Tyrt and Rubma both: first of all, thanks for sharing your thoughts on this subject respectfully. A lot of threads I've started in this forum end up very differently.

Two thoughts:

1. My understanding is that Yingling didn't criticize a SPECIFIC decision or individual in public -- which would indeed have consequences damaging to discipline. Correct me if I'm wrong, but as I understand it he wrote, in a military journal, a criticism of senior officers as a class, and criticized not their decisions but the limitations they placed on decision-making processes in the name of careerism. I think that's legitimate.

2. As I tried to say in my original post, the decisions which caused the most grief in Iraq were NOT those made by anyone in the military. In fact we know that many senior military, including Shalikashvili, predicted that the number of troops deployed for the invasion wouldn't be sufficient to pacify the country. He was, essentially, fired by the civilians for saying so, which has led -- in my view -- to the situation where his successors have settled for what troops they could get without complaint, even when it was obvious far more were needed.

The military is, thank God, true to the principle of civilian rule, and as a result it is more than one can expect for a serving senior officer to openly criticize the President, no matter how damaging the results of his bungling may be. What I would really like to see is some RETIRED senior officers -- how about YOU, General Powell? -- speak up a bit more loudly. As it stands, the President has behind him the active military (because, of course, it's insubordination to be otherwise) and appears therefore to have his worst decisions endorsed by the "experts" in the field. I understand that most senior officers are conservative, and thus tend to favor Republicans, but it seems to me that loyalty to those who serve under one might come into play here.

The fact is that the military has been given a mission and denied the tools it needs to achieve it because to do so would interfere in tax breaks for the supporters of the ruling party. SOMEBODY ought to be saying that, besides an easily dismissed civilian like myself.