P Wolfowitz

At the end of his "introductory" 40 minute speech, P Wolfowitz cited how France was against the idea of a US military occupation, and so they must be for the transition to the "Interim" government, which comes before the "Transitional" government, which comes before the "Constitutional" government. Then he listed a number of battles, and said there were lessons to be learned. For example, Tarawa, the Chosin Reservoir, and another WWII battle. The point he appeared to be making was that war could be more brutal than expected. I can't imagine any other lessons. At Chosin, for example, 8 divisions of the Army were surrounded and 1 division of Marines pulled their tails out of the fire. I guess he doesn't realize the Marines are right in the middle of the fire in Fallujah, already. Then he listed heroic soldiers, mostly from WWI and WWII, but a couple who died in Somalia. Again, what lessons can be learned? The politics of WWI and WWII are unassailable (attempts have been made), and the politics of Korea tend to point exactly to political problems of war (Korea wasn't authorized by Congress, but the UN, our troops had a politically defined mission, but then again, MacArthur should have been yanked earlier, he was convinced the Chinese were bluffing, but I was never a Truman fan, so, it's a mixed bag. I like FDR and Ike more). Then R Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs spoke, but I wrote this.