented the administration with an analysis of polls about the Iraq war in 2003 and 2004. They concluded that Americans would support a war with mounting casualties on one condition: that they believed it would ultimately succeed.

That finding, which is questioned by other political scientists, was clearly behind the victory theme in the speech and the plan, in which the word appears six times in the table of contents alone, including sections titled "Victory in Iraq is a Vital U.S. Interest" and "Our Strategy for Victory is Clear."

….

The role of Dr. Feaver in preparing the strategy document came to light through a quirk of technology. In a portion of the document usually hidden from public view but accessible with a few keystrokes, the plan posted on the White House Web site showed the document's originator, or "author" in the software's designation, to be "feaver-p."

Thus, it appears that the strategy showcased by Bush's speech and the accompanying strategy document was actually a strategy to win the war for public opinion -- not to win the war in Iraq. As The New York Times reported:

"This is not really a strategy document from the Pentagon about fighting the insurgency," said Christopher F. Gelpi, Dr. Feaver's colleague at Duke and co-author of the research on American tolerance for casualties. "The Pentagon doesn't need the president to give a speech and post a document on the White House Web site to know how to fight the insurgents. The document is clearly targeted at American public opinion."

So, perhaps to be fair to the Bush administration, we should not criticize his V Is For Victory speech and strategy document for failing to set forth any new approach for winning the war in Iraq. That is not what they were intended to do. Instead, we should judge the speech and document for what they were designed to do -- to fool us into thinking victory is just around the corner.

Judged on these terms, Bush's V Is For Victory speech and strategy document may not prove totally unsuccessful. Making fools of people that take it seriously is one of the few abilities that the Bush administration excels in.
I know that I, for one, feel foolish having searched through Bush's speech and strategy document looking for signs of a new strategy in Iraq.
posted by Gary at 12:16 PM

 
BUSH’S PLAN NINE FOR IRAQ

While I have previously counted myself among the skeptics of Bush's incompetent bungling of the war in Iraq, Bush's new strategic plan for victory has convinced me.

As today's New York Times reports, Bush laid out his new plan for victory in a speech he gave yesterday and in a 35-page strategy document that was released a few hours earlier.

To those who view Bush's new plan as an overhyped repackaging of the same platitudes and rhetoric masquerading as a policy that has left us floundering after two and a half years of war, I say that is an understatement.

We can now count ourselves among those generations of Americans that have had the honor of witnessing historic statements of American principles. Americans of yesteryear were privileged to witness the Monroe Doctrine, Wilson's Fourteen Points, FDR's Atlantic Charter, Truman's Marshall Plan. But we are more blessed for we have witnessed a foreign policy statement more bold, breathtaking and even visionary than any of these statements: Bush's Plan Nine For Victory In Iraq.

Bush's bold new strategy for victory in Iraq can only be truly appreciated when viewed in the context of Bush's first eight disastrous Plans For Victory In Iraq.

Plan One was to invade Iraq with far fewer troops than military experts said were needed to pacify the country and see what happened. This was Bush's Roll The Dice Plan For Victory In Iraq.

Plan Two was to stop fighting, sit back, wait for the resulting looting and anarchy to stop and then be greeted with flowers as liberators. This was Bush's Stop And Smell The Flowers Plan For Victory In Iraq.

Plan Three was to administer Iraq with the same sense of civic responsibility that motivates the Bush administration's governance of our own country by giving away multi-million dollar no-bid contracts to Halliburton and friends, hiring incompetent cronies and ignoring approaching chaos until it was too late. This was Bush's Katrina Plan For Victory In Iraq.

Plan Four was for Bush to bravely dare Iraqis to attack our armed forces. This was Bush's Bring It On Plan For Victory In Iraq.

Plan Five was to announce the openings of schools as the real benchmark for success in war. This was Bush's Back to School Plan For Victory In Iraq.

Plan Six was to adopt a policy that torture was permitted and then act surprised when torture and death squads resulted. This was Bush's Let Cheney And Rumsfeld Be Cheney And Rumsfeld Plan For Victory In Iraq.

Plan Seven was to deny reality by declaring we're winning as the death toll mounts and heralding Iraq as a beacon of democracy that will usher in a new age of peace and freedom in the Middle East. This was Bush's Clap Harder for Tinkerbell Plan For Victory In Iraq.

Plan Eight was to declare all-out war against critics of the ineptitude and mendacity of the administration's Iraq policy through such tactics as outing covert CIA agents married to critics and calling critics cowards and traitors even if they're war veterans. This was Bush's Slime And Defend Plan For Victory In Iraq.

In light of the disastrous results of Bush's first eight Plans For Victory In Iraq, I confess that I at first doubted that Bush's Plan Nine For Victory In Iraq would provide any realistic assessment of the situation or strategy for concluding the war. But when I googled Plan Nine and found this page summarizing Bush's Plan Nine, I was astounded by the brilliance and sheer audacity of the plan.

According to this summary, under Bush's Plan Nine, America has apparently recruited aliens from outer space to join the coalition of the willing. Taking Cheney's and Rumsfeld's no-holds barred approach to the next level, our allies from outer space will engage in "Unspeakable Horrors," including "Paralyze The Living And Resurrect The Dead!" While obviously short on the technical details of this ground-breaking approach to warfare, the summary of Plan Nine does reveal that the our alien allies will be immediately deployed to Iraq to "resurrect dead humans as zombies and vampires to stop human kind from creating the Solaranite (a sort of sun-driven bomb)."

Plan Nine also sets forth the most coherent explanation to date of the reason why we had to invade Iraq. Although Iraq may not have had the weapons of mass destruction the Bush administration implied threatened America, Iraq could have developed this Solaranite bomb.

As a scientific advisor to the Bush administration official explains in an appendix to Plan Nine, if Iraq had developed a Solaranite bomb, it could have exploded sunlight itself with the following apocalyptic results: "Explode the sunlight here and a chain reaction will occur direct to the sun itself and to all the planets that sunlight touches, to every planet in the universe." Bush's scientific advisor leaves no doubt about the consequences we could have been facing if Saddam had remained in power free to develop this ultimate weapon of mass destruction: "Explode the sunlight here, gentlemen, you explode the universe."

Plan Nine presents the best rationale for Bush's decision to go to war in Iraq. Who can blame the Bush administration for not waiting for a smoking gun in the form of an exploding universe?!

While Bush has had a shaky start in his first 58 months as president, I think he is finally getting the hang of this presidency thing. Plan Nine is without a doubt far better reasoned and grounded in reality than any other policy -- either foreign or domestic -- of the entire Bush administration.

UPDATE: I may owe the Bush administration an apology. Reliable sources tell me that the summary page for Plan Nine that I found actually summarizes Plan Nine From Outer Space, the ludicrous 1959 science fiction film that some rank as the worst film of all time.

Upon reflection, I don't know how I could have confused Plan Nine From Outer Space with Bush's Plan Nine For Victory In Iraq. I should have realized I had stumbled upon the wrong plan since Plan Nine From Outer Space has no clear statement how to achieve victory in Iraq and does not even acknowledge one of the biggest problems we must confront -- that the presence of American troops in Iraq is actually fueling the insurgency.

If I have unfairly compared Bush's Iraq policy with the worst science fiction film ever, I apologize. I'll take another stab at finding Bush's Plan Nine For Victory In Iraq on the internet.

SECOND UPDATE: I found another document on the internet claiming to be Bush's new plan, entitled National Strategy For Victory In Iraq. Despite the official-sounding title, this document also seems suspect to me since it has neither a clear statement of how to achieve victory nor any acknowledgment that the presence of American troops is fueling the insurgency. Moreover, unlike Plan Nine From Outer Space, this purported new plan for victory doesn't even set forth any new approaches.

I confess, I can't tell which plan is the better representation of the strategic thinking of the Bush administration. I may owe an apology to Ed Wood, director of Plan Nine From Outer Space, and, perhaps, the architect of Bush's Iraq policy.
posted by Gary at 10:32 AM