Iraq War: Winning all the time

"I think we are winning.  Okay?  I think we're definitely winning.  I think we've been winning for some time." - Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the Iraq War 04/26/05

"I just wonder if they will ever tell us the truth." - Harold Casey, Louisville, KY, October 2004.

Isn't there an old saying about people who remember everything but have learned nothing?

Rummy and his generals may be classic examples: Lawmakers Take Shots at Pentagon by Mark Mazzetti Los Angeles Times 06/24/05.

The men directing the war in Iraq told testy and nervous congressional panels Thursday that the sophisticated insurgency had not declined in strength but asserted that U.S. troops were making steady progress and victory was certain.

Is it too early to ask, still winning after all these years?  Remember, it's commonplace for military officers reflecting on the Vietnam War to claim that the US won militarily.  So these declarations of sure victory, ongoing victory, unending victory need to understood in that light.

At least somebody finally told Rummy to wipe the sneer off his face:

Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) told Rumsfeld to "get off your high horse" and stop answering questions "with a sneer."

"The problem is, we didn't ask enough questions at the beginning of this war that we got into, Mr. Bush's war," Byrd said. "The press didn't ask enough questions. The Senate didn't ask enough questions…. That was wrong."

That's the verbal equivalent of a bitch slap.  And Rummy deserves it.

Senator Lieberman, always an obtuse supporter of the war, fretted aloud that the public was "tipping away" from supporting the war.  Gee, Joe, what was your first clue?  The 60% or so of the public that says they oppose the war?

This appearance by Rummy and the generals, and Karl Rove's Nixon-on-OxyContin, Democrats-are-the-terrorists line that he rolled out Wednesday, are part of a build-up to Bush's love-the-Iraq-War plea this coming Tuesday:

The appearance by Rumsfeld and three top generals, who at times made their cases with color charts on giant poster boards, marked the opening of a six-day push by the Bush administration to shore up confidence in its strategy in Iraq. President Bush plays host to Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari today and plans a major address Tuesday. Other administration officials are also expected to weigh in on the issue in coming days.

Salvaging public support on Iraq has grown in importance for the administration as it encounters mounting opposition on other fronts, including Bush's chief domestic priority of overhauling Social Security and the nomination of John R. Bolton to be ambassador to the United Nations.

And why has public support "tipped away" from the Iraq War?  Here's one big reason (my emphasis):

The three military commanders — Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, who is chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Army Gen. John P. Abizaid, head of the U.S. Central Command; and Army Gen. George W. Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq — described an Iraqi insurgency that had not weakened despite two years of intense counterinsurgency operations.

Abizaid said more foreign fighters were streaming through Iraq's porous borders than six months ago but that the overall strength of the insurgency had not changed in that time.

It was a more sober assessment than Abizaid gave Congress in March, when he said the insurgency was fizzling, citing as evidence the insurgents' failure to disrupt the January election.

After two years of swaggering assurances that we're winning big time ... the insurgency has not weakened?  Actually, "has not weakened" is a euphemism for getting stronger all the time, it seems.  But, of course, a liar like Abizaid can't be expected to say that out loud.

But the generals with the most powerful army in the world, with half the military budget of the entire world but who can't defeat this insurgency - or even diminish it - are ready with their own version of Rove's war-critics-are-to-blame-for-all-the-problems position:

Yet the military commanders also voiced concern that Iraqi insurgents would be emboldened, and U.S. troops would lose heart, if officials in Washington lost their resolve in the face of declining public support.

Although U.S. troop morale in Iraq remains high, Abizaid said, he expressed worries about the mood in Washington.

"When I look back here, at what I see is happening in Washington, within the Beltway, I've never seen the lack of confidence greater," he said.

Gosh, general, do you think that "lack of confidence" might have something to do with the fact that you and your colleagues can't seem to open your mouths about the Iraq War in public without lying in our faces?