Rumsfeld Walks Away From His Web of War

Aw, shucks!

That was a touching farewell by Rummy at the Pentagon the other day. Who knew Mr. Old Europe was so sentimental?

In a town-hall setting, the outgoing defense secretary told staff that an Alaska woman gave him a bracelet last August, and he promised to wear it until troops in the Army's 172nd Stryker Brigade came home.

He failed to mention that the soldiers' yearlong tour was extended by four months because Rummy's intransigence and incompetence makes it harder for U.S. troops to leave Iraq.

He didn't admit that he had rejected repeated warnings about the Army being stretched thin and serious concerns about securing other global hot spots -- like North Korea and Iran.

Donald Rumsfeld's arrogant refusal to listen to generals about war plans as well as tuning out military lawyers about the Geneva Conventions helped tarnish the U.S. image globally, criminalized the war policy and pushed Iraq into civil war.

But at least he got his exit strategy. In November, the president gave him his pink slip. Our troops still don't know when they can walk off the job. You think Bob Gates likes bracelets?

Rummy's gone and on Monday, Gates steps in. Maybe Rummy will write a best seller about six years with Bush II. Or write his memoir about life as a career defense secretary, starting in 1975. Don't count on a McNamara mea culpa. Rummy's too deep in the tunnel to see the parallels to the mistakes made in Vietnam.

Rummy will be home for Christmas. Not so for most of our troops, subjected to multiple tours.

On Rummy's watch, Iraq devolved into as dangerous a place as when troops went to oust Saddam Hussein and nation-build under the WMD hoax. Tens of thousands of Americans have been killed and injured as well as countless Iraqi civilians. Iraq is in civil war, and Rummy's miscalculation is greatly to blame.

If Rummy really supported the troops, he would have made sure they had the necessary body and vehicular armor.

He would have made certain that the Pentagon more carefully audited U.S.

defense contractors, especially Halliburton, whose no-bid contracts were in excess of $10 billion with no incentives to deliver goods and services to aid our troops.

Supporting the troops is not the same as supporting the war. Despite his heartwarming visits to Walter Reed hospital, Rummy supported the war. He protected two institutions -- the presidency and the Pentagon -- at the expense of our troops.

At Rummy's town-hall chat, someone asked him to name his worst work day. "Clearly, the worst day was Abu Ghraib, seeing what went on there and feeling so deeply sorry that that happened," he replied.

When the president makes such a statement, it's called plausible deniability. When Rumsfeld does, it's called implausible deniability. Looks like someone needs a good thumping.

Here's one from journalist Seymour Hersh, who in the May 24, 2004 issue of The New Yorker magazine, wrote of high-level, secret Pentagon plans to "Gitmoize" Iraq.

He wrote, "The roots of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal lie not in the criminal inclinations of a few Army reservists but in a decision, approved last year by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to expand a highly secret operation which had been focused on the hunt for al-Qaida, to the interrogation of prisoners in Iraq."

Back then, Sen. Carl Levin asked at an Armed Services Committee hearing, "How far up the chain of command was there implicit or explicit direction or approval or knowledge of this prisoner abuse?" A good question that remains unanswered.

Rummy heads out the door with a long and bloody paper trail stuck to his Florsheims. Not his idea of a restful retirement? Aw, shucks!

Rhonda Chriss Lokeman (lokeman@kcstar.com) is a columnist for the Kansas City Star. To find out more about Rhonda Chriss Lokeman, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.
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