Petraeus in 2003: "Tell Me How This Ends" -- and He Still Doesn't Know

What will end up being the most famous quote of the Iraq war? Remember, Bush did not actually say "Mission Accomplished." Perhaps Cheney's "final throes" will win the prize. . But increasingly, as the significance of Gen. David Petraeus grows (seemingly by the minute), I have come to believe that it might up being his once-obscure 2003 remark: "Tell me how this ends." It was cited again today by Andrew Bacevich in his New York Times op-ed contribution.

Petraeus said that when he was a Major General directing the 101st Airborne during the U.S. invasion but it's clear that today he has no more of a clue to the answer than he did five years ago.

Who did he say the five words to? The lucky recipient was Rick Atkinson, the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for The Washington Post and military historian. It shows up in in Atkinson's book about the attack on Iraq, In the Company of Soldiers, which featured Maj. Gen. Petraeus as a key character. I recommend the book for its portrait of Petraeus as a media-friendly, but somewhat scary (in his focus and drive) character.

When I interviewed Atkinson about it (there's a chapter about it in my new book on Iraq and the media), he said he considered the Petraeus quote a "private joke" at the time, but it soon became the general's "mantra."

In the post-invasion epilogue for his book, Atkinson speaks frankly. Petraeus and his soldiers had performed well, taking relatively few casualties, and showing both restraint and courage in battle. But they "were better than the cause they served." It was "vital not to conflate the warriors with the war." The casus belli f or the war, that Iraq posed an imminent threat to America, "was inflated and perhaps fraudulent." And if "the war's predicate was phony, it cheapened the sacrifices of the dead and living alike."

So I asked Atkinson in 2004 whether he felt the book was somewhat hollow, documenting the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time. Did he have mixed feelings about his own effort? "There's nothing mixed about it at all," he fired back. "I was against the war before, during, and after it. I have no mixed feelings about the hundreds of dead soldiers--it was a poor use of their lives. I was certain last March that we as a nation had not done all we could to make sure lives were not lost, but I'm dogmatic about it now."

As a scholar of World War II, with popular books on that to his credit, the lesson he draws is "that if you're going to fight a global war, whether it's against the Axis in the 1940s or against terrorism today, nothing is more vital than nurturing a powerful, righteous coalition." Failing to do this has placed a tragically unfair burden on our military. "They took down a country the size of California in three weeks," he pointed out, "but there was not much thought devoted to the question of what happens next. It's astonishing how little thought was given."

But what about the argument that leaving Iraq now would dishonor the soldiers who have died so far? "It's not George Bush's military," he replied, "but the country's as a whole, and the collective proprietorship means we collectively decide if it is used properly and the cause is worth their sacrifice--and whether that cause should be truncated or we stay there forever."

Greg Mitchell's new book is So Wrong for So Long: How the Press, the Pundits -- and the President -- Failed on Iraq.It includes a preface by Bruce Springsteen and a foreword by Joe Galloway, and has been hailed by our own Arianna, Bill Moyers, Glenn Greenwald and others.

Comments

[Sepiastar]

Why are we there? NEWSFLASH - you are there because many of you elected a President (twice) that engaged in a pre-emptive strike on a secular nation. SIMPLE. Obviously, half of this country is incapable of objective analysis because as an ordinary citizen, I RESEARCHED Iraqi and knew our invasion would ignite a civil war once the area became unstabilized. America DESTROYED this country as the rest of the world agressively protested against our invasion and the American citizens returned the favor by electing George W Bush Jr to a second term. Then we display our ethnocentric mentality about their need for self-sufficiency because, HEY, It's their country and they need to fix it. NO, WE NEED TO FIX IT SINCE WE ARE TO BLAME! I didn't hear any Iraqi's calling for the US to save them from Saddam Hussein. The Iraqi's weren't dancing in the streets when Saddam Hussein and his sons were executed (only some of the Sunni's b/c of impending power). Then I heard the argument, women are being treated as second class citizens. However, you fail to enlighten me on how some Iraqi women were professionals (attorneys, teachers) before this invasion and have had to flee their land because of the increased violence. So, how did you make it safer for women? Americans blatant disrespect for other nations will be the detriment of your own nation. Yet, we wonder why the rest of the world has a condescending view of Americans now!

[Indedave]

"It's not George Bush's military, but the country's as a whole." This should come as a shock to the CIC who has used it in much the same fashion as any 18th-century, 10-year-old future despot played with his little tin soldiers in his palace bedroom.

[RuleofLawNow]

The national draft should be put back on the table. I registered when I was called to do so, and I did so because I viewed it as a civic duty. If there is no consequence to the average citizen, then our democracy suffers. The all volunteer army is not inherently bad, but it insulates the American people from the immediacy of their vote. It must stop with no loopholes. The conservatives should be forced to put their genetic pool where their mouths are.

[CBS]

I watched most of the hearings today and it is clear that neither Petraeus or Crocker have a clue....th­is is as they define it an unending war. The Iraqis will do nothing to help themselves while we are still there. Apparently nothing was learned from Vietnam. It will end when this war has completely destroyed the U.S. Army and National Guard. Maybe that is not a bad thing...it will be hard to start wars without them.

[JBS]

"Why are we putting our sons and daughters lives at risk?" That's a mighty broad editorial "we" there. Less than 1% of the US population bears the burden of service in Iraq; 99% or "our" sons and daughters are at no risk what-so-ever. And 1% of the US population reaps the benefits from the record windfall profits this war has brought the military-i­ndustrial-­energy-ent­ertainment complex.

But the 1% paying the cost aren't the 1% profiting.

[grendl]

I was speaking figuratively. But maybe thats the problem, if they're not your kid, its not your problem.

[shep1900]

And yet, Senator McCain's child _has_ served there, and another one is likely to do so soon. It makes his pro-war stance all the more baffling.

[grendl]

Why are we putting our sons and daughters lives at risk? For what?

Securing a nation filled with tribal warring factions who harbor vendettas for perpetuity, who like a cobra simply plays dead when manhandled as the Iraqi's are doing now with us, but will simply rise again to strike their enemies once we have loosened our grasp on their country.

For what? They don't think of each other as equal. Maybe instead of investing all these military minds, and armaments, and soldiers into this abyss, you do what you won't do in this country, Mr. Bush. Invest in education. Teach Iraqi's the meaning of democracy, rather than pounding the equality of man tenets into their skulls with mortar rounds. All they've seen so far is an American superiority complex, thus their defensiveness, thus their siding with Al Sadr against our puppet Maliki.

It's pointless. Providing security has no end goal. The region will always need security, and the people of Iraq must be willing to stand up and provide it themselves. Of course having been subjugated for the last forty years, they have a natural mistrust of centralized government and power, and for good reason.

This isn't a war. Stop calling it a war, liars. This is a police action, and most of you are getting kickbacks.

[sugarmoes]

it ends the same way it is started... BY MAKING IT SO!!! except this time... the lies told to end it will at least save lives instead of taking them.

y'know... them ivy league schools that a vast majority of these "leaders" come from... they sure don't teach common sense now, DO THEY???

or maybe that's the whole idea. they got theirs so fuck everyone else.

and they call themselves christians­... LMMFAOOOOO­OOOOOOOOOO­!!!!!!!

HYPOCRITES!!!!