Still, he and other Pentagon officials said, they are studying the lessons of Iraq closely - to ensure that the next U.S. takeover of a foreign country goes more smoothly.
"We're going to get better over time," promised Lawrence Di Rita, a special assistant to Rumsfeld. "We've always thought of post-hostilities as a phase" distinct from combat, he said. "The future of war is that these things are going to be much more of a continuum....
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How lovely it must be to live in a world of dreams.
Even though those dreams - of cruise missiles arcing flawlessly to target and the world re-made to order for the purposes of paunchy fellows, too fond of rich sauces - are foul. Still, to the dreamer, it must be a sweet reverie.
I wonder if this is how it was in Rome in the latter period. Were there, even as the Empire itself was in tatters and unwelcome guests knocked rudely for entry, dreamers clinging to their copies of Tacitus or Caesar's "The Gallic War" while thinking, 'we can rebuild it and next time, we'll get it right.'
How much money do these crackheads think the US possesses? How many legions are at her command? How much patience do they believe the American public (let alone the world) will have for a series of invasions and occupations?
Is it possible for a debtor nation, with a diminishing industrial base, a growing number of impoverished people, an educational system in freefall, nurtured, it seems, more on dreams of greatness than the irrefutable fact, to do anything besides twist in the wind, struggling against the inevitable? What was it Zizek said? The plague of fantasies?
This talk of future interventions and getting it right is the Washington equivalent of whistling in the dark while walking past the cemetary.
DRM
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