Sy Hersch: >A key element of the drawdown plans, not mentioned in the President's public statements, is that the departing American troops will be replaced by American airpower. ...<
if there's anything that should be known about "airpower," it's that it can't be sufficient without ground troops. Adherence to the idea that it's enough (along with light, mobile, "special" forces) is one reason why the Iraq war has worked so poorly for the US. > "We're not planning to diminish the war," Patrick Clawson, the deputy director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told me. Clawson's views often mirror the thinking of the men and women around Vice-President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. ...< Pat Clawson may be the same guy who used to hang around URPE and was reportedly in the Progressive Labor Party. -- Jim Devine "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante.
