GW gave an
uninspired, twenty minute, address to the nation tonight. He's pumping in 20,000 more troops into Iraq, as well as a job-creation plan expected to cost $10 billion. He refuses to involve two countries that border Iraq - Syria and Iran. He also failed to state how long these additional troops would be needed. So he's discarded the most important recommendations made by the bipartisan
Iraq Study Group.
He's also ignored the advice of
Sun Tzu.
When you engage in actual fighting, if victory is long in coming, then men's weapons will grow dull and their ardor will be damped. If you lay siege to a town, you will exhaust your strength.
Again, if the campaign is protracted, the resources of the State will not be equal to the strain.
Now, when your weapons are dulled, your ardor damped, your strength exhausted and your treasure spent, other chieftains will spring up to take advantage of your extremity. Then no man, however wise, will be able to avert the consequences that must ensue.
Thus, though we have heard of stupid haste in war, cleverness has never been seen associated with long delays.
There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare.
It is only one who is thoroughly acquainted with the evils of war that can thoroughly understand the profitable way of carrying it on.
