In a Land Far, Far Away

I just finished reading an article in The New Times that described a PowerPoint presentation that was made by military planners in 2002 concerning the allegedly-as-of-then possible invasion of Iraq. Once the planning reached an actual occupation and post-Saddam period, the slides were stuffed full of puppies and balloons. The biggest job left for our armed forces was going to be sweeping up the rose petals that had been strewn in their path on the way in.

And this is the problem with the current administration: They always plan assuming that things will work exactly as they want them to. It never occurs to them that things might go terribly wrong and that instead of paring the American presence in Iraq down to 5,000 soldiers, we would be "surging" up to 150,000.

Prudent planning always assumes the worst likely outcome. The sunshine and lollipops stay stored in a box until needed. And had a worst-likely-outcome assessment been made of invading Iraq, it never would have happened.

Let's just hope that someone somewhere with some sort of influence will apply the proper kind of analysis to the invasion of Iran that Mr. Bush is now plumping for. Remember: Those who do not learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.