Friday, April 27, 2007

The missing debate

Former CIA director George Tenet says in a new book that there was never a debate within the Bush White House on the merits of going to war with Saddam Hussein. The White House counter claim is to say there was a debate, it's just that the director of the CIA was not in a position to be aware of it.

I don't know which is worse: that there was never any debate at all, or that the alleged debate went on without the head of the country's intelligence agency being aware of it.

The United States needs to fight terrorism. But military strategists from Sun Tsu on down have emphasized the importance of picking the field of battle that is most advantageous for your own side. Iraq is not the only option for our field of battle in this war.

Gen. David Patraeus, commander of U.S. ground forces in Iraq, has said that he will give us an assessment in September on whether he thinks the current "surge" strategy is working. Let's hope that he will give us an honest assessment, and he will not be tied to the notion that we must stay in Iraq for no other reason than the fact that we are already there.

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