Jules Crittenden reports that American generals in Iraq, recently reported to be against having more US troops, actually think it’s a topping idea.

Fact is, no one in the MSM actually knows what the generals are telling the president. Because the generals are telling the president, not the MSM.

“We” being used here in the editorial sense, to refer generally to Army planners involved in preparing for Operation Iraqi Freedom. The Army chief of staff at the time was Gen. Eric Shinseki, who ran afoul of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. As I recounted here:

You may recall that a few months ago the position of SecDef Donald Rumsfeld was that the invasion of Iraq could be successfully conducted with a much smaller force than was used in the Gulf War. The Army, led by then-SecArmy Thomas White and Army Chief of Staff Eric Shinseki, demurred. In fact, when asked by a Congressional committee about the size of the forces required, Shinseki answered that the war and the occupation following would require hundreds of thousands of troops.

Rummy went ballistic and told the media that Shinseki “misspoke.” He dispatched Deputy SecDef Paul Wolfowitz to Capitol Hill to, basically, call Shinseki a nitwit.

Cokes now the testimony of US Central Commander in Chief Gen. John Abizaid to the Senate Armed Services Committee (NYT link):

General Abizaid almost provided some vindication for Gen. Eric Shinseki, the former Army chief of staff, who warned early in the Iraq campaign that several hundred thousand troops would be required to impose stability in Iraq once Saddam Hussein was overthrown.

“General Shinseki was right,” General Abizaid said in response to a question by Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina.

And that’s that.

At his just-finished press conference, President Bush spoke more carefully about the departure of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld than people generally give him credit for being able to do. It’s pretty clear that Bush fired his SecDef, that Rumsfeld’s resignation, though termed a “mutual understanding,” was Bush’s intiative all along. Former CIA Director Robert Gates will take the job.

Hard to say that Rumsfeld’s departure was a surprise. I think it would have come even if the Reps had won big yesterday.

… but when I started to play!” So began the long ad copy by John Caples in 1925 for learn-piano-at-home booklets.

To the amazement of all my friends, I strode confidently over to the piano and sat down.

“Jack is up to his old tricks,” somebody chuckled. The crowd laughed. They were all certain that I couldn’t play a single note.

“Can he really play?” I heard a girl whisper to Arthur.

“Heavens, no!” Arthur exclaimed “He never played a note in all his life… But just you watch him. This is going to be good.”

I decided to make the most of the situation. With mock dignity I drew out a silk handkerchief and lightly dusted off the piano keys. Then I rose and gave the revolving piano stool a quarter of a turn, just as I had seen an imitator of Paderewski do in a vaudeville sketch.

“What do you think of his execution?” called a voice from the rear.

“We’re in favor of it!” came back the answer, and the crowd rocked with laughter.

Then I Started to Play

Instantly a tense silence fell on the guests. The laughter died on their lips as if by magic. I played through the first few bars of Beethoven’s immortal Moonlight Sonata. I heard gasps of amazement. My friends sat breathless — spellbound!

What made me think of this classic ad?

This:

White Sands missile test phenomenal’ …

[M]ilitary officials said the [anti-missile] test went better than they could have hoped.

“This was phenomenal,” said U.S. Army Col. Charles Driessnack, the project manager for the Missile Defense Agency’s THAAD program. “It performed as expected.”

The test demonstrated the THAAD’s ability to “completely destroy that warhead so that no chemical or nuclear residue would contaminate areas” below the explosion, Driessnack said. …

The target — a Hera missile that closely mimics the characteristics of the more infamous SCUD missiles — was launched shortly after 5:17 a.m. Wednesday. It took to the skies from a location on the far northern reaches of the bombing range’s territory, about 100 miles north of the Organ Mountains, 25 miles north of Highway 380.

It carried a canister of inert material to simulate chemical or biological elements that could be mounted on an enemy missile, Driessnack said. The target missile rose roughly 200 miles above the Earth before beginning the final stage descent toward land.

The THAAD was launched close to the southern end, on the east side of the Organ Mountains. The object of the THAAD missile is to provide a weapon to intercept incoming missiles during the “terminal” phase, when only seconds remain before it would strike an intended target. …

As the target missile launched, it streaked into the still-dark sky, looking like a comet with a long, white tail. As it got to the second firing stage, red fire bloomed out of the leading edge of the missile.

Minutes later, the THAAD was launched, giving a little pirouette before speeding upward. …

When the target missile was destroyed, sending a brilliant white, mushroom-like cloud into the dark sky, the crowd began to applaud and cheer wildly.

” We smashed it,” several people cheered as the rainbow colored contrail gave way to the cotton ball cloud of destruction above.

I am remembering the scorn and ridicule heaped upon President Reagan and the program he began, the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, which detractors (and there were many) scoffingly called “Star Wars.”

They laughed then. They ain’t laughing now.

James Joyner has an excellent roundup and analysis of the Defense Department’s plan to specially tax raise the fees of military retirees for their post-retirement health care, known as TriCare.

Before reading his piece, let me clarify a point. Many people think that military retirees (I am one) get free health care for life, just as they did while on active duty. Not so. There are three levels of TriCare for retirees available, and all cost retirees money. The plan I use requires me to make a co-pay for every doctor visit and every fee I am charged. (BTW, it is against the law for a doctor to waive the co-pay amount.) There is also an annual deductible per person and per family member.

That is to say, retiree health plans work just alike almost every other health plan in the country. Case in point: I am covered for health care by a plan paid for by the Tennessee Conference of the UMC. The Conference pays the premiums but I have to pay the co-pay and deductible. (I have never used it since both it can’t be used to pay TriCare’s co-pay or deductible and my family is not included).

Anyway, the crux of DOD’s plan is to raise fees and deductibles for all retirees age less than 65, when retiree’s coverage converts to Medicare. Quoth James,

If the changes touted by senior defense officials are adopted, annual enrollment fees for TriCare Prime, the military’s managed-care option, would triple by October 2008 for working-age [ed – anyone under Medicare age] retired officers and double for enlisted retirees.

Yearly deductibles for retirees using TriCare Standard, the fee-for-service health insurance option, would double for officers and rise by a third for enlisted. Also, for the first-time retirees who use TriCare Standard would pay an enrollment fee in addition to their deductible. [ed- which would also increase].

Without summarizing all of James’ excellent points, here is his conclusion:

This will probably in retrospect be considered an incredibly bone-headed proposal by the Defense Department (and proposals like this are instigated by the political appointees in the DoD). We care about the soldiers, until they retire, then we renege on decades old promises. This has the potential of being a major gaffe, with lots of sound bites about throwing away old soldiers and sailors.

I don’t think that has any chance of being approved, so the question becomes why is it being proposed? The money involved is orders of magnitude below the Medicare Prescription Benefit, and the political consequences are so great. There has to be another agenda here I do not see (or maybe they really are being that dumb; having worked in DC I understand that).

Yes, one wonders. But having worked in the Five-Sided Puzzle Palace, I think I can answer James’ question. This is a trial balloon and already has some support in Congress somewhere. James is right that it almost certainly won’t pass - this session. But it’s not intended to pass. It’s intended to plow the road for Son of Raised Fees that we’ll see next session.

The Military Officers Association of America (MOAA, of which I am a member) is tracking this issue closely. See HTML page here and PDF here. Quick summary:

The new plan envisions establishing an enrollment fee for TRICARE Standard, which has no enrollment fee at present. It would also double the TRICARE deductible and more than triple the TRICARE Prime enrollment fee over the next three years, and then increase all of these fees annually by the percentage of inflation. Retired officers would be charged about one-third more than enlisted members. …

The fundamental issue is that military medical and retirement programs need to be substantially better than civilian programs. They are an essential offset to the extraordinary demands and sacrifices inherent in a military career - sacrifices that civilians don’t have to deal with and wouldn’t put up with. Jacking up healthcare costs for military retirees to follow corporate trends misses the whole point of why we have a unique military health plan.

Guard, reserve and retired families “already gave” to their country in a multitude of ways that civilians haven’t and never will. If we’re at all concerned about future recruiting, retention and readiness, we’d best not forget that.

A country that can afford billions for pork, billions to rebuild Iraq, and still cut billions in taxes every year can afford the cost of health coverage for military members and families who spent decades sacrificing their own freedoms to protect freedom for the rest of America.

There are reports that the US paid Iraqi newspapers to run pro-Coalition stories. Naturally, the MSM are shocked. According to a radio news report I heard yesterday, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has ordered an investigation.

But that’s not what I want to write about. The story hearkens me back to the days of the early 1990s when the old USSR went away and much more vigorous military-to-military contacts between the Russian Federation (now gone, too) and the USA were being done.

My boss, Col. Rick Kiernan, was part of a team that attempted to introduce American concepts of public affairs to the Russian army. There were other teams doing other subjects, of course. But the Russian army, no longer the Soviet army, was faced with having to establish an actual media-relations office that responded to public and media inquiries, rather than just hand out the Party’s latest swill.

In the class on handling media relations for high rankers, a Russian officer asked how much per hour to charge a reporter for interviewing a general - did the rate go up as the rank went up?

Col. Kiernan explained that the idea was to make sure the army’s accurate information was put before the public through the media, so they should be eager to arrange interviews for generals and marshals, not charge reporters to conduct them.

A light-bulb moment, yes? Alas, the next question: “Oh, then we should pay the reporters to interview our generals! That way they will have to print what we tell them to.”

As Rick said to me later, “It occurred to me that there was some really basic work that had to be done.”

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has now fully succumbed to the disease known as verbiosis bureacratitis.

The Pentagon’s long struggle over how to describe the war in Iraq moved to new ground Tuesday as Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said he wanted to retire the term “insurgents” in favor of “enemies of the legitimate Iraqi government.”

Ah, that adds clarity.