I don’t know how we missed this piece when it appeared over at the American Thinker, but FrontPage has picked up the excellent column by Richard Baehr: “The Protocols of the Elders of Zinni.” This morning the American Thinker adds Douglas Hanson’s “The low-down on Zinni.”
UPDATE: Commander Mark Basich (USN, ret.) demurs from Hanson’s critique:
I think Zinni is contemptible. Having said that, I also think the American Thinker article [by Hanson] that you linked to was an amateurish hack job — at least the first half of it that dealt with Zinni’s tour as CINC CENTCOM. It is written as if the author thinks that CENTCOM is in charge of US policy in his geographic area, without significant direction from Washington. No CINC could have been successful in combatting Islamic terrorists under the policies of the Clinton administration. Nor, for that matter, under the policies of the pre-9/11 G W Bush administration. Before 9/11, the nation was not prepared to do what needed to be done (and still may not be). Any rogue CINC who had attempted to do what Douglas Hanson thinks he should have done in CENTCOM in the ’90s would have been fired, and put on trial.
I am sure that someone could write a fair critique of Zinni’s CENTCOM performance. Douglas Hanson hasn’t. His critique is oblivious of history, and ignorant of the politico-military institutional relationships. In fact, because it is so laughably unfair, his article does more harm than good.