Thursday, December 09, 2004
Andrew on Rumsfeld
When Rumsfeld said, "you go to war with the Army you have," he was apparently forgetting that we went to war months and months ago. The fact that soldiers are still unprotected, that we still have too few troops there, that prisoner abuse is still occurring, that the borders are still not even close to being sealed, that the insurgency is still threatening the entire future, that we still haven't confronted the question of our global manpower needs ... well, these issues go to the heart of the question of Rumsfeld's and Bush's competence. This is not knee-jerk anti-war sentiment. This is knee-jerk pro-war sentiment. The question of whether we should fight is to me an obvious one. The question of whether Bush and Rumsfeld have a clue what they're doing is less easily answered. But we sure know they think they're perfect. And their arrogance has just intensified. Not encouraging.
There are lots of small rebuttals that one might make Sullivan's points, but the basic thrust is fair. Whether or not I would agree with all the assumptions implicit in Sullivan's criticism, I would be a much happier citizen if the administration would clearly articulate its vision for the military for the next five to ten years.
UPDATE: A commenter (the lefty but loyal Screwy Hoolie) points toward a post by Atrios that plausibly accuses Rumsfeld of lying on the question of armor for Humvees. If one were to be more open-minded toward Rummy than Atrios would ever be, the evidence adduced therein implies that Rumsfeld knows not whereof he speaks on the subject. Or that Army logistics remain unforgiveably FUBARish three years into hot war, and that the Pentagon staff is not telling its civilian leadership the truth.
I have several observations to make on the question of military procurement and logistics. First, it is famously inept. Anybody who has served in the military has endless stories on the topic. Second, it is essential to military success. Some of the real catastrophes in military history have derived from failures in logistics. There is very little excuse not to invest a lot of management time in getting procurement and logistics to run smoothly. Third, the United States has in the last century done a better job of both procurement and supply than most countries, so we have it within ourselves to do a good job. Fourth, it is not clear to me whether we are doing a good or a bad job in Iraq. The press has of course exposed numerous failures in planning. But are these failures greater than in other American wars, or less? Given the intensity of the press coverage of this war, it may be that we are simply seeing more reporting of the problem in the mainstream media, rather than a worse problem. Thoughts on this question from knowledgeable people would be much appreciated. Finally, you have to wonder whether the scandal-mongering over "no bid" contracts hasn't thrown the Pentagon's procurement bureaucracy into a frenzy of butt-covering. Just as we have learned in corporate America that Sarbanes-Oxley "internal controls" trim the velocity of our purchasing operations, so must the fear of investigation and pillory influence the paper-pushers in Arlington.
4 Comments:
By 
Gordon Smith, at
Thu Dec 09, 02:22:00 PM:
"less easily answered"...
Answered .
They're making it up as they go along.
By Gordon Smith, at
Thu Dec 09, 03:59:00 PM:
Thanks for the shoutout and the thoughtful Update.
By 
, at
Fri Dec 10, 08:06:00 PM:
Jack, there are several aspects to this question.
1. It's not simply a question of requisitioning the materials. It's a question of whether the industrial capacity exists to supply them in the time frame needed. There is a pretty big time lag for a lot of these materials, especially some of the more complicated equipment and weaponry.
We are still a manufacturing economy, but a lot of that capacity of moving overseas and we are not in quite the same position we used to be.
2. Often it is not DOD that is to blame, but the branches of the military themselves. For instance, sometimes the specific branches are not asking for what they need - Congress has been quite generous in its desire to defend our troops, but there is still some very stupid management on the part of the individual services to be overcome. And DOD is not to blame - it is the individual services that make those decisions.
3. Also, sometimes we have the supplies, but they don't get where they need to be. It's not so much supply as delivery and management that are the problem.
4. Expectation management is still a huge issue. The perfect war will never be fought until we have perfect soldiers. And that ain't gonna happen in our lifetime. Get over it.
We keep trying, and frankly we're doing a damn fine job. Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater just because there have been a few screwups.
The armor on Humvees things is ridiculous. If you up-armor Humvees, IED's will just be improved so they can blow throw the improved armor - you're just chasing your tail. The only advantage is a morale advantage. The real solution is to go after and eliminate the IEDs (duh...).
By , at
Fri Dec 10, 08:08:00 PM:
