Posted by: Dale Franks on Sunday, November 25, 2007 Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the former US military commander in Iraq, has given the Democratic response to the President's weekly radio address. Apparently, the general doesn't much like the president. Retired Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, who led coalition forces through the first critical year of Iraq's insurgency, said Saturday in a nationally broadcast radio address that President Bush had failed to "devise a strategy for victory" and that the time had come to withdraw U.S. troops.The thing is, as the coalition commander in Iraq, Gen. Sanchez was the primary officer for providing military advice to the president about Iraq, and assisting in formulating a winning strategy there. So, where was the "strategy for victory in Iraq that employed, in a coordinated manner, the political, economic, diplomatic and military power of the United States" created by General Sanchez, that he proposed to the president? What objections did Gen. Sanchez raise to the Bush Administration policy? Where is the record of Gen. Sanchez's efforts to create such a strategy? If it exists, I am unaware of it. Gen Sanchez wasn't some innocent bystander to the policy process re Iraq. He wasn't some middle-of-the-pack battalion commander, following the orders he was given. He was the senior military commander on the ground. It was his responsibility to propose a strategy to the president that contained his best military advice. It was his responsibility to plan the strategy, obtain approval for it, and then execute it. If there was a failure in the administration's strategy or execution, then what did Gen. Sanchez do to correct it? If his best military advice was ignored, then why didn't he resign? Whatever failures the Bush Administration may have made in Iraq—and they've made more than their fair share of them—General Sanchez was involved in those failures up to his neck. And if he felt the Administration's policy was that flawed, and that he could not in good conscience support it, then he had the obligation to resign, and oppose it as a private citizen. Gen. Sanchez is perfectly free to engage in the political process as a private citizen. But to pretend he had no part in the policies he now decries—and that he must have in large part formulated as coalition commander—simply stretches credulity. |
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