[Note] I lifted much of this diary from a piece I did earlier. Since the story received so little attention, and since I believe the information is so valuable, I've decided to reuse it to make a separate point about how the right-wing propaganda apparatus works.
David Brock has covered at length how the right wing uses its vast think tank network to rationalize regressive and/or failed policies. These "experts" provide a wide array of functions for them, all of which are specifically geared toward providing intellectually disingenuous cover for weak policy goals.
Today they have provided us with a classic example of this. They intend to use one of the members of these think tanks in a desparate attempt to maintain Donald Rumsfeld's political viability.
The Times is reporting that
Rumsfeld is sending over a former four star General to Iraq to examine our Iraq Policy.
The Pentagon is sending a retired four-star Army general to Iraq next week to conduct an unusual "open-ended" review of the military's entire Iraq policy, including troop levels, training programs for Iraqi security forces and the strategy for fighting the insurgency, senior Defense Department officials said Thursday.
The extraordinary leeway given to the highly regarded officer, Gen. Gary E. Luck, a former head of American forces in South Korea and currently a senior adviser to the military's Joint Forces Command, underscores the deep concern by senior Pentagon officials and top American commanders over the direction that the operation in Iraq is taking, and its broad ramifications for the military, said some members of Congress and military analysts...
At a meeting Thursday with his top military and civilian aides, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld instructed that General Luck look at all areas of the operation, identify any weaknesses and report back in a few weeks with a confidential assessment, senior defense officials said.
"He will have a very wide canvas to draw on," said Lawrence Di Rita, the Pentagon spokesman. Mr. Di Rita emphasized that Mr. Rumsfeld was very satisfied with his commanders in Iraq, but wanted to give them all the help they needed in assessing "the very dynamic situation."
So the question, I guess, would be how likely is this gentleman to be highly critical the Iraq operation and to truly question the essential assumptions of the situation? Is this evaluation more likely to shift the conventional wisdom within the Pentagon or is simply going to tweak the operation a bit, but still confirm the basic assumptions of the War, which have long since been discredited by everyone but the more abject followers of the Republican foreign policy party line.
Well, as it turns out, that is exactly who Gary E. Luck would be.
Luck was the commander of the XVIII Airborne Corps during the first Gulf War. After the War, he was placed in command of U.S. forces in Korea through the 1994 Nuclear crisis. Luck would argue during the crisis that the US could win a easy victory in any military engagement with North Korea, claiming successful completion would take no more than 90 days.
After he left the service he became influential in military circles as a kind of mentor to higher Echelon military commanders, and has written several books. Based on the books' concepts and intellectual approach, Luck seems to mirror Rumsfeld's interest in more abstract military theory.
He is also affiliated with the Center for Security Policy, a defense policy think tank which seems to be little else than a propaganda arm for the Bush administration's foreign policy objectives. Aside from the their front page today, which had a write up defending Alberto Gonzales as the man who refused to allow America to "enter a treaty with Al Queda", on the website, I also found a links page to some of the most oblivious defenders of the Iraq war in the country including several defending Rumsfeld against recent criticism, senate testimony rejecting legislation requiring the military to be environmentally responsible, and a position paper done by a member which may be the stupidest, most sophist attempt at linking the Iraq War with the War on Terror I've yet read (the hook: its the Civil War, Baby).
And now for the coup de grace. Luck was the individual who invented the concept of "Shock and Awe".
In a 1994 book entitled "Inducing Operational Shock to Achieve Quick Decisive Victory", Luck argued that because America was to be required to fight high intensity military engagements more often, it is necessary that new tactics be developed which can bring about quicker more decisive military victories. In the abstract he writes:
This paper explores the capacity of an airborne division to inflict operational shock in mid to high-intensity conflict as part of a Joint Task force (JTF). The United States faces a multi-faceted and complex security environment in its new role as a dominant world leader. As the U.S. enters the new millennium, it experiences a rapid increase in the frequency and demand to exercise military force in pursuit of vital national interests. The Army intends to maintain a small technologically elite force that can attain quick decisive victory at minimal cost to lives and national resources in order to maintain a viable and flexible response for emerging contingencies. To implement the current National Security Strategy (NSS) and National Military Strategy (NMS) U. S. forces must maximize efficiency in resolving conflict due to the shrinking size of the force and the growing instability in the international security environment. Operational shock is a temporary or permanent condition that neutralizes the enemy's ability to achieve his aim. Inflicting shock at the operational level can allow U.S., coalition, or multinational forces to increase material and/or positional advantages that lead to operational and strategic end states. Inducing operational shock against a hostile military force is a product of bringing force to bear on the opponent's entire structure. The condition creates paralysis and the ensuing disintegration that can lead to quick decisive victory. Operational shock is induced through the application of force and activity throughout the depth, width, and breadth of the battlespace, to neutralize the opposition's ability to function coherently or to achieve its aim. The airborne division is a critical component of the shock theory and enhances the JTF's capacity to inflict this operational condition in a contiguous or noncontiguous framework. The airborne division has unlimited reach, responsiveness and flexibility.
This is an unfortunate choice.
Because of his obvious predisposition to towards Rumsfeld's strategic choices, and because he has based his intellectual reputation on operations that prescribe approaches similar to those taken in the Iraq War, any conclusions Luck draws about the current state of affairs in Iraq are likely not to ask the kind of sweeping questions necessary to bring about success after such a catagoric debacle as that we are witnessing today in Iraq.
It appears the mission Luck is undertaking is little more than yet another attempt by the Bush administration to generate support for their failed policies, instead of attempting to correct their mistakes--mistakes they appear still determined to justify.
The only conceivable explanations for the selection of Luck to conduct this review would have to be that either this is yet another conservative expert called in to provide intellectually dishonest support for the Bush administration's policies, or that, in opposition of every fact on the ground and all common sense, Rumsfeld is still so certain that he is right, he sees no reason to seek the advise of an individual who could give constructive criticism of the basic philosophical blunders that have led to the current situation in Iraq. In either case, there is ample evidence to suggest this is the wrong approach.
However, if your objective isn't necessarily succeeding as expeditiously as possible in the mission, but, rather, proving to the world that you are right, it makes all the sense in the world.
MoralQuestionsBlog.com