BernieHund: The Political Watchdog

The Pentagon smells of political control and an increasing lack of care, concern, and competence to properly prosecute the War in Iraq.  It is time to bring our men and women home rather than continue to offer them up as sacrificial lambs to satisfy a few old mens’ needs for mental masturbation.

Please excuse my ignorance, but I seem to be missing something.  We, as a nation, are involved in two wars.  I don’t accept Donald Rumsfeld’s comment [paraphrased] that we don’t go to war with what we want but with what we have.  That still nauseates me.  Someone should have dumped his ass out in the middle of the desert without armor.  And, we could send General James Conway to keep him company.

But, I’m not quite understanding the politics of the military.  Why would General James Conway lie before a Congressional committee when those lies are costing the lives of the Marines he commands?  I just don’t get it.  Or, once again are we seeing another military officer of high rank (much like Army Surgeon General Eric Shoomaker) who does not possess sufficient reading and listening comprehension skills to operate effectively?  It seems more and more as if the Peter Principle is the only way to get promoted in the military. 

After General Conway’s testimony last month, Senator Edward Kennedy is calling him out.

The commandant of the Marine Corps “misrepresented” the Corps’ February 2005 request for armored vehicles to Congress and is unwilling to fix the way the Marines handle urgent pleas for new equipment, Sen. Edward Kennedy says in a letter to the commandant.

Gen. James Conway told the Senate Armed Services Committee last month that combat commanders didn’t ask for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles in February 2005 but for new armored Humvees. That, Kennedy wrote Conway, is contradicted by the request itself.

“This is a clear request for MRAPs, and not armored Humvees,” Kennedy writes. The Massachusetts Democrat and three other senators have criticized the Marines’ slow response to requests from troops.

Kennedy pointed out the blatant lie, not a misrepresentation as he so politely named it.

Kennedy, in his letter, states that MRAPs were noted 17 times in the 2005 urgent request while Humvees were not mentioned once.

Just another lie.  Or, to quote Eric Shoomaker, a “miscommunication”.

It’s time to bring our men and women home.  If we can’t support the military and keep them supplied with the necessities to prosecute the war, we need to bring them home.  And, maybe it’s time to prosecute some of those in Washington.  The treatment of our service men and women, either in theater or when they return home, is nothing short of criminal.