From today's LA Times. This is unbelievable...
One of the most heavily criticized actions in the aftermath of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003 was the decision, barely two months later, to disband the Iraqi army, alienating former soldiers and driving many straight into the ranks of anti-American militant groups.
Surely something that controversial must have been debated and talked about ad nauseum before making that decision??? Maybe not:
But excerpts of a new biography of President Bush show him saying that he initially wanted to maintain the Iraqi army and, more surprising, that he cannot recall why his administration decided to disband it.
WTF????
"The policy was to keep the army intact; didn't happen," Bush told biographer Robert Draper in excerpts published in Sunday's New York Times.
Draper pressed Bush to explain why, if he wanted to maintain the army, his chief administrator for Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, issued an order in May 2003 disbanding the 400,000-strong army without pay.
Sounds like he's picking up "I don't recall" lessons from Gonzo:
"Yeah, I can't remember; I'm sure I said, 'This is the policy, what happened?' " Bush said, adding: "Again, Hadley's got notes on all this stuff" -- a reference to national security advisor Stephen J. Hadley.
Douglas J. Feith, then undersecretary of Defense for policy and an architect of the Iraq invasion, said the excerpts raised interesting questions about how the pivotal decision was made.
ya think?
Read the whole article here.