More Retired Generals Call for Rumsfeld's Resignation

The widening circle of retired generals who have stepped forward to call for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's resignation is shaping up as an unusual outcry that could pose a significant challenge to Mr. Rumsfeld's leadership, current and former generals said on Thursday.

Maj. Gen. Charles H. Swannack Jr., who led troops on the ground in Iraq as recently as 2004 as the commander of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division, on Thursday became the fifth retired senior general in recent days to call publicly for Mr. Rumsfeld's ouster. Also Thursday, another retired Army general, Maj. Gen. John Riggs, joined in the fray.

"We need to continue to fight the global war on terror and keep it off our shores," General Swannack said in a telephone interview. "But I do not believe Secretary Rumsfeld is the right person to fight that war based on his absolute failures in managing the war against Saddam in Iraq."

Another former Army commander in Iraq, Maj. Gen. John Batiste, who led the First Infantry Division, publicly broke ranks with Mr. Rumsfeld on Wednesday. Mr. Rumsfeld long ago became a magnet for political attacks. But the current uproar is significant because Mr. Rumsfeld's critics include generals who were involved in the invasion and occupation of Iraq under the defense secretary's leadership.

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..........and more on this story from Daily Kos

President Bush's refusal to acknowledge the advice of his military experts is a sign that he is weak, weaker than ever. He is desperately afraid of what will happen if he admits that his Secretary of Defense is hindering--not helping--the war in Iraq and the War on Terrorism. As one general put it in the New York Times article linked above:

"Are the floodgates opening?" asked one retired Army general, who drew a connection between the complaints and the fact that President Bush's second term ends in less than three years. "The tide is changing, and folks are seeing the end of this administration."

It is for that selfish reason that the President refuses to fire Rumsfeld. It is because he puts politics and power above the lives of our troops. The President's credibility is already non-existent. And as long as he keeps a failed Secretary of Defense of the job, his judgment is non-existent (and dangerous) as well.

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