Pentagon officials testify before Congress on Iraq War estimates:
1. General Shinseki gave his estimate in response to a question at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Tuesday: “I would say that what’s been mobilized to this point — something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers — are probably, you know, a figure that would be required.”
2. “The idea that it would take several hundred thousand U.S. forces I think is far off the mark,” Mr. Rumsfeld said.
3. In his testimony, Mr. Wolfowitz ticked off several reasons why he believed a much smaller coalition peacekeeping force than General Shinseki envisioned would be sufficient to police and rebuild postwar Iraq. He said there was no history of ethnic strife in Iraq, as there was in Bosnia or Kosovo.
4. A spokesman for General Shinseki, Col. Joe Curtin, said today that the general stood by his estimate. “He was asked a question and he responded with his best military judgment,” Colonel Curtin said. General Shinseki is a former commander of the peacekeeping operation in Bosnia.
5. Mr. Wolfowitz spent much of the hearing knocking down published estimates of the costs of war and rebuilding, saying the upper range of $95 billion was too high, and that the estimates were almost meaningless because of the variables. Moreover, he said such estimates, and speculation that postwar reconstruction costs could climb even higher, ignored the fact that Iraq is a wealthy country, with annual oil exports worth $15 billion to $20 billion. “To assume we’re going to pay for it all is just wrong,” he said.
6. At the Pentagon, Mr. Rumsfeld said the factors influencing cost estimates made even ranges imperfect. Asked whether he would release such ranges to permit a useful public debate on the subject, Mr. Rumsfeld said, “I’ve already decided that. It’s not useful.”
Pentagon Contradicts General on Iraq Occupation Force’s Size
By Eric Schmitt
New York Times
February 28, 2003In a contentious exchange over the costs of war with Iraq, the Pentagon’s second-ranking official today disparaged a top Army general’s assessment of the number of troops needed to secure postwar Iraq. House Democrats then accused the Pentagon official, Paul D. Wolfowitz, of concealing internal administration estimates on the cost of fighting and rebuilding the country.
Mr. Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, opened a two-front war of words on Capitol Hill, calling the recent estimate by Gen. Eric K. Shinseki of the Army that several hundred thousand troops would be needed in postwar Iraq, “wildly off the mark.” Pentagon officials have put the figure closer to 100,000 troops. Mr. Wolfowitz then dismissed articles in several newspapers this week asserting that Pentagon budget specialists put the cost of war and reconstruction at $60 billion to $95 billion in this fiscal year. He said it was impossible to predict accurately a war’s duration, its destruction and the extent of rebuilding afterward.
“We have no idea what we will need until we get there on the ground,” Mr. Wolfowitz said at a hearing of the House Budget Committee. “Every time we get a briefing on the war plan, it immediately goes down six different branches to see what the scenarios look like. If we costed each and every one, the costs would range from $10 billion to $100 billion.” Mr. Wolfowitz’s refusal to be pinned down on the costs of war and peace in Iraq infuriated some committee Democrats, who noted that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Mitchell E. Daniels Jr., the budget director, had briefed President Bush on just such estimates on Tuesday.
“I think you’re deliberately keeping us in the dark,” said Representative James P. Moran, Democrat of Virginia. “We’re not so naïve as to think that you don’t know more than you’re revealing.” Representative Darlene Hooley, an Oregon Democrat, also voiced exasperation with Mr. Wolfowitz: “I think you can do better than that.”
Mr. Wolfowitz, with Dov S. Zakheim, the Pentagon comptroller, at his side, tried to mollify the Democratic lawmakers, promising to fill them in eventually on the administration’s internal cost estimates. “There will be an appropriate moment,” he said, when the Pentagon would provide Congress with cost ranges. “We’re not in a position to do that right now.”
At a Pentagon news conference with President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, Mr. Rumsfeld echoed his deputy’s comments. Neither Mr. Rumsfeld nor Mr. Wolfowitz mentioned General Shinseki, the Army chief of staff, by name. But both men were clearly irritated at the general’s suggestion that a postwar Iraq might require many more forces than the 100,000 American troops and the tens of thousands of allied forces that are also expected to join a reconstruction effort.
“The idea that it would take several hundred thousand U.S. forces I think is far off the mark,” Mr. Rumsfeld said. General Shinseki gave his estimate in response to a question at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Tuesday: “I would say that what’s been mobilized to this point — something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers — are probably, you know, a figure that would be required.” He also said that the regional commander, Gen. Tommy R. Franks, would determine the precise figure.
A spokesman for General Shinseki, Col. Joe Curtin, said today that the general stood by his estimate. “He was asked a question and he responded with his best military judgment,” Colonel Curtin said. General Shinseki is a former commander of the peacekeeping operation in Bosnia.
In his testimony, Mr. Wolfowitz ticked off several reasons why he believed a much smaller coalition peacekeeping force than General Shinseki envisioned would be sufficient to police and rebuild postwar Iraq. He said there was no history of ethnic strife in Iraq, as there was in Bosnia or Kosovo. He said Iraqi civilians would welcome an American-led liberation force that “stayed as long as necessary but left as soon as possible,” but would oppose a long-term occupation force. And he said that nations that oppose war with Iraq would likely sign up to help rebuild it. “I would expect that even countries like France will have a strong interest in assisting Iraq in reconstruction,” Mr. Wolfowitz said. He added that many Iraqi expatriates would likely return home to help.
In the 1991 Persian Gulf War, many nations agreed in advance of hostilities to help pay for a conflict that eventually cost about $61 billion. Mr. Wolfowitz said that this time around the administration was dealing with “countries that are quite frightened of their own shadows” in assembling a coalition to force President Saddam Hussein to disarm.
Enlisting countries to help to pay for this war and its aftermath would take more time, he said. “I expect we will get a lot of mitigation, but it will be easier after the fact than before the fact,” Mr. Wolfowitz said. Mr. Wolfowitz spent much of the hearing knocking down published estimates of the costs of war and rebuilding, saying the upper range of $95 billion was too high, and that the estimates were almost meaningless because of the variables. Moreover, he said such estimates, and speculation that postwar reconstruction costs could climb even higher, ignored the fact that Iraq is a wealthy country, with annual oil exports worth $15 billion to $20 billion. “To assume we’re going to pay for it all is just wrong,” he said.
At the Pentagon, Mr. Rumsfeld said the factors influencing cost estimates made even ranges imperfect. Asked whether he would release such ranges to permit a useful public debate on the subject, Mr. Rumsfeld said, “I’ve already decided that. It’s not useful.”
Republican integrity:
Cunningham pleaded guilty to one count of income tax evasion and four counts of conspiracy: mail fraud, wire fraud, bribery of public official and accepting bribes. U.S. District Larry A. Burns scheduled Cunningham’s sentencing for Feb. 27.
A somber-looking Cunningham stood with his hands clasped in front of him, answering the judge’s questions with a muted “Yes, your honor,” or, at times, “Yes, sir.”
“Between the year 2000 and June of 2005 in our district, you conspired to accept bribes in exchange for performance of official duties. Did you do that?” Judge Burns asked Cunningham.
“Yes, your honor,” Cunningham replied.
“Did you take both cash payments and payments in kind?”
“Yes, your honor,” the congressman said.
“Did you follow up by trying to influence the Defense Department?”
“Yes, your honor.”
I need to give Bush some credit, I have been reading that on Wednesday he is going to announce “his” plans for a Iraq withdrawal. Even though he had no choice he is about to do the right thing.
And the righties will pretend they’ve never even heard of a man named Murtha.
“This was OUR idea from the start!”
THE EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES!
I wonder how places like right thinking to spin the withdrawal. I hope it happens it is time to end the Iraq fiasco.
Unlike Vietnam – we have the blogs now, so there’s going to be a LOT of things said from the right that completely contradict everything they’d said prior. It will be right there in black and white.
Not saying politics is going to become something out of a law school or anything, but many of these writers have a decision to make right now…either poo-poo, call it a bad move and blame the Dems/anti-war crowd OR pretend the last few years never existed and pretend they never thought anything different.
Bush set this up by never giving into the notion of a change of direction over there. He made it easy for his supporters to just call us wrong about the whole thing. By starting to draw down prior to the ’06 elections, he’s contradicts himself…big time.
With so many people dying, you’d think a country like ours could be past the days of making it up as we go along…but that’s the story of Iraq.
The wierd thing is Bush is starting to make sense regarding immegration reform and creating a guest worker/amnesty program. If he keeps it up his last 3 years may not be a complete waste of time.
If Bush does the right thing and gets out of Iraq, then the next president will only have to worry about the deficits left by this admin, but at least Iraq will not be a worry for the next president.
karl – while the immigration issue is a big one, the reason nobody goes near it besides some in Congress and the pundits…$$$
To police this issue, you require bodies, equipment, offices, detention centers, recordkeeping, etc.
What he’s doing here is the right thing, because before a commitment is made that leaves us straped for cash, we have to KNOW it’s the right idea. His plan is good, but probably going to divide his base, as the situation with lost jobs and salary depression is often behind someone complaining about the problem.
I say, if someone wants over the border, give them a 10% discount on whatever the going rate happens to be for a ride across the border. They come to the gate and pay the fee, get fingerprinted, papers, etc…
They’re going to make it over whether you build a wall, hire more border guards or spend millions driving them all back to Mexico. The beef of some concerning the national defense angle is a pie in the sky kind of desire.
It’s not as simple as opening up a new government department and filling it with salaried workers and a lot of vans. We had a line on Atta before 9/11. Most of the answers to ‘how’ we defend ourselves are already known.
If the beurocracy doesn’t function well, we suffer. History has proven that expanding the beurocracy will not solve the problem, just as slashing away pieces of it won’t either.
Leadership and selflessness is the key to ensuring something works. That’s why the military did their job so well during the invasion.
As for our government in it’s current form, clearly the idea has to be coming up with a plan that will work – not just a plan that will appease certain special interests. So far this administration hasn’t done very well when it comes to designing a plan that will work to fix what the public considers broken. My opinion is that special interests muddy the water each and every time.