"LYING, INCOMPETENCE, AND CORRUPTION" -- ANTHONY ZINNI

Liveblogging Anthony Zinni on MTP:

We are paying a price for lack of credible planning, or the lack of a plan, or throwing 10 years of planning away, in effect; for getting distracted from Afghanistan and the war on terror; for rejecting the advice we were given.

We can’t let Iraq fall apart. It is part of a whole myriad of issues we have re stability in the ME. We have to get this government to form a unity government. We have to make a decision on the militias – they’re part of the problem.

It’s a classic insurgency. We haven’t given the people a reason to turn against them. We’ve wasted three years here. We let all these snakes come out.

Disturbing parallels to Vietnam. The little successes aren’t solidified into a national plan, a strategic set of policies coming from Washington and Baghdad.

The American media is being made a scapegoat for what’s going on over there. Journalists killed, kidnapped. Hard to blame them for not telling good stories when security is such that they risk their lives to go out to get those good stories.

Lying, incompetence and corruption. Yes, I saw it all. Spin, cherry-picking facts, use of metaphors, walking away from 10 years of planning, lack of cohesive approach to aftermath, belief in these un-credible exiles, a series of disastrous mistakes. Rice said “tactical mistakes,” no they were strategic mistakes, policy mistakes that were made back here.

Rumsfeld should resign, to begin with. Those responsible for the non-planning, those that stood by, they shoul be held accountable. Those in power now find their time must be spent defending the past, rewriting history.

Every president in history has held people accountable, Lincoln went through every general until he found Grant, when MacArthur screwed up, he was dismissed.

I never saw any solid proof that Saddam had WMD, sure he had some leftovers but over time these degrade. We were watching Saddam with an army that had caved in. He was at our mercy. To say that this threat was grave and gathering seemed preposterous to me. To say he wasn’t contained is an insult to all our forces that did just that for ten years. The containment worked remarkably well and was a tribute to our troops how they handled it.

UPDATE:

ThinkProgress has the transcript.

Tags: Anthony Zinni, Meet The Press, Iraq war