Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

More top brass blasting Rumsfeld

Two more retired generals go on the record saying the defense secretary has bungled the war in Iraq and should resign.

By Wire services
Published April 14, 2006

WASHINGTON - A growing number of commanders who served under Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld say he has botched the Iraq operation and ignored the advice of his generals and should be replaced.

Maj. Gen. Charles H. Swannack Jr., who led troops on the ground in Iraq as recently as 2004 as commander of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division, on Thursday became the fifth retired senior general in recent days to call publicly for Rumsfeld's ouster.

He was joined by retired Army Major Gen. John Riggs, who told National Public Radio that Rumsfeld fostered an "atmosphere of arrogance."

The White House says Rumsfeld retains President Bush's confidence.

"The president believes Secretary Rumsfeld is doing a very fine job during a challenging period in our nation's history," Bush spokesman Scott McClellan said Thursday.

Military experts say the parade of recently retired military brass calling for Rumsfeld's resignation is troubling.

With public antiwar sentiment increasing, "the president and his team cannot afford to lose that support," said Kurt Campbell, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense.

Yet for Bush to try to distance himself from Rumsfeld "would call into question everything about the last three years' strategy in ways the White House worries would send a very negative message," said Campbell, now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Displays of public dissension are especially controversial while troops are at war and morale is a concern.

The officers said that challenges to civilian policy were not new - similar opposition flared during the Clinton administration, particularly around the issue of gays in the military. But many of the latest condemnations come from officers who served in the Iraq war, and the controversy has split the ranks over whether attacks by those officers so soon after retiring are appropriate.

Joining the criticism earlier this week was retired Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste, who served as an infantry division commander in Iraq until last November. He called for a "fresh start at the Pentagon," accusing Rumsfeld of ignoring sound military decisionmaking and seeking to intimidate those in uniform.

Earlier calls this year for Rumsfeld's replacement came from Marine Lt. Gen. Gregory S. Newbold, former director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Army Maj. Gen. Paul D. Eaton, head of training Iraqi forces in 2003; and Marine Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, the former head of U.S. Central Command.

Former Defense officials said Batiste's criticisms were particularly surprising because of his direct role in planning and fighting the war, first as former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz's military aide and then as commander of the 1st Infantry Division when it was deployed to oversee central Iraq in 2004.

"Batiste is really the younger generation who has seen this war firsthand," said Thomas E. White, the Bush administration's first secretary of the Army and a frequent Rumsfeld critic. "When a guy like that steps up, it takes it to an entirely different level."

Rumsfeld himself answered "no" when asked this week whether the march of retired generals was hurting his ability to do his job. "There's nothing wrong with people having opinions," he said.

Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has become Rumsfeld's strongest defender in uniform. "He does his homework. He works weekends, he works nights. People can question my judgment or his judgment, but they should never question the dedication, the patriotism and the work ethic of Secretary Rumsfeld," Pace said.

The most nettlesome member of Bush's Cabinet, Rumsfeld has been a lightning rod since the war began in March 2003.

He was blamed for committing too few U.S. troops and for underestimating the strength of the insurgency. He took heat in 2004 over the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at the U.S. Army-run Abu Ghraib prison, and for a brusque response he gave to an Army National Guard soldier in Kuwait who questioned him on inadequate armor.

Republicans in Congress have offered Rumsfeld little in the way of public support.

Pentagon spokesman Eric Ruff said Thursday that Rumsfeld has not talked to the White House about resigning and is not considering it.

As to the latest general to call for Rumsfeld's resignation, "I don't know how many generals there are. There are a couple thousand at least, and they're going to have opinions," Ruff said. "It's not surprising; we're in a war."

But it is surprising, especially because it's a time of war, said P.J. Crowley, a retired Air Force colonel who served as a Pentagon spokesman in both Republican and Democratic administrations and was a national security aide to former President Clinton.

"This is a very significant vote of no confidence and I think the president has to take this into account. The military is saying it does not trust its civilian leadership," said Crowley, now a senior fellow at the liberal Center for American Progress.

Criticism of political leaders by retired generals is nothing new. Historians note that former military leaders dating back to the American Revolution have written criticisms of the conduct of wars, and Rumsfeld dismissed many of the criticisms this week as just the latest in that tradition.

But Andrew J. Bacevich, a professor of international relations at Boston University and a Vietnam veteran, said he believed it was unprecedented for retired senior officers who had so recently served during a war to criticize civilian leaders while troops were still in the field.

"I would take this as evidence that the search for scapegoats with regard to the Iraq war has now been fully engaged by the military," Bacevich said.

"The officer corps doesn't want to get stuck with responsibility for a war that has already proven to be a disappointment and could result in failure."

Information from the Washington Post, Associated Press, New York Times and Los Angeles Times was used in this report.

[Last modified April 14, 2006, 01:58:12]