By Brent Budowsky, The Hill. Posted September 1, 2007 (AlterNet).
To lay the foundation for the historic debate that will begin as Labor Day ends, the point of this note is to highlight how wrong Petraeus has been in his previous tours of duty in Iraq.
Fact: After the initial phase of fighting, in the areas under his command, sectarian warfare ultimately escalated and his efforts for political agreements, while worthy, failed.
Fact: In his tour of duty commanding the training of the Iraqi military, his training results were a dismal failure, and all subsequent training programs have been to redo his failed efforts and undo the damage done during that tour of duty.
Fact: There have been major disappearances, losses and/or misplacement of large amounts of Iraqi weapons that were grossly mismanaged (at best) under his command. Almost certainly those weapons were ultimately sold on the Iraqi black market with some landing in the hands of criminals, insurgents and al Qaeda terrorists who used them to kill Americans and Iraqis.
More at:
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/61390/The article provides an extensive discussion of Petraeus' unpromising history.
This is Bush's savior?