Rumsfeld takes the point

In military terms the point man is the guy that blazes the trail, ready to take on and engage the enemy first. In the George Bush cabinet it seems that Donald Rumsfeld is the “point guy”.

Rumsfeld the Secretary of Defence has been quite busy of late making public speeches and carrying the flag for the Administrations Iraq policy.

Whether it’s visiting with American families in Alaska or appearing in front of Legionnaires in Utah, Rumsfeld has been the loudest of proponents for staying the course in Iraq, a notion that is finding a less and less receptive audience along the home front.

So in order to try and revive support, the new approach seems to be to suggest an opinion other than that of the current holders of the White House is akin to appeasement.

Rumsfeld made that comparison in his speech to the brave men and women that fought in the Second World War, Korean War and other military engagements through the years, a group that probably don’t need an introductory course about serving their country.

The trouble with his analogy is that it puts the us against them mentality into a debate, one that surely could use a bit more research. Tying the war in Iraq into the war against terrorism is an approach that isn’t gaining much cache with many Americans at the moment, having been led down the reason for war path a few times already under different parameters. Suggesting that having a contrarion opinion to that of the Administration is appeasment is just plain dangerous.

Tracking down the terrorists of 9-11 in Afghanistan, that was a cause. America, with the smoke from the World Trade Centre in the air at the time could understand the reason to send troops to a far off place hardly anyone had heard of before. Tracking Osama Bin Laden and his gang of thugs was a task that America was up to and probably looked forward to completing, but somehow that task got sidetracked with the Iraq war.

The mixed messages from that involvement in Iraq seem to be another manner, a search for Weapons of Mass Destruction morphed into, democratizing the Middle East and fighting the terrorists in one place on their turf and not Americas, only problem is that while the wars in Iraq rages on, the terrorists continue to plot and come close to revisiting their successes.

Last month in England was yet another warning that it’s only through hard and dedicated police work that these acts can be stopped. So far, about the only positive thing from Iraq has been the removal of a despot who tortured his own people. After that the people there continue to suffer in a cauldron of violence that won’t be called a Civil War, but for all intents and purposes seems to be just that. They are as far from democracy today as they were when Saddam was toppled, perhaps further as the daily toll of violence spirals upwards and upwards.

Suggesting that your involvement is not necessarily helping things along, isn’t quite the thing of appeasement. It’s quite possibly a simple fact, the longer that American forces remain the longer apparently it seems the violence will continue.

True, they probably can’t cut and run now, but somehow they need to return the governing of Iraq back to those with a vested interest in their own well being. The sooner Iraqis are able to not only govern themselves, but police themselves the better it will all be for a people that have suffered far too much over the years.

The White House says that they hope that nobody tries to politicize the War, but yet do that very same politicizing on their own letterhead. By their words and deeds they make the War political, as all wars eventually become. With mid term elections coming up fast in November, it seems that the war rhetoric will heat up on all sides.

Already the Administration has launched a bit of damage control, with the Department of Defence suggesting that the Secretary's speech was mis-characterized by the media, perhaps indicative as to just how controversial his comments became.

Rumsfeld drawing comparisons from today to the Second World War might be a tad disingenuous, but it could come with a significant backlash effect. In fact the Guardian newspaper of England published papers that show that appeasement comes in many forms and in many families.

If the Guardian is to be taken at their word and research, the Bush family itself benefited greatly from relationships with the German government of the Nazi era, despite sending their children off eventually to fight that very same menace. By the way, they were not the only high profile American family to do so, as you'll discover upon reading the story. Possibly points not touched on in front of those vets by the Secretary of Defence.

We suspect that the comparisons to the Second World War will probably be scaled back, lest anyone wonder about certain Saudi families which may have had a business relationship with the latest generation of the Bush name and other high profile Americans.

Whatever the reason, the lines seem to be shaping up to be you’re either “with us, or agin us” again down in the USA. Something that in a country as ideologically split as it is, might be a rather dangerous political and social path to travel down.

These are troubled times for the USA and for the world for that matter, there truly are no doubt many enemies out there fueled by hatred, wishing to do harm.

As we said earlier, the point guy is the one ready to take on and engage the enemy first, a brave soldier doing his duty for his unit. The folks in the White House though should remember one thing foremost, their own citizens are not among their enemies.