In public newly appointed Defense Secretary Robert Gates stands behind the President, as he serves at his leisure of course. Nonetheless it has been reported by anonymous Administration officials that Gates opposes any additional troops being sent to the quagmire and civil war that is Iraq.
It is obvious to us here that the escalation is a crazy deja vu of Vietnam and completely unwarranted. It is obvious to the troops and of course the American people know it more and more each day as the death toll climbs higher.
From the New York Sun:
WASHINGTON — With President Bush leaning toward sending more soldiers to pacify Iraq, his defense secretary is privately opposing the buildup.
According to two administration officials who asked not to be named, Robert Gates expressed his skepticism about a troop surge in Iraq on his first day on the job, December 18, at a Pentagon meeting with civilians who oversee the Air Force, Army, Navy, and Marines.
Right from the get go the new Defense Secretary knew that the idea was irresponsible. No additional amount of troops is going to make a difference in the increasingly bloody civil war. The only thing that an escalation can do is increase the death toll of our brave men.
These comments of Gates that defy President Bush have mostly been kept low and out of sight. It is up to the Democrats to pull it out of him and the generals and get it as testimony in front of the new Democratic House and Senate.
The Sun's Eli Lake also seems to hint at this:
Before taking over as defense secretary earlier this month, Mr. Gates had been a member of the 10-person Iraq Study Group, also known as the Baker-Hamilton commission. That group has warned against a long-term buildup of forces in Iraq, arguing it would lessen pressure on the elected government in Baghdad to reach a political accommodation there, which the commission says is the only way to stabilize the deteriorating nation.
That's the way many of the Democrats preparing to take over Congress see things as well. Yesterday, in a conference call with reporters, the incoming chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Joseph Biden, a Democrat of Delaware, said he would launch three weeks of hearings on Iraq in January in part to persuade Republicans to go to the White House to oppose a new troop surge for Iraq.
Hopefully he will forget about the strange presence behind his back when he swears an oath to tell the WHOLE truth.
That is what has to be done. This
|