Retirement doesn’t discredit generals
Usually Alex Hoffman’s cartoons merit no more than a grin
and a shake of the head on my part. But his April 19 cartoon upset
me way beyond the simple grin.
The cartoon compared a general in the battlefield with a retired
general sitting back in a recliner holding a sign calling for the
resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. The caption
asked, “Who would you consult?”
Clearly Hoffman was following the Fox News argument:
discrediting the retired generals and instead shifting the
attention to the silence of the active generals.
The problem with this tactic is that it overlooks both the
immense credibility of the six generals criticizing Rumsfeld and
the reason why no active generals have spoken out against him.
Many of the retired generals criticizing Rumsfeld worked
directly with the troops in the war in Iraq. The rest worked with
the Bush administration or other recent administrations.
As for active-duty generals, some have received flak for
pointing out flaws in the overall Iraq strategy, like
underestimating what has become the biggest problem in the war: the
insurgency.
When Army field commander Lt. Gen. William S. Wallace, not one
of the six, started talking about this threat in 2003, Gen. Tommy
R. Franks, then the head of the Afghanistan and Iraq invasions,
threatened to have him fired.
Regardless of whether you think Bush should consult active
generals or retired generals who dealt with Rumsfeld, the problem
remains the same: Rumsfeld chose neither.
Jorge Rincon
Fourth-year, economics