Burning Bush

Illustration by Jack GouldIn the May 13 edition of theGuardian, one of the U.K.'s largest daily newspapers, Sidney Blumenthal described the growing hatred of the Bush White House among U.S. military officers:

William Odom, a retired general and former member of the National Security Council who is now at the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank, reflects a wide swath of opinion in the upper ranks of the military. "It was never in our interest to go into Iraq," he told me. It is a "diversion" from the war on terrorism; the rationale for the Iraq war [finding WMDs] is "phony"; the U.S. army is overstretched and being driven "into the ground"; and the prospect of building a democracy [in Iraq] is "zero." In Iraqi politics, he says, "legitimacy is going to be tied to expelling us. Wisdom in military affairs dictates withdrawal in this situation. We can't afford to fail; that's mindless. The issue is how we stop failing more. I am arguing a strategic decision."