Bu$hco installed, then three star, General Patraeus to replace General George Casey who was subsequently confirmed as Chief of Staff of the United States Army. He was confirmed to that position by the Senate in a vote of 81-0 on January 26, 2007, and became a four star general. Petraeus oversees all coalition forces in Iraq and carries out the new Iraqi strategy plan outlined by the Bush administration.
Before leaving for Iraq Petraeus recruited a number of highly educated military officers, nicknamed "Petraeus guys" or "designated thinkers," to advise him as commander, including Col. Mike Meese, head of the Social Science Department at West Point and Col. H.R. McMaster, famous for his leadership at the Battle of 73 Easting in the First Gulf War and in the pacification of Tal Afar more recently, as well as for his doctoral dissertation on Vietnam-era civil-military relations entitled Dereliction of Duty. While most of Petraeus's closest advisers are American military officers, he also hired Lt. Col. David Kilcullen of the Australian Army, who was working for the US State Department.
IRAQ HEARINGS: Sen. Feingold Question.
from CNN Sept. 10
ReplyDelete"By carefully manipulating the statistics, the Bush-Petraeus report will try to persuade us that violence in Iraq is decreasing and thus the surge is working," said the Senate's No. 2 Democrat, addressing a Washington think tank last week.
Durbin's criticism was echoed by David Walker, head of the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office, who also raised questions about how the statistics were compiled.
In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Friday, Walker said he is not comfortable with the methodology used to track the death toll driven by sectarian violence.
For instance, he said, a body found with a gunshot to the front of the head is classified as an ordinary crime, while a body with a gunshot to the back of the head is attributed to sectarian violence.