Rumsfeld Refused To Plan For Post-War/U.S. Cooks Books On War Dead

Just when you thought you'd read all the bad stories on the politics behind the Iraq war, a new revelation creeps up that- bam!!- reminds you of what a horrible scam these neocons pulled on the American people.

Knight-Ridder Wire: Army general says Rumsfeld refused to plan for post-war Iraq

Long before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld forbade military strategists to develop plans for securing a post-war Iraq, the retiring commander of the Army Transportation Corps said Thursday...

..."Then, just as we were barely into Afghanistan Rumsfeld came and told us to get ready for Iraq." [said Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid]...

..."The secretary of defense continued to push on us that everything we write in our plan has to be the idea that we are going to go in, we're going to take out the regime, and then we're going to leave," Scheid said. "We won't stay."..

..."I remember the secretary of defense saying that he would fire the next person that said that" [we needed post-invasion operations like security, stability and reconstruction], Scheid said...

"He said we will not do that because the American public will not back us if they think we are going over there for a long war."...

Bold added by me... Do I even need to comment on this one?

Revelation #2- the U.S. is redefinining what counts as 'death' in Iraq to cut down death tolls-

U.S. officials, seeking a way to measure the results of a program aimed at decreasing violence in Baghdad, aren't counting scores of dead killed in car bombings and mortar attacks as victims of the country's sectarian violence.

In a distinction previously undisclosed, U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Barry Johnson said Friday that the United States is including in its tabulations of sectarian violence only deaths of individuals killed in drive-by shootings or by torture and execution.

That has allowed U.S. officials to boast that the number of deaths from sectarian violence in Baghdad declined by more than 52 percent in August over July.

But it eliminates from tabulation huge numbers of people whose deaths are certainly part of the ongoing conflict between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. Not included, for example, are scores of people who died in a highly coordinated bombing that leveled an entire apartment building in eastern Baghdad, a stronghold of rebel Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr...

I'm shocked. I didn't think they were even counting the killed Iraqis at all!

I know it's not blowjob perjury, but someone should be impeached/fired over all this.

[PS- Because these revelations are so depressing, I decided to find good news about Iraq to balance it out: "Millions of Shiite pilgrims thronged the streets of Karbala on Saturday for a religious festival that ended peacefully amid tight security... About 4 million people were in Karbala for the festival observing the birthday of Imam al-Mahdi al-Muntadhar, a ninth century religious leader." And almost no one was murdered!]