Rumsfeld was focused on one kind of war, got another

[NVMojo]

WASHINGTON — If only he could show us the memo.

"It's still classified, I suppose?" says Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, looking toward his assistant during a recent interview in his office.

He's interested in sharing the memo because the memo, as he outlines it, demonstrates that his critics are utterly mistaken: He did not dash heedless and underprepared into Iraq. Rumsfeld foresaw the things that could go wrong — and wrote them up in a classically Rumsfeldian list, one brisk bullet point after another, 29 potential pitfalls in all. Then he distributed the memo at the highest levels.

"It would have been probably October of '02, and the war was March, I think," of the following year, Rumsfeld explains. "I sat down, and I said, 'What are all the things that one has to anticipate could be a problem?' And circulated it and read it to the president — sent it to the president. Gave it to the people in the department, and they planned against those things."

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http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2002622498_rumsfeld14.html

[Lerkfish]

1. bizarre. who's rewriting history now?

[indepat]

2. Fixed all of the only 29 things which could go wrong

[jimshoes]

3. We'll subpoena it

at the war crimes trial OK Don. I know you want every one to know it wasn't your plan that dragged us into an unmitigated quagmire.

[pushycat]

4. He sat down all by himself and figured it all out, did he? He has

available every resource in the various US militaries, think tanks, war colleges, etc. at his command and he just blew past using any of them. That dumb President didn't question 1 thing Rumsfeld imagined all by himself, either.

what a stupid, stupid, damn dangerous way to run a country