Froomkin: Petraeus should watch his back; it's already marked for Bush's knife

[BurtWorm]

Bush has a tendency to chat up the importance of his generals, to keep their backs nice and soft for his blades when the going gets rough.



http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/07/16/BL2007071600891_pf.html

...

And when virtually all of Bush military line of command, including the entire Joint Chiefs of Staff, opposed his "surge" proposal late last year, Bush responded not by listening, but by removing the top two commanders responsible for Iraq and replacing them with more amenable leaders, including Army Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus.

Petraeus, as it happens, wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post just five weeks before the 2004 election describing what he called "reasons for optimism" in Iraq. Now Petraeus is Bush's "main man." Maybe he should be watching his back.

Thomas E. Ricks writes in Sunday's Washington Post: "Almost every time President Bush has defended his new strategy in Iraq this year, he has invoked the name of the top commander, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus.

"Speaking in Cleveland on Tuesday, Bush called Petraeus his 'main man' -- a 'smart, capable man who gives me his candid advice.' And on Thursday, as the president sought to stave off a revolt among congressional Republicans, he said he wanted 'to wait to see what David has to say. I trust David Petraeus, his judgment.'"

Yet Ricks continues: "Some of Petraeus's military comrades worry that the general is being set up by the Bush administration as a scapegoat if conditions in Iraq fail to improve," he writes. "'The danger is that Petraeus will now be painted as failing to live up to expectations and become the fall guy for the administration,' one retired four-star officer said. . . ."


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[SpiralHawk]

1. "Smirk, smirk, smirk" - Commander AWOL

"We learned lots of 'special' things in my beloved occult cabal. Smirk, smirk, smirk. Just ask my grandpoppy, Prescott Skull & Boner Bush, who served and profited as banker to Hitler and the Nazis. Smirk, smirk, smirk. Our corporate toady media will never tell the American public this proven fact, because we Skull & Boners own their supplicant and compliant asses. Smirk, smirk, smirk.

"Why do the so-called Christian republicons worship me, scion of an occult cabal? Smirk, smirk, smirk. Do you suppose Jesus would join Skull & Bones? You better ask my intimate pal, Pope Ratzinger. Smirk, smirk, smirk."

- Commander AWOL

[ClintonTyree]

2. File this story under, DUH!

Bush has never taken responsibility for anything in his life. OF COURSE Betrayus is going to be the sacrificial goat for Bush's ineptness. Betrayus should have known that as soon as Bush gave him the tap. If he didn't the man isn't smart enough to pour piss out of a boot with the directions written on the heel.

Now, what are the odds that Betrayus gives anything but a positively GLOWING report of Iraqi progress in September? Anyone? Anyone?

Anyone not smart enough to stay out from beneath Bush's boot heels is a little loopy in my book.

Betrayus is a lock for the Medal of Freedom though. I think just about everyone in the Bush administration has one by now. How they've cheapened THAT award! :eyes:

[BurtWorm]

3. kick

[jmowreader]

4. I had Petraeus pegged as a member of the living dead from the start of his command

Bush has thrown just SO many generals under the wheels of his bus. It's unbelievable that any general--ESPECIALLY one as smart as Petraeus is reputed to be--would accept anything from Bush.

There is a very outside chance that, if Petraeus was promoted to theater commander right after his tour in the 101st and allowed basically free reign over there, what he wanted to do would have worked. It was working in Mosul!

Right now there's no way. The bad guys have gotten way too bad for anything we try to work.

Here's what's going to happen: in September, two months from now, General Petraeus will have to submit his report. If he's got any shred of decency left, he'll have to admit what he's doing isn't working. At that point, General Petraeus will be thrown under the bus with the rest of them.

By the time this shit's over, Multinational Forces-Iraq will be an O-4/O-5 command. No general will take the job, no colonel will want it, so Bush will have 150,000 troops under the leadership of an Infantry battalion operations officer.