Blumenthal: Clinging to happy talk

[Desperadoe]

"Metrics" is one of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's obsessions. In October 2003, he sent a memo to his deputies and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: "Today, we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror." Rumsfeld demanded precise measurements of progress, including the "ideological." By the "war on terror" he meant Iraq as well as Afghanistan. A study was commissioned by the JCS and conducted by the Institute for Defense Analyses, a military think tank. In utterly neutral terms, the IDA report detailed a grim picture at odds with the Bush administration's rosy scenarios. Not only has Rumsfeld suppressed the report, but the Pentagon has yet to acknowledge its existence.

Against the advice of senior officers of the military, Rumsfeld applied his doctrine of using a light combat force in the invasion of Iraq. Gen. Eric Shinseki, then commander of the Army, was cashiered and publicly ridiculed for suggesting that a larger force would be required. But Rumsfeld and the neoconservatives assumed that there would be no long occupation because democracy would spontaneously flower.

In April 2004 the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College produced a report on the metrics of the Rumsfeld doctrine, "Toppling Saddam: Iraq and American Military Transformation." It concluded that the U.S. coalition's swift victory over Saddam Hussein was achieved by overwhelming technological superiority and Iraqi weakness and therefore that using Operation Iraqi Freedom as "evidence" for Rumsfeld's "transformation proposals could be a mistake." The Pentagon has refused to release this study.

"Intellectual terrorism" prevails throughout the defense establishment, a leading military strategist at one of the war colleges, who deals in calm, measured expertise of a rigorously nonpartisan nature, told me. Even the respected defense research institute the Rand Corporation is being cut out of the loop, denied contracts for studies because the "metrics" are at odds with Rumsfeld's projections.<snip>

http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2005/01/14/pentagon_suppression/index.html

[teryang]

1. This is not unexpected

In Vietnam the need for metrics to obscure our defeat created the infamous body counts. Unfortunately, that metric is far too discredited for our even our one dimensional media to resurrect.

What will the obscurantist ideologues do now to hide the truth? Well enough about that, time to check on the earnings reports from my defense contractor stocks.

[90-percent]

2. Rummy

I think he should get a presidential award or something for his excellent work thus far. He's lost far less Americans than the tsunami, so his concept of lean war is paying off.

When we pull out of Iraq and loose this war, be it 10,000 more US lives or 60,000 US lives, we WILL GET our 14 military bases and 100% control of the oil, won't we?

We're not just gonna pull out and leave all that oil there under somebody else's control, are we?

we are gonna get all those bases, no?

-85%

[teryang]

3. Sunk costs are no costs

The costs of the sacrificed are not entered on the corporate bottom line. The soldier and taxpayer foot the bill, the corporatists reap the spoils. You have accurately articulated their perspective.

Unfortuneately, the oil pipelines and infrastructure are still under attack and the markets to be despoiled are not readily accessible. Therefore, they will have to satisfy themselves gorging on the taxpayer while three soldiers pay with their lives every day. "Not tactically significant" as they say. The financial aspect really isn't working out though. There will come a point where domestic markets will collapse as a result of the miscalculations concerning the costs and markets.