JCS Chairman Gen. Pace not to be reapponted.

This just in.

The operation of the war in Iraq/Afghanistan is under the command of a Navy admiral. Now a Navy Admiral will be the military services’ advisor to the president, except for the so called “Iraq war czar” whose exact status is still in the formative stage.

Is this a good idea? What do you suppose will be the effect on the Army and Marine Corps which are the branches with all the people doing the actual fighting?

Oh wow, on face that sounds like the dumbest idea ever. The Navy is already way out of touch with the reality of modern warfare. We are deficient in fighting insurgents due to lack of intelligence, and we’ve been using naval weapons to use a sledghammer where a scalpel would be more effective.

What I wonder is how much this was influenced by the decision of Gen. Pace to submit a letter of support of Scooter Libby for his sentencing. I personally thought that for a serving officer to do so was highly improper. I imagine that he would have gotten some highly pointed questions on that issue in his confirmation hearing.

As to the appointment of an admiral, rather than an army, air force or Marine officer, I doubt it is particularly significant. There is a tradition of rotating the office among the services, and it has been a long time since there has been a navy man in the post. These days, with joint service being so significant and the chairman not being not in direct operational command (the theater commanders like CENTCOM are), it shouldn’t matter much.

Pentagon Briefing Video June 08, 2007

Over and over again, Gates says we need to avoid looking backward. That would cause a “divisive ordeal.” Still, he also says that support for the Iraq war remains high in the senate.
Gates claims Mullen’s major concern is the state of the Army.

I haven’t seen much of Gates on video, but he seemed quite subdued today.

There aren’t enough :rolleyes: .

He might have something there. The administration is quite capable of causing divisive ordeals without outside help.

Gates now has a team of his choosing in place. Maybe that’s the real reason Pates is leaving. That was a suggestion on one of the news telecasts tonight.

Good riddance to an appalling homophobe.

So does the War Czar jerk the JCS’s chain of comman, or vice versa?

This Administration is full of manly men who can stand up to anything except a few questions about what they’ve been doing on our dime.

Everything is under control, except for the Democat congress. According to CNN Headline News (not web cite), when asked about Pace Bush said that he wasn’t renamed because of the “poisonous atmosphere” in the Democratic controlled congress.

Why would this Congress be any readier to confirm Mullen than to reconfirm Pace?

Peter Pace’s Political Gaming on Libby and Gays Ends His Reign

Then there’s the whole issue of Pace being a spineless lacky of Don Rumsfeld.
Mullen has none of these problems.

Depends on what you’re rolling your eyes at. I think the likely explanation here is that Gates wants to sack the guy and put his own man in, and this was his way of allowing the General to save face. I doubt very seriously that he’s afraid of a Senate confirmation hearing.

At the idea that “we need to avoid looking backward.” How else can we learn from our mistakes?

Yeah but in a “poisonous atmosphere” does it make any difference who Bush puts up?

According to the report in the Los Angeles Times Mullin is expected to be confirmed easily. If he is do you think GW will retract is slur about the “Democrat poisonous atmosphere?”

And what do you mean spineless lackey? Isn’t he the leader of the few and the proud?

That’s just an impression I’ve gathered from the many joint news conferences the two have done. Pace always seemed subservient to me. I suppose a collection of cites could be gathered to cast the General as an independent go-getter, but that’s not the impression I’ve gotten of the man. I doubt that I’m alone in that.

The ‘poisonous atmosphere’ won’t be quite so hard on Mullen, because critics of the way the invasion’s been run will have fewer concrete examples of things Mullen’s screwed up.

Read my sentence following the above quoted one.

My impression of his comment was that no matter what he does it’s wrong, poor guy.

Pace says he was fired:

Kathleen Parker, who I used to like until she went all Dennis Miller after 9/11, says it is all the Clinton’s fault (imagine that).

Article here.

Harry Reid agrees that Pace came up short in giving GW the best military advice. And I also agree. My question about how could he be a spineless lackey was based on his being a Marine and Marines are never spineless lackeys, are they?

Pace either thought that adding 20something thousand troops would make a difference or he didn’t want to contradict the Decider. I think for that alone he failed. It seems to me that all of the high military officers should have told GW in plain English that unless the Iraqi government somehow brought the different factions together the addition of troops was nothing but adding targets. They may have done that but if they did, they caved, saluted and said “Yes, Sir.” when the decision went against them.

While the politicians and generals dither and hem and haw and wait for September, people are dying and nobody in our government seems to take that seriously.