A Correction the Times Won't Make

"The New York Times has once again repeated a popular myth to mislead its readers about Secretary Rumsfeld. We ask for an immediate correction.
Today's editorial claims: "There have never been enough troops, the result of Mr. Rumsfeld’s negligent decision to use Iraq as a proving ground for his pet military theories, rather than listen to his generals." Whether or not the Times believes there were enough troops in Iraq, the claim that any troop level in Iraq is the result of Secretary Rumsfeld "not listening to his generals" is demonstrably untrue.

Generals involved in troop level decisions have been abundantly clear on this matter:

*General Tommy Franks, Commander, U.S. Central Command during the opening of Operation Iraqi Freedom: "Don Rumsfeld was a hard task master -- but he never tried to control the tactics of our war-fight [Franks, "American Soldier, " pg 313]"
4 Mile Creek

That's nice, but you might want to find a better source than Deploy'em and leave'em Franks. I would think his view are biased by the fact that he participated in histories most disastrous military campaign ever, where they drove past the enemy in a race to retire in time to catch Wheel of Fortune.

I think it's fair to say that all the generals you quote are political generals, they have all been claiming victory while we are entrench in a situation which is deteriorating day by day.

If these generals were in fact giving the public their truly felt assessment, then all future promotions should be put on hold, and all officer candidate currently in school now should be sent to Iraq and Afghanistan to study theoretical warfare on the ground in theater.