Perhaps Donald Rumsfeld was right: the Coalition should not have gone for the ‘hard slog’ in Afghanistan (or Iraq). Hindsight suggests that Rumsfeld had foresight in his desire that a shock and awe campaign be followed by a light presence and eventual withdrawal – the blood baths that have ensued from intense deployment might have been avoided. I hope the two times Secretary for Defence Secrte addresses those issues in his memoir, Known and Unknown, due to be published in January three months after Bush’s. Another thing I wouldn’t mind clearing up, is what the hell he meant by this:

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