Stan Goff: Reflecting on Rumsfeld

[noamnety]

In August 2003, I was interviewed on CNN as “the father of a soldier.” Iraq had claimed only 270 American armed forces members’ lives. I called the conflict “a quagmire,” bringing hoots of virtual laughter from right-wing bloggers the following day. They were still holding out for the Parisian Rose Parade promised them by Ahmed Chalabi, and I was just some malcontented geriatric hippie still mired in the linguistics of the ‘60s.

I don’t want any last laugh. It’s not funny. My son has been to Iraq four times now, and is straightaway headed to Afghanistan, where the Taliban now controls whole towns throughout the south. ...

A Goffian journey through history, military tactics, and humanity: http://www.truthdig.com/report/page3/200601017_reflecting_on_rumsfeld/

[bemildred]

1. Thanks, excellent piece.

Mr. Goff continues to impress. His deconstruction of Lind I especially liked.

The problem is that the Bushites assume that control of the Mighty Wurlitzer makes real world intelligence and competence unnecessary, that it's all a video game, and you get an arbitrary number of do-overs. This is, of course, not true, and anyone who lives outside the power elites knows this perfectly well.

Mr. Rumsfeld has the happy expectation, like his predecessor McNamara, of knowing before he dies that he was full of shit.

[cliss]

2. Wow, what an article.

Thanks so much for posting, lwfern. This is my favourite military writer - really any kind of writer (Stan Goff writes about a lot of things).

check out his own web site;
http://www.stangoff.com

He also writes for From the Wilderness, but that is a subscription site, so I'm always overjoyed when I see articles from Mr. Goff that are free....

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/

[noamnety]

3. I love his blog.

I post there sometimes, usually sticking my foot in my mouth at every opportunity. :)