Office of the Independent Blogger

Bush has assigned his new Defense Secretary the task of expanding the military’s size. Naturally, I have a few thoughts about it to be shared after the block.

“I’m inclined to believe that we do need to increase our troops — the Army, the Marines,” Bush said in the Oval Office session. “And I talked about this to Secretary Gates and he is going to spend some time talking to the folks in the building, come back with a recommendation to me about how to proceed forward on this idea.”

The president’s decision comes at a time when he is rethinking his strategy in Iraq and considering, among other options, a short-term surge in troop levels to try to secure violence-torn Baghdad. The Joint Chiefs of Staff are resisting the idea during internal debates in part out of the conviction that it will further strain already-pressed forces.

A substantial military expansion will take years and would not be meaningful in the near term in Iraq. But it would begin to address the growing alarm among commanders about the state of the armed forces. Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army’s chief of staff, warned Congress last week that the active-duty Army “will break” under the strain of today’s war-zone rotations. Former secretary of state Colin L. Powell, a retired chairman of the Joint Chiefs, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday that “the active Army is about broken.”

The Army has already temporarily increased its size from 482,000 active-duty soldiers in 2001 to 507,000 today and soon to 512,000. But the Army wants to make that 30,000-soldier increase permanent and then grow an additional 7,000 soldiers or more per year. The Army estimates that every 10,000 additional soldiers will cost about $1.2 billion a year.

The incoming chairman of the House Armed Services Committee spoke out forcefully today for increasing the size of the Army and Marines, noting that their leaders describe the services as “stretched and strained.” “We’re going to have to pay attention to this,” Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) told reporters. Saying the two services are “bleeding,” he added, “I think we have to apply the tourniquet and strengthen the forces. I think that will be a major part of our work.”

In describing his decision today, Bush tied it to the broader struggle against Islamic extremists around the world rather than Iraq specifically. “It is an accurate reflection that this ideological war we’re in is going to last for a while and that we’re going to need a military that’s capable of being able to sustain our efforts and to help us achieve peace,” he said.

Must be a hard day to be Donald Rumsfeld. His replacement replaces him and Bush immediately asks him to kill Rumsfeld’s only “accomplishment” and concern (as far as I can tell): “military transformation.” In other words, the smallening of the military — gone, as a goal and reality, as it should be — but like this? Dismantling his pride and joy isn’t the way to honor “the greatest Defense Secretary,” Mr. President — but he knows that. Somewhere in his head, he understands that his Defense Secretary and he have horribly mismanaged the task of governing. The thing that I’m curious about is, “Why hasn’t he figured out that, hey, the active military needs more soldiers” before this week? That’s why he’s already in the bottom five of Worst President Ever. Also: his insane secrecy and dishonesty.

He’s a stupid Richard Nixon. Which is a shame…as Nixon’s only redeeming trait was his brilliance.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 19th, 2006 at 8:55 pm and is filed under Outside Retort (Current Affairs).