Word: abizaid
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...military judgment that has raised questions. As Franks' second in command, some officers say, Abizaid shares the blame for the failure to plan for what would happen after the initial rush to Baghdad. But his more serious missteps, in the view of his critics, began when Abizaid took over from Franks in July 2003, two months after the infamous "end of major combat operations" speech by President George Bush. Among those mistakes: failing to keep enough troops in Iraq in the fall of 2003 to establish basic security; allowing the disbanding of the Iraq Army and de-Baathification; missing...
...Senior and mid-level officers - all of whom either fought in Iraq or were involved in operations there, and none of whom were willing to be identified by name - are beginning to assert privately that Abizaid and other top generals must inevitably share responsibility for the setbacks in Iraq. Many of those officers have lost men on the battlefield in Iraq and saw their requests for more troops go unheeded. Others worked in positions where they saw the planning for Iraq or the execution of the war go wrong. "Iraq will go down as the greatest military and strategic blunder...
...conducted the war. Gen. George Casey, who has been in command in Iraq for more than two years, has been the target of some of these complaints. But he came to Iraq when the situation had already degenerated into a complex insurgent fight. More criticism is being directed at Abizaid, who was a key military planner for the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the Pentagon before becoming Director of the Joint Staff, and then No. 2 at CENTCOM to Gen. Franks...
...paper, Abizaid was the right officer at the right moment. An Arab-American graduate of West Point, Abizaid studied in the Middle East, speaks some Arabic (though he is far from fluent) and commanded troops with distinction in Grenada and Gulf War I. Even today, many senior and retired officers speak of Abizaid with reverence; Sen. John Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has praised him as an "outstanding officer"; and not even his harshest critics question his commitment to service...
...Abizaid is also accused of mismanaging the campaign in Fallujah in April 2004. Following the gruesome killing of four contractors, he pressured the Marines - over their objections - to attack the town. Then he compounded the mistake, in the view of these officers, when, faced with complaints from the Iraqis and Arab media about high civilian casualties, he abruptly halted the attack, violating the usual practice of allowing commanders on the ground to control the tactical fight. Many analysts see it as a turning point that allowed the insurgency to expand and become more dangerous...