Epstein Secrets

portantly, we have to ask, why are people not facing this truth, in light of all of the facts.... FINALLY we have come to terms that like the war in Vietnam which most people accept as a huge mistake, it is now more than ever evident, that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq may be larger mistakes. Because

the press by an administration already girded for combat. How depressing to look back on those days and see not just the obvious -- Douglas Feith, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice; those who promised America would be "greeted as liberators" (Cheney), and who threatened nuclear "mushroom clouds" (

onald Rumsfeld and his deputy Paul Wolfowitz suggested the war could be done on the cheap and that it would largely pay for itself. In October 2003, Rumsfeld told a press conference about President Bush's request for $21 billion for Iraq and Afghan reconstruction that "the $20 billion the president reque

ited former basket ball player & bad-boy, Dennis Rodman to Pyongyang. As I use to say in the 196os if we had dropped televisions instead of bombs in Vietnam, the war would have been over years earlier. And in this case, if we send JayZ and Beyonce to visit him and then invite him to Disney World and Asp

, Bush belatedly moved to rein in his vice president, siding with Justice Department lawyers on surveillance issues; firing Cheney's dearest friend, Donald Rumsfeld, from his Pentagon job; letting Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice win the argument over whether to bomb a Syrian nuclear reactor site (we didn't)

ened. After Iraq, there has been a weird amnesty and amnesia about people's misjudgment on the most consequential decision of our times.... Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Bremer, Rice, McCain, Abrams, and others including the pro-war press claque are still offering their judgments unfazed. One of my fathe

ce. No President since Dwight D. Eisenhower had served two full terms. John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Lyndon Johnson, overwhelmed by the war in Vietnam, had declined to run for reelection in 1968. Richard Nixon resigned less than seventeen months into his second term. Gerald Ford (who was never el

esident Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld—most associated with extreme views of how to han

of the first four years. During the 2004 campaign, Bush came close to jettisoning the two people—Vice-President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld—most associated with extreme views of how to handle post-9/11 foreign affairs. After the election, Cheney saw the influence of his principal ideolo

ic debt centers on 40=8040entitlements" like Social Security (which hasn't a=ded a penny to the national debt) when we're still paying for Korea an= Vietnam and Grenada and Panama and the first Gulf War and Somalia and the=Balkans and on and on. Estimates of just how much of our national de=t payments a

ays of the Iraq War and things were not going well. Wh=n asked whether he wished he had more troops. Petraeus was too polit=cally savvy to criticize the Donald Rumsfeld "light footprint*=8* strategy, so he deflected the question, answering it a different way= "I wish we had more Foreign Service officers, aid profess

was too polit=cally savvy to criticize the Donald Rumsfeld "light footprint*=8* strategy, so he deflected th

plomat, following a rough trace of his father’s man-on-a-mission trajectory, also with a bit of that secretive Knights of Templar feeling: Princeton, Vietnam, the Philippines, the halls of the State Department in Foggy Bottom. Wisner had become the first phone call for some of America’s leading corporate f

ging the most expensive war on terrorism in human history, the US was uneasily discovering that it was creating more terrorists. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had sketched the nature of this puzzle in an October, 2003 memo with acid clarity. He asked: “Are we capturing, killing or deterring and dissuading m

yond what the soldiers and analysts could match or even fully monitor. “Is our current situation such that ‘the harder we work, the behinder we get?” Rumsfeld asked in 2003.38 To be constantly behind. This was a commander’s nightmare. Among other things it was that sense of never quite catching up that had

troops we lose. War cost esti- mates usually don't include those things. But they have to be paid. We still are paying for %rid War II, Korea and Vietnam, but histo- rians and budget planners have closed the books. The costs turn up now in the Department of Veterans Affairs budget. Every veteran and

estimating $200 billion for Iraq. but that was before a monumentally mismanaged occupation and a civil war. Back then, in 2002. Defense Secretary Donald Rtunsfeld thought $50 billion to $60 billion woukl do the job, but he asked people not to hold him to a hard number. For the record, the price tag pas

" he said, "what history decides." U.S. troops and their families, as well as the Iraqis dying every day. are more than Interested" in whether Mr. Rumsfeld and President Bush are making good decisions. The generals and Mr. Rumsfeld also continued the administration's soft retreat from taking full res

utocrats who have overseen GDP growth rates of 10 percent annually over the past three decades? It is in places like China, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam where good dictators have produced economic miracles. These in turn have led to the creation of wide-ranging personal freedoms, even as these leade

estoring morale at the Pentagon and, more important, repairing relations with Congress, which had grown distrustful of the Defense Department under Rumsfeld. Bridging two administrations, Gates gets credit for stabilizing Iraq, though the key decisions that led to success--a surge of troops and the app

restoring morale at the Pentagon and, more important, repairing relations with Congress, which had grown distrustful of the Defense Department under Rumsfeld. Bridging two administrations, Gates gets credit for stabilizing Iraq, though the key decisions that led to success--a surge of troops and the appoin

autocrats who have overseen GDP growth rates of 10 percent annually over the past three decades? It is in places like China, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam where good dictators have produced economic miracles. These in turn have led to the creation of wide-ranging personal freedoms, even as these leaders