The Army Times

Apparently the Army Times is about to publish an editorial calling for the Secretary of War (the modern world calls the position the Secretary of Defense) Donald Rumsfeld (or perhaps it's Rumsfield -- if it isn't an English name your faithful correspondent is lost) to resign his post. ... The Army Times is published by the Gannet chain of newspapers. These are the same people who publish that great organ of intellectual analysis and journalism known as USA Today. The only thing about the Army Times is the word "Army."

The Army Times is not Stars and Stripes. It is not Leatherneck Magazine. The Army Times is edited and written by people not in the Army, less soldiers in Iraq.

Your faithful correspondent is of the opinion that Mr. Rumsfeld's (or is it Rumfield's?) biggest mistake in his strategy in Iraq is that he was not, and had not, been harsh enough with the Iraqis. The only reason that the Germans and the Japanese succumbed to Allied warfare during World War Two is because the populace of those nations had been bombed into submission. They were just too damn tired to fight anymore. The Iraqis have been, in reality, treated with kid gloves because the various media are now capable of instantly showing what a rotten thing war is. But sometimes rotten things advance the growth of things that are good. Just look in your garden and the way that you plants and lawn thrive on composted cow manure or plant compost.

But Mr. Rumsfeld has access to men who are more educated in the ways of warfare than your faithful correspondent and probably the Army Times. .. As an aside, your faithful correspondent was a Zumwalt sailor when the rights and feelings of the individual swabjockey were deemed more important than the needs of the Navy as a whole. And it was probably the worse Navy this great nation has ever seen.