CLOSE, BUT NOT QUITE (via Kevin Whited):

What Rumsfeld's Critics Don't Get (Gregory Scoblete, 07 Dec 2006, Tech Central Station)

Many Iraq war supporters greeted the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld with a sigh of relief, if not a quiet cheer.

Neoconservatives like the Weekly Standard's Bill Kristol and war historian Frederick Kagan began clamoring for the secretary's scalp earlier than even most Democrats. They believe that Rumsfeld and his doctrine of military transformation, which sidelines manpower in favor of speed and precision, have all but destroyed their vision of a democratic Iraq and a Middle East transformed. Time.com blogger Andrew Sullivan has been a vociferous critic of the outgoing secretary, frequently accusing him of sending "just enough troops to lose."

For incoming Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, it's important that he not take the wrong lessons from Rumsfeld's ignominious departure. Iraq does not stand as a rebuke to Rumsfeld's transformative doctrine, or to the crucial political assumptions it makes about the proper use of American military power. Just the opposite. [...]

In the rush to heap opprobrium on an unpopular figure, it's important not to lose sight of the fact that on several fundamental issues of how America exercises its military power, Rumsfeld was right and his critics are wrong.

Rumsfeld's vision of transformation has always been far too parsimonious for neoconservatives, who championed an American Empire and waxed nostalgic for the British Colonial Office. To the military's traditional role of defeating and deterring conventional nation states, Rumsfeld labored to add the ability to quickly locate, target and destroy terrorist cells and facilities around the globe and to accomplish these tasks remotely, minimizing U.S. casualties. Such a vision demanded a lean, agile and networked force. It was not, however, the neocolonial occupation army demanded by his critics.

Rumsfeld was clearly the odd man out in an administration that jettisoned its realist sensibilities in the aftermath of 9/11 in favor of a more ambitious use of American power. His preference to turn Iraq over to the Iraqis quickly stood in stark contrast to the administration's professed aims of constructing a democracy in the heart of the Middle East. His desire for a rapid exit undoubtedly hastened Iraq's sectarian fragmentation, but such a fragmentation was inevitable. The U.S simply did not possess enough manpower to accomplish what Rumsfeld's critics wanted to in Iraq.

That's very nearly right, but it was never a question of whether we had sufficient troops to transform Iraq but why you would use such troops for the occupation of a liberated people who are predisposed to create a democracy. The troops we sent were an obstacle rather than a help. The Administration should have had more faith in the Shi'a and the Kurds.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 8, 2006 4:03 PM