Since this is the Pit, let me just say that the time-out on this board sucks ass.
It’s easy to have the knee-jerk reaction of vilifying Giuliani for “blaming the troops”.
But there’s nothing in the laws of physics that prevents troops from screwing up in the field.
Troops can and do make mistakes, as do presidents.
Left_Hand has most accurately pointed out Rudie’s error.
Bush was not, in fact, “cautious”. He did not, in fact, “do what a commander in chief should do”. Specifically, he did not listen to his most qualified advisor, one who had the most experience in peacekeeping (in Bosnia) – General Erik Shinseki.
In fact, after Shinseki gave Congress his honest estimate that 400k troops would be required to win the war and keep the peace in Iraq, Bush had Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz – civilians with no military experience – publicly discredit the general and repeat the administration’s figure of less than 100k troops.
We now know, after bitter experience, that Shinseki was of course right. We now have about double the Bush administration’s original figure of 75k in Iraq, and it’s still inadequate.
(Lest I be attacked, I do know that Kerry is lying when he claims that Bush had Shinseki fired. His retirement had already been planned and announced before all this. I would also say that Kerry was wrong in his stance on the first Iraq war. And it is also true that Bush has been blamed for things that are in no way his responsibility, e.g. Kerry claiming that the flu vaccine shortage is somehow Bush’s fault.)
Face it… we traded a lying, draft-ducking ex-dope-smoker for a lying, draft-ducking ex-alcoholic, and in the bargain we got the chicken hawks, the basest sort of men, who are unwilling to face combat themselves but are eager to send others to die.