Gates Criticizes DoD Iraq War Planning

[unhappycamper]

Gates Criticizes DoD Iraq War Planning
May 16, 2008
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon's slow response to wartime challenges such as protecting troops against roadside bombs stemmed in part from a mistaken belief within the defense establishment that the Iraq and Afghanistan wars would be short, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said.

In remarks prepared for delivery to the Business Executives for National Security May 15, Gates cited three areas in which he has pushed for speedier solutions to battlefield issues: a need for more pilotless drones for surveillance, more bomb-resistant vehicles to protect troops and improved treatment of the wounded.

"We must put our defense bureaucracies on a war footing with a wartime sense of urgency," Gates said, according to a text of his prepared remarks provided by the Pentagon. He was delivering the speech at a ceremony in which he was receiving the business group's Eisenhower Award for his wartime leadership.

Gates became the Pentagon chief in December 2006, succeeding Donald H. Rumsfeld. The Afghanistan war began in October 2001 and the U.S. initially invaded Iraq in March 2003. Gates said that the outcome of each conflict is "far from foretold" and that each will persist "for a long time to come."

In his speech, Gates made no direct mention of Rumsfeld or others who held leadership positions in the early stages of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. But he made clear his view that the defense establishment has been too focused on the future, at the expense of more immediate solutions.


Rest of article at: http://www.military.com/news/article/gates-criticizes-dod-iraq-war-planning.html



uhc comment: Four fucking years after the invasion of Iraq and now you decide "We must put our defense bureaucracies on a war footing with a wartime sense of urgency"??????