Gen Clark Laments Latest Tragedy Bush Still Has No Plan

[robbedvoter]

General Clark Laments Latest Tragedy
Bush Still Has No Plan
Clark Has Strategy for Success.
http://clark04.com/press/release/067/
Little Rock - There was more tragic news out of Iraq today. A Black Hawk helicopter went down near Tikrit, killing all six soldiers on board.

The Bush Administration still has no plan in Iraq. Their only strategy is to call up more American reservists.

Retired four-star General Clark has a four-pronged success strategy for Iraq:

1. We must end the American monopoly on the occupation and reconstruction.
2. We must develop the right force mix with better intelligence to fight and win a guerilla war.
3. We also need to reinvigorate our security partnerships with Europe. General Clark has proposed a New Atlantic Charter to do that.
4. We must give Iraqis a greater stake in our success, including establishing a new sovereign government in Iraq right away.

"Gert and I were saddened to hear of the continued loss of lives," Clark said. "Success in Iraq is the only way to honor the sacrifice of so many American men and women."

[IndianaGreen]

1. Clark is right in everything but in the call for a new Atlantic Charter

Don't take this as a criticism of Clark, but as a rejection of United States defense policies towards Europe, policies that were pursued by Democratic and Republican Administrations.

NATO has long outlived its usefulness! NATO has become a tool of American imperialist aggression, as well as a conduit for the wares of American arms merchants.

We should abolish NATO and let the EU develop their own defense alliance. We should also cut the umbilical chord to Great Britain, and the British be completely free from their co-dependency to Washington and join the Europe to which they properly belong.

[Donna Zen]

2. Gain or more pain?

Does the world gain if the US is further isolated from its natural friends.

I agree with your assessment that anyone dealing with the US today is bound to get warped, and yet, I would hope that there will someday be a better outcome to all of this. Thus, between the reality of my cynicism and the hope of my idealism, I must find room to believe that good people need to begin moving towards a new way of thinking, and planning, and doing, or we are all going down. The new organization(s):

But we have seen that it is foolish to act alone as a first resort, to determine alone the threat, to decide alone on a response, and then to say to the world, "you're with us or against us." Our first choice should be to act with the power and authority of many nations. This model could be applied to our friends and allies in Asia as well.

I also propose creating an agency that will bring the same skill to solving the problems of poverty, disease, and ethnic conflict that we have brought to the challenge of warfare. We should be using our great capacities to prevent conflicts early so we don't need to use force later. That means drawing on the skills that now exist across the federal government.

This new agency should have a budget for real research and development, real planning, and the ability to draw on the US national civilian reserves which I proposed last month. This agency will give us a power to engage that we don't have right now. Because we don't need a new strategy of preemptive force as much as we need a new capability for preemptive engagement.

[VolcanoJen]

3. Not LBN... locking

This press release was issued on November 7th; the LBN rules require that news be no older than 12 hours at the time of posting.

Please feel free to begin a new discussion in the Politics & Campaigns or General Discussion forums.

Thanks!
VolcanoJen
DU Moderator