Hillary and Donald, Sittin' in a Tree

Hillary flails about today as she talks about progress in Iraq: Clinton acknowledged that new tactics have brought some success against insurgents, particularly in Iraq's al-Anbar province. ''It's working. We're just years too late in changing our tactics,'' she said. ''We can't ever let that happen again. We can't be fighting the last war. We have to keep preparing to fight the new war.'' Sounds like she and Donald Rumsfeld are on the same page!

(AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Being lectured by Hillary Clinton on military tactics is like being lectured by Bill Clinton on family values. Oh wait, he did that.

But seriously, Hillary manages to display her appalling ignorance of things military in even that short an excerpt. Her mistake is thinking that we know what the next war will be like, and that there is a recipe for success for any given war. This has been a persistent flaw in liberal assumptions - that there is a "right way" to fight a war. That assumption is only valid if the military has perfect knowledge, an unresponsive enemy, and overwhelming strength. And that never happens.

She also misses the distinction between a strategic change and a tactical change. The old "Stay-on-base/patrol/train" strategy minimized US casualties while we built up the Iraqi military. The current "Clear/hold/stay-in-neighborhoods" strategy is quite different, increasing US casualties, but reducing violence in cleared neighborhoods. It is the strategic shift that has resulted in the recent gains in Iraq.

Still, Hillary's statement is largely true, if empty. The sclerotic military leadership has always been slow to react to new missions and battlefields. This is one reason I admire Donald Rumsfeld: he badgered a reluctant military into accepting (mostly) a new doctrine based on flexibility, speed, and coordination. So, though I was joking above, he and Hillary really are on the same page.

I think she would be horrified if she thought her shallow partisan rhetoric all the way through.