Word: gen
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...surge of new troops to make a real difference, change has to come in Washington, not just in Baghdad, argues retired Gen. Tony Zinni. Like many other active duty and retired officers, Zinni has been disappointed in the failure of other government agencies like State, Justice and Energy to devote resources to the reconstruction effort. "Washington needs almost as much work as Iraq does," Zinni says. "First and foremost, it needs to establish a viable interagency structure. Doing more of the same - either in Iraq or Washington - won't work. There have never been enough troops, but if there...
...Marine Corps has openly questioned the wisdom of the move without an overarching strategy. "We would fully support, I think, as the Joint Chiefs, the idea of putting more troops into Iraq if there is a solid military reason for doing that, if there is something to be gained," Gen. James Conway, who became Commandant of the Marine Corps six weeks ago, said to reporters recently. "We do not believe that just adding numbers for the sake of adding numbers - just thickening the mix - is necessarily...
...military operation, the regiment is broken into squads, each commanded by a captain in radio contact with Gen. Treb. Under the captain, Treb says, "You will be instructed in how to fluff confetti," which isn't quite as salacious as it sounds. With a final invocation he sends us - mostly New Yorkers, but including recruits from California and Georgia - to our battle stations. We'd be there until after midnight, when we'd fulfilled our final mission: confetti accompli...
...even before a decision is made to expand or shrink the U.S. military presence in Iraq, Congress may face the politically touchy question this year of whether to increase the involuntary call-up of National Guard or Army Reserve troops for Iraq duty. Army Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Schoomaker has warned that his active force will break down if it isn't replenished with more Guard and Reserve soldiers. But members of Congress know that these part-time warriors, whose ranks have also been strained by Iraq deployments, are political powerful constituencies in their congressional districts...
...surge has been backed by a handful of neoconservatives in and out of the government, along with some retired generals, most of whom have been over to the West Wing in the last 10 days to talk about it. It surely helps the surge faction that CENTCOM boss Gen. John Abizaid, who had publicly opposed the idea, announced his retirement this week. And Colin Powell would not have broken a year's silence on Iraq just to oppose the surge last Sunday unless he was pretty convinced it was gaining steam...