Black Box Report

Perhaps concerned with his place in history, President Bush recently granted a series of interviews with author Robert Draper for his book, "Dead Certain." While the book's title is seemingly in earnest, it doesn't exactly reflect its subject. From the NY Times article:

And in apparent reference to the invasion of Iraq, he continued, “This group-think of ‘we all sat around and decided’ — there’s only one person that can decide, and that’s the president.”

Yes, he's The Commander Guy. The Decider. Ecept when he's not:

Mr. Bush acknowledged one major failing of the early occupation of Iraq when he said of disbanding the Saddam Hussein-era military, “The policy was to keep the army intact; didn’t happen.”

But when Mr. Draper pointed out that Mr. Bush’s former Iraq administrator, L. Paul Bremer III, had gone ahead and forced the army’s dissolution and then asked Mr. Bush how he reacted to that, Mr. Bush said, “Yeah, I can’t remember, I’m sure I said, ‘This is the policy, what happened?’ ” But, he added, “Again, Hadley’s got notes on all of this stuff,” referring to Stephen J. Hadley, his national security adviser.

"Didn't happen." Well, why didn't it happen? "Yeah, I can't remember..." The Decider seems less clear on that, content to pass the buck and leave the decision at the feet of an underling.

Now it seems that underling doesn't feel like getting thrown under the bus:

A previously undisclosed exchange of letters shows that President Bush was told in advance by his top Iraq envoy in May 2003 of a plan to “dissolve Saddam’s military and intelligence structures,” a plan that the envoy, L. Paul Bremer, said referred to dismantling the Iraqi Army.

[SNIP]

In releasing the letters, Mr. Bremer said he wanted to refute the suggestion in Mr. Bush’s comment that Mr. Bremer had acted to disband the army without the knowledge and concurrence of the White House.

“We must make it clear to everyone that we mean business: that Saddam and the Baathists are finished,” Mr. Bremer wrote in a letter that was drafted on May 20, 2003, and sent to the president on May 22 through Donald H. Rumsfeld, then secretary of defense.

After recounting American efforts to remove members of the Baath Party of Saddam Hussein from civilian agencies, Mr. Bremer told Mr. Bush that he would “parallel this step with an even more robust measure” to dismantle the Iraq military.

One day later, Mr. Bush wrote back a short thank you letter. “Your leadership is apparent,” the president wrote. “You have quickly made a positive and significant impact. You have my full support and confidence.”

Apparently Bremer didn't read the fine print when he accepted his Presidential Medal of Freedom - "By accepting this medal, you hereby swear to not contradict anything The President says, even in the event that you are being scapegoated for someone else's (i.e. his) mistake." Bremer's letter to Bush means one of two things:

First, if Bush was keeping up with Iraq policy and read Bremer’s letter, he was lying about his role in the mistake that helped create the Iraqi insurgency.

Second, if Bush never read Bremer’s note and was detached from policy decisions, major consequential transformations were underway in Iraq while the president had no idea what was going on, even when given information in print by his own administrator on the ground.

Or it may be a third option:

Maybe when Bush said Bremer had his "full support and confidence" as he conducted these measures he had his fingers crossed behind his back and didn't really mean it. Bet the liberal media didn't consider that angle.

Paul Bremer gets no pat on the back here for outing this particular lie. He was as complicit in the de-Ba'athification of Iraq as Bush was, with one small difference - he was following orders:

Why should people have to provide evidence to force the president to take responsibility for key decisions about the war? He may not have been aware it was a key decision - that seems to be the case - but not understanding how important it was doesn't absolve him of responsibility for it. Instead, it highlights the poor understanding he and others in the administration had about what postwar conditions would be like, and what would be needed to stabilize the country.

It's hard to comprehend the overwhelming lack of foresight this administration demonstrated in the run-up and execution of their pet war. Perhaps because too many of them never actually served in the military, they do not seem to understand that a soldier's duty is to follow orders. That perhaps just because Saddam was a terrible person, and had his army do terrible things, that it does not necessarily follow that the soldiers were terrible people too. Indeed, many of them, in the aftermath of the fall of Baghdad, were actively campaigning to help restore order, optimistic of the possibilities following the fall of a brutal dictator. But not only were they shunned, they were summarily fired - and no one bothered to even disarm them. Brilliant idea! Put thousands of angry, armed militants out on the streets with no way to support themselves or their families, just when you're trying to restore order. And in their place, hire RNC loyalists who know precisely squat about rebuilding a country, nevermind having any useful knowledge about the people they were supposedly there to help.

But no one could have predicted an armed insurgency....

You'd have to be pretty drunk on the kool-aid to find a way to defend the Decider on this, and finding such a rube was difficult, but that's what I'm here for. The Elephant Bar says it all depends on what you mean by "dissolving Saddam's military and intelligence structures":

I do not believe this is the same thing as saying..."we will disband the army." On the other hand, it would have been a good idea to get a clarification of Bremer's intent.

Ahem.....

ar·my (är'mç)

a) A large body of people organized and trained for land warfare.

b) A tactical and administrative military unit consisting of a headquarters, two or more corps, and auxiliary forces.

Yeah, I don't know how anyone could've thought Bremer was referring to the Iraqi Army.

President Bush may like to compare himself to Harry Truman, but unlike the 33rd president, with this administration the buck stops...somewhere else:

Ultimately it doesn't matter whether Mr. Timberland was freelancing or if he got his orders direct from Dear Leader, though of course dishonesty about such things should matter...Either way, Bush was in charge. Or should have been, despite his busy mountain biking and brush clearing schedule.

But Rove knew better. He knew if he could get Bush in front of some cameras and military personnel, saying things like "I'm the Decider," that's what the public would take away. Perception is everything in politics, and the administration did everything they could to pass of the perception that Bush was in charge to further their political ends. Thus does the Bush myth perpetuate itself:

The bulk of the public who do not bother to go fact-checking between carpools and soccer practice drop-offs and such will never, ever know the depth of their craven public farce.

But the problem with treating everything as a political excercise, telling convenient lies to bolster your positions, is that the web gets so complicated, you not only forget which lies you told to cover up other lies, but the new lies can tend to really tick somneone off, someone you had already relied on to help further your political goals. Bush shouldn't be concerned about his place in history - it's pretty much in the bag already:

This is a case of everybody trying to blame everybody else for the purposes of keeping their lagacy intact. Hey, I've got news for you guys: NONE OF YOU are going to come out of this looking good. In fact, the only way it'll go without mobs carrying torches chasing you everywhere you go is by acknowledging your mistakes.

And the dustbin of history fast approaches