"Alright Nix, what do they have waiting for us in Foy?"

Partisan 1: Bush had a chance to get Bin laden, and he didn't!

Partisan 2: Ya, well so did Clinton, he had him on a silver platter, the CIA drones had him in sight!

Partisan 1: That's not as bad as Bush, this was the guy responsible for 9/11! He probably let Bin Laden go so he could still invade Iraq!

Partisan 2: At least Bush took the threat seriously & wasn't grabbing hummers in the Oval instead of focusing on this nation's enemies!


The "Bush did it on purpose so he could still invade Iraq" was actually said, out loud in all seriousness, by a sitting US Congressman on MSNBC very recently which caused even the left wing commentator to gasp.

But lets be serious for a moment - the record on national security for the modern Democrat Party is not simply "inept." Making a partisan issue out of Tora Bora is rather "glass house-ish", wouldn't you say? Kerry in particular, along with characters such as Dick Durbin and Jack Murtha, have repeatedly, publicly gone as far as maligning our soldiers as murderers and accusing them of "kicking in the doors of women and children in the dead of night"; not to mention comparing them to Nazis and Gulag guards, all in there endeavours to malign the Bush administration. So I had no doubts that any operational error Bush and co made would someday (sooner rather than later) come to light the moment these people were in charge.

Let me start with this ... immediately following 9/11 I had great reservations with "blaming" Clinton. I routinely attacked his policies, character (but then again who didn't), and various aspects of his cabinet and tenure. But the idea of holding him "responsible" for 9/11 was something I never felt entirely comfortable with. One can scroll back through our 1000+ Bund posts, and the email threads before that and you will never see me indicting Bill Clinton by name. What you will find is a more legitimate argument - that a "police" or "criminal justice" strategy rather than an active war mentality as applied to fighting Islamic terror is quite literally fatally flawed. That, I believe, is not only a perfectly legitimate discussion, but one vitally important to maintain less we regress (as is evident in the current administration). And I have heard this very argument made by Limbaugh et al, however they (for ratings or true belief) do make a point to attach Clinton, by name, to that 9/10 mindset (as it has been dubbed). The problem is one could then reasonably stretch that indictment to include the way both Bush 41 and our beloved Reagan "saw terrorism", as it applied to the United States - that being more criminal than war. Did those presidents have a chance to capture Bin Laden? No. But even with that mistake on Clinton's part I would contend the 9/10 mindset wasn't exclusively his - as a nation we all owned that mistake (save some sharp analysts within our bureaucracies). Now you can make the point, as the 9/11 Commission Report did, that our professionals in Intel & security, along with the elected officials they briefed "should have realized" that "they were at war with us, but we were not at war with them." Ok, that's a legitimate critique and one necessary to make in order to avoid a repeat of mistakes. However, as I said, that was hardly the exclusive domain of William J. Clinton in specific, but rather a cautionary tale of what we as a nation must avoid in the future.

Now, that was a mistake or "misguided approach" if you prefer, in strategy. In how we as a nation dealt with Islamic terror - treating it as a criminal justice matter. The Bush error recently revealed appears to me to be an operational mistake. In other words Bush went full bore ahead in correcting our government's 9/10 mentality by taking the war to the enemy, but made an error in battlefield operations. And as I mentioned with Clinton, it is more than obvious that such a mistake is hardly the exclusive property of George W. Bush. Every engagement has its' mistakes. The fog of war is just that, and commanders must make the decision they think best at the time. And in my opinion the fact that this nation was never again attacked under the tenure of George W. Bush overshadows this operational mistake.

On a personal note I always liked Rummy. He was tough. He came off, to me anyway, as an unapologetic, eats nails for breakfast Sec Def, and at the time that was exactly what the American public was looking for. So I would endeavour to include that in my report card were I you.

Now to further the conversation - what Kerry, in his infinite wisdom, has done by releasing this report and making partisan hay out of it is cause exactly the partisan 1 / partisan 2 (kudos to Dr. Seuss) conversation. Which does what? It leads serious, informed people into the legitimate conversation of the criminal justice vs hot war discussion. Which highlights with a big, fat, yellow, fluorescent marker just how far the Obama administration has reversed course and thrown this war back into the realm of the civilian, criminal domain. From transferring KSM and company to New York, to shutting down GITMO, to mandating only the FBI (a domestic police force) be allowed to interrogate high priority targets on the battlefield all the way to Holder - in perhaps the worst congressional testimony performance by an AG in US history - conceding that there may be instances where reading battlefield prisoners their Miranda rights is "appropriate." So in my estimation no matter who wins the partisan Clinton VS Bush "should of gotten Bin Laden" argument, Obama loses.

****

Now, the PoTUS just gave his much anticipated "Afghanistan Speech." He did it from West point, which I have no problem with, he is the Commander-in-Chief. But in a 30 minute+ speech he never mentioned the words "victory" nor "win" once. Nor did he use the word Islamic or Muslim, opting for the baron, faceless "extremist" description - and that's significant, one must be able to identify evil by name in order to confront it. He spoke much of "ending" the war. I still don't know how one "ends" a war in a vacuum - you either win or lose, but that historical lesson is lost on Barry. One just hasn't the time to read Sun Tzu or Frederick the Great when there's Communist Manifesto's to memorize and "workers of the world unite" rallies to go to. And I have no doubt that May Day picnics are a fabulous place to cruise for chicks on a sunny Cambridge afternoon. Ooh, look, they died the potato salad in the "white" deviled eggs red, how posh .. . but I digress. Even more distressing though is the flawed strategy in his thinking on the troop surge (and by the way, anytime he prefaces a segment in a speech with, "now let me be clear", I know my anus is about to get a work out). His hand picked general, McChrystal, asked for 60,000 troops, with a caveat minimum of 40,000. The president gave him 30,000. Now help me with this Obama apologists the world over - if 30,000 is a good idea how is 40 or 60 thousand not an even better one? Has any commander in history ever woke that morning for battle and decried, "dammit, I've just got to many f***ing troops! How am I supposed to effectively wage this war with so many troops"? The entire premise is ludicrous to the point of being child like. But most comcerning of all may be the deadline he announced for withdrawal. Oh, he won't call it that, he refers to it as a "transition date." Uh huh, I see. And to be so specific as July 2011, it's mind boggling. Surely Jihadi calenders in caves the region over just gained a red check mark.

I have come to the conclusion that a man whom has never failed professionally, and I mean never. Whom went from a state senator to leader of the free world in roughly 4 years, and did so based solely on likability, believes that the power of his personality is a perfectly legitimate substitute for a strategy, a plan. And I don't see how that story ends well ...

God Bless those brave men in theater and about to deploy - if we pull this off it will be a tribute to their talents and commitment ... and nothing else.