Iraq Occupation Quotes
The “surge” was the short term injection of a large number of American combat troops into Iraq when the Iraq War was going badly. President George W. Bush, who at the urging of Vice President Cheney and the neoconservatives had invaded Iraq and while the invasion went well the administration botched the so-called peace and America was in the midst of a Iraqi civil war. Bush went ahead with the surge despite the advice of the Joint Chiefs. What makes the quotation particularly interesting, beyond the fact that the senior military advice was ignored, was that the President had always campaigned on the principle that the President should listen to the senior American Military officials on military tactics and strategy. He like Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, and other presidents found that the military leadership perspective was often very narrow and not even militarily infallible. The Iraq War turned in our favor after the surge albeit that there have been arguments since then as to whether or not the surge was the reason or was it due to other factors which occurred at the same time. Probably, all were factors.
After the United States Military victory at the Beginning of the Iraq War, the Bush administration operated under the neoconservative view that the Iraqis wanted a democracy and freedom and saw the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq as an opportunity to apply extreme conservative principles in the construction of a modern democracy in the Middle East. Bush appointed one of his political supporters and conservative ideologue as the head of the occupation authority and almost all of the many positions to rebuild Iraq was filled with conservative ideologues almost all of whom had no previous practical experience in the area of their new responsibility, and had not diplomatic skills or experience in Iraq, the Middle East. Almost none spoke Arabic or knew anything about Islamic culture. The occupation was a disaster, and the deadly phase of the Iraq war broke out.
