Same as it ever was
When we left War Room for a winter hibernation a couple of weeks ago, it was pretty clear that George W. Bush had decided that the "way forward" in Iraq involves sending more U.S. troops, even if he couldn't quite bring himself to saying so yet.We return this morning to find National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley telling the Wall Street Journal that "there might be a need for an Iraqi surge alongside an American one," but that the president still hasn't made a final decision about the way forward. "We're still working on the mix of options," Hadley says.
It has been nearly two months since the president fired Donald Rumsfeld and declared that it was time for a "fresh perspective" on a war that is "not working well enough, fast enough." And it's worse than that. As the New York Times reports this morning, Bush figured out in mid-September -- after months of ignoring warnings from Iraq -- that his plan for the war wasn't working and that a reassessment was needed. Did it happen then? No. From the Times: "As the American elections approached, White House officials say, they believed it would amount to political suicide to announce a broad reassessment of Iraq strategy."
Translation: To save his own political life, Bush was willing to let American soldiers keep dying without a plan to win.
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