LA Times: Perle says he should not have backed Iraq war

By Peter Spiegel, Times Staff Writer
November 4, 2006

WASHINGTON — Richard N. Perle, the former Pentagon advisor regarded as the intellectual godfather of the Iraq war, now believes he should not have backed the U.S.-led invasion, and he holds President Bush responsible for failing to make timely decisions to stem the rising violence, according to excerpts from a magazine interview.

Perle — a leading neoconservative who chaired the Pentagon's defense advisory board for the first three years of the Bush administration — is quoted in January's Vanity Fair as saying the U.S. might have been able to strip Saddam Hussein of his ability to build unconventional weapons "by means other than a direct military intervention."

"I think if I had been Delphic, and had seen where we are today, and people had said 'Should we go into Iraq?' I think now I probably would have said, 'No, let's consider other strategies for dealing with the thing that concerns us most, which is Saddam supplying weapons of mass destruction to terrorists,' " Perle said, according to interview excerpts released Friday by the magazine.

Perle's about-face is the latest in a series of war recriminations by neoconservatives, many of whom blame Iraq's spiraling violence on the administration's management of the postwar stabilization effort.

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I could say 'Yes, but not my son or daughter, What about their sons and daughters? Hmmmmm

Army general issues appeal to keep military ranks filled


By Ron Martz
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 11/04/06

Americans need to get serious about the war against international terrorism and start encouraging more young men and women to join the military, a top Army general said Friday.

Lt. Gen. Russel Honore, commander of the First Army based at Fort Gillem in Forest Park, said in a speech at the Atlanta Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Decatur that many people in the United States tend to let the events of their everyday lives overshadow the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"We need to remind people we are at war," Honoré said. (SNIP)

But because of the nature of the enemy, he added, it is important for Americans to understand what is at stake for the nation and to make concerted efforts to keep the ranks filled.

"We can't have a part of America say, 'Yes, but not my son or daughter.'"

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