The thing that annoys me most right now (OK, one of the things that annoys me) is the "nyah nyah nyah" tone to much of the rejoicing over our military success in Iraq. Yes, it's great that Saddam is out of power, but why be so childish about it? "Smugness is our greatest enemy" says this Newsweek editorial.
He castigates those of us who opposed the war for not admitting that freeing millions of people from Saddam was a good idea, but he does also skewer the Pentagon for the poor handling of the aftermath.
"I learned last week that many Army officers wanted to airlift in 3,000 MPs (military police) from Europe to protect supply lines and police Baghdad. That would have aided the drive to the capital and helped to protect institutions like hospitals and museums once forces arrived there. As it was, the main hospital wasn’t even secured until an officer was alerted to the looting by New Yorker reporter Jon Lee Anderson.
"But Rumsfeld apparently decided: no MPs. The European MPs would have had to be replaced by reservists. And if more reservists had been called up in the middle of the war, it would have reinforced the criticism that Rumsfeld hadn't sent enough troops. When the real history is written, we may find out that some ofthe world’s oldest treasures were lost to looters in part because someone at the Pentagon suffers from the oldest of human sins—pride."
