Even though my reading of virtually all well-publicized books on Iraq seemed to reiterate similar information, I was compelled to read the one yet unread book: Cobra II by Michael R. Gordon and General Bernard E. Trainor. While the detailed contents (507 pages plus notes and appendixes) is extraordinarily well-written (as in a novel), the substance is very depressing.
It remains a mystery how so many could deny the validity of what so many others thought to be major problems with any military action intended to change the regime in Iraq. Cobra II reinforced the notion that all the planning efforts were designed to accommodate Rumsfeld’s biases intended to transform the military. Inputs contrary to these biases were ultimately disregarded.
Troops pathetically trying to adjust to realities not considered during the planning phase would be comical, if not so sad. Plans based only on preconceived notions seldom work. In this case, adjustments were made by the force of reality bearing in on the military as they attempted to implement the plan. The military adjusted to unexpected geography and the presence and strength of the Fedayeen, the non-military resistance fighters.
And, after finally getting to Baghdad, the inability to establish security independently of the US military become another casualty of the biased planning.
It will never be known whether the denied advice of (1) needing 350,000 troops on the ground to secure the area, (2) establishing quick transition to Iraq control of the government, (3) maintaining the available, if weak, institutions of police and civil service, would have made the difference will never be known.
It is clear that what happened epitomizes the failures of this administration to govern properly.
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