5 Comments:

• I listened to it. He was surprisingly frank. I also appreciated his perspective in comparing things now with the desperation/fear of the late 60s-early 70s. I sometimes wonder why people aren't as active or concerned now as they were then, but I think he gives the answer. Despite the crap going on, things aren't as scary or uncertain as they were then.
  
  My biggest disappointment with Powell is that he seemed to think it was more important to be the good soldier and do the "right thing" by the president, rather than the "right thing" by the American (and Iraqi) people. He admits that his quitting wouldn't have stopped Iraq from happening. Not a fair comparison, but any of the Nazi leadership could have made the same claim. It's still wrong to participate.

  By  Greg, at 7/15/2007 9:23 PM  

• Yes.
  
  I had always perceived (though as you said it is no excuse) that he did what he did because of his vow to the office against his own better judgment. That is why I lost so much respect for him.
  
  But I think that he has so real a perspective on things when it comes to Foreign policy.
  
  I think that his comments on the status of things in Iraq make me reassess my view (which I expressed a few posts ago) of the next least-worst moves. A bloody shame this whole thing.

  By  Ian, at 7/15/2007 11:37 PM  

• So, what is your view? In the old post, if I understood it, you said that if we want to be in it to win it we need to sacrifice, even have a draft, and really send in a ton of troops. I wasn't sure if you meant that's what we should actually do, or just that we were never in it to win and we were never asked to be in it to win.
  
  Do you think the least-worst move is to pull out, let the civil war take its course and hope for a moderate Shiite regime that will give a role to the Sunnis/Kurds so they will actually all feel invested?
  
  I think that's where I'm at. Yeah we broke it, but frankly we can't fix it. Sorry Pottery Barn... We ARE the bull in the china shop, and nobody will be able to fix anything while we're there breaking things--or giving others an excuse to break things and blame it on the bull.

  By  Greg, at 7/16/2007 9:18 AM  

• My very long comment was just eaten by blogger!
  
  A summary:
  -Was thinking:
  .that a really big show of American forces helping build infrastructure and general do-gooding instead of fighting was important.
  .peacekeeping instead of occupying in order to win propaganda war
  
  -Am thinking:
  .Not sure, but worried that leaving the dust to settle will just make us even more shameful at what remains than we are right now.

  By  Ian, at 7/16/2007 11:14 PM  

• I would really like for us to be able to do that--demostrate that we can fix things, but I worry that we lost that chance and we can no longer directly do anything to fix it, since with us being there, it will just incite more violence.
  
  The big mistakes that have made it impossible to fix things--
  1) Starting the war in the first place
  2) Going in with too few troops to patrol and stop looting after Baghdad fell
  3) Disbanding the Iraqi army and de-Baathification--essentially put 1/2 million guys with guns and everyone with technical expertise out of a job, and unable to be hired.
  
  I think #3 was the fatal flaw.
  Of course this isn't my genius brain that came up with this.
  
  See: http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/316/index.html

  By  Greg, at 7/17/2007 11:02 PM  

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