Originally Posted by astralis

bluesman,



disagree here. the administration wanted to use a lighter footprint because SecDef Rumsfeld wanted to make a point about the lethality of a RMA-ized american army. in this, he was supported by neo-conservatives such as paul wolfowitz, as they believed a smaller army would add to the shock effect ("look what the americans did with only a fraction of their possible power!"), and also because they were pushing for military action into either tehran or damascus next.

rumsfeld wanted to use 75,000 troops, utilizing heavily on SpecOps and air power in a replication of the afghan campaign. gen. franks originally wanted gulf war levels, and the result was a compromise.

aka in the end, faulty troop levels were a DoD decision and NOT a politically-motivated decision, either on part of the white house or for that matter, the democrats.

to the extent that troop levels were politically-motivated, should have been when the administration- not just rumsfeld- refused to listen to the testimony of gen. shinseki, whom asserted that iraq needed even more than gulf war level of troops.