Miscalculate This

I hope you had a chance to read the LTG Petraeus article yesterday, because a key part of his plan kicked off in Samarra yesterday just before dawn. It was a big step towards making Iraq safer for the elections. Early news reports indicate 17 enemy killed with no coalition killed. My sources indicate they're right about the coalition forces, but I'm tracking well over 100 enemy killed in Samarra thus far. This is a staggering figure, because it's approaching the actual number of insurgents believed to be in Samarra. Either our estimates were off, or it's turning out to be one heckuva last stand over there. The people of Samarra have been asking us to "clean out" the insurgents since early September. We waited as the Iraqi government attempted diplomacy (hey- insurgents have needs too), and the talks fell apart on the 23rd. Now we're turning Samarra into a "go zone" which will be effectively patrolled and protected by Petraeus' new Iraqi Sooper Troopers. If this sounds familiar, it's because something very similar happened recently in Najaf. There was a little more diplomacy in the Najaf situation, because of the "Mosque sensitivity" issues, but the result was very telling- dozens of insurgents killed, few American casualties, and a successful transfer of authority to the new Iraqi Security Forces. Since that time, Najaf has been flooded with reconstruction money and the people have never been happier. The coalition approval rating in Najaf has nearly doubled since the end of that standoff. The people of Samarra said "I'll have what they're having" and so it goes. I hope you're starting to notice a pattern here, because it's not an accident.

Today I'd like to address the issue of President Bush's "miscalculation." First off, I think it was nice of him to take the heat for us, but the obvious truth is that George Bush miscalculated nothing. Here's a couple secrets I'd like to reveal:

1) George W. Bush didn't learn anything about strategic war planning as a lieutenant in the Texas ANG. He didn't learn about war planning while serving as the Governor of Texas either.

2) Bill Clinton didn't learn anything about war planning as a young student in search of a secret method for smoking pot without inhaling. He didn't learn about war planning while serving as the Governor of Arkansas either.

When we bombed the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, Clinton called China and said "I'm sorry." Clinton had nothing to do with that bomb going astray, but as a leader, he took responsibility and did what we expect a leader to do. Bush did the same when he said that he "miscalculated" the transition from combat operations to stability operations in Iraq. The fact is, we had the most experienced military and diplomatic strategists in the world working on the strategy, and it just so happens that some of their assumptions were wrong. If you want to know the real story about the miscalculations, you won't get a more honest assessment than this one by LTG Wallace. LTG William Wallace was the V Corps Commander, and therefore, the Army Forces Commander in Iraq when the war kicked off. I arrived in Kuwait on February 28th '03 with the 101st Division Advance Party and I was surprised when LTG Wallace welcomed us off the plane. He shook our hands and said he wanted to personally welcome the 101st and thank us for coming. I'll never forget what he said to us that day:

"I know you've been hearing different things on the news, but I'm telling you it's not a matter of if this war's gonna happen, it's a matter of when it's gonna happen. It's gonna be tough, it's gonna take courage and sacrifice, and if we thought it was gonna be easy, we wouldn't have asked for the 101st."