go to see rumsfeld. what i would actually say to the minister's on whatever aspect of iraq policy, if the state department is on board, you have to argue very fiercely with the vice-president office and if they want to see rumsfeld, with his office, and also with condoleezza rice how one port in these matters are. the one thing that ran all through 2002 was if it came to war in iraq, we would all be in much better shape for the war itself and the aftermath if it is done within the framework of an international coalition, blessed by the administration. with the vice-president and rumsfeld, andÑi up to a point wh condoleezza rice. >> that brings me over to my last question, and brings me to crawford, april, 2002. what i would like to ask you is this -- what extent did american and british policy forces merge in 2002 along the lines that you suggested during that weekend at the crawford ranch? in particular, bush's commitment at that time to follow the u.n. inspectors route and also by constructing an inte

go to see rumsfeld. what i would actually say to the minister's on whatever aspect of iraq policy, if the state department is on board, you have to argue very fiercely with the vice-president office and if they want to see rumsfeld, with his office, and also with condoleezza rice how one port in these matters are. the one thing that ran all through 2002 was if it came to war in iraq, we would all be in much better shape for the war itself and the aftermath if it is done within the framework of an international coalition, blessed by the administration. with the vice-president and rumsfeld, andÑi up to a point wh condoleezza rice. >> that brings me over to my last question, and brings me to crawford, april, 2002. what i would like to ask you is this -- what extent did american and british policy forces merge in 2002 along the lines that you suggested during that weekend at the crawford ranch? in particular, bush's commitment at that time to follow the u.n. inspectors route and also by constructing an inte

rumsfeld said, if push comes to shove, we don't need teh brits. >> [unintelligible] >> impossible to say. we had a very high reputation at the time in the united states. there was no popular stance in favor of going to war. it was not particularly encouraging of the administration. i did not come across anybody except for an oil man in houston. i doubti t would have done a loto f damage. -- a lot of damage. >> in order to be seen as a good ally and reap the benefits that would produce, was it necessary for us to go in with the strength that we did? could we have made a smaller contribution to the operation? >> i'm sure we could've made a smaller contribution to the operation. it was not in the heart of a military plan, along the spectrum of military persistence, what made us fix on the large land force. i remember being told by a member of the administration quite early in 2002, we were apparently planning to send more or less what we did send. i'll always have to say, if it came the war. -- if it came to war. in addition to political support, it would've been greatly received and ha

one guy named tom warwick was infamous leaked kicked off the team by rumsfeld. that was a very big problem there. they did more war gaming in terms of looking it then we did and looking at the after raft -- aftermath of iraq. we learned a lot of lessons from iraq from an execution standpoint. one thing we then have to say is with the surge, we have another thing called a re-evaluation phase that we did not talk about. looking at it over time and seeing whether it works or not. in this case, they did a really good job of reevaluating what was working and not working in iraq. in some of the provinces you had some really terrific general's and other soldiers who were basically using this method. i think there are some real problems there, but in the end, there was the surge that could overcome a lot of the problems they fell into initially. >> this is such a short question with a huge possibility of answers. maybe you can highlight an answer here. how can health care reform be effectively implemented? >> i will try to keep it really short. the health care reform, w

those months of the views of the senior members of the incoming administration, in particular, donald rumsfeld, district cheney, colin powell and condoleezza rice with regard to iraq. >> well, it wasn't until fairly late in the day in that year that we knew who were going to occupy the chief's positions in the bush administration. so until that became clear, to find out what was going on, what was being planned, it became necessary to speak to members of a group who were known informally as the vulcans. the vulcans were a group of american advisors who advised george w. bush when he was the presidential candidate. and when i went down to texas in early 1999, which was shortly before he declared himself as a candidate, he said to me with much frankness, i don't know much about foreign policy, i'm going to have to learn pretty damn fast, and one of the things i'm going to do is surround myself with good people. and the good people turned out to be this group, called the vulcans, led condoleezza rice and paul wolfowitz, who has become deputy secretary for defense. so my team and i folk tussed on

you remember that secretary rumsfeld said in january or february, 2003, that we will go and do this whether or not the british are with us. they were planning to do all thing, if necessary, whether or not they have allies. -- had allies. it is in the american frame of mind to do things on the basis of american decisionmaking, american resources, american self-reliance with other partners being very welcome to add things where they can but is mainly being an american enterprise -- >> if i could interrupt you. when the british government took the decision in different military options it was presented with to go for the largest, including a division level land force, a strong part of the argumentation was that this would give us a significant influence over the way the operation was conducted. do you think that london failed to appreciate that despite that decision that we were a low- quantity partner, did you think we re -- did they think that we were a high-quantity part because of that? >> no, they would have to rely on good american decisionmaking and resource allocation to get this thing

you remember that secretary rumsfeld said in january or february, 2003, that we will go and do this whether or not the british are with us. they were planning to do all thing, if necessary, whether or not they have allies. it is in the american frame of mind to do things on the basis of american decisionmaking, american resources, american self-reliance with other partners being very welcome to add things where they can but is mainly being an american enterprise -- >> if i could interrupt you. when the british government took the decision in different military options it was presented with to go for the largest, including a division level land force, a strong part of the argumentation was that this would give us a significant influence over the way the operation was conducted. do you think that london failed to appreciate that despite that decision that we were a low- quantity partner, did you think we re -- did they think that we were a high-quantity part because of that? >> no, they would have to rely on good american decisionmaking and resource allocation to get this thing done well. in

. >> foreign defense secretary rumsfeld took issue on the  speech last night and i just want to clarify t the prs said commanders in afghanistan repeatedly asked for support to deal with the re-emergence of the taliban. but they did not arrive. i assume you are referring to the request in 2008? >> that's what the line of the speech -- i will let secretary rumsfeld explain to you and to others whether he thinks that the effort in afghanistan was sufficiently resourced during thinks tenure. as secretary of defense. i think that's something that -- >> he said he's not aware of a sickle request of that nature between 2001 and 2006 when he was secretary of defense. >> i'll let him explain to the american public whether he believes the effort in afghanistan during 2001 and 2006 was appropriately resourced. you go to war with the secretary of defense you have, jay. >> that's cute. the question is what specifically was president obama talking about when he said that? >> what president obama was talking about were additional resource requests that came in during 2008 which we have discussed in h

rumsfeld made a big deal. the guy really transforming the military from within rewriting the counter insurge yens. he's been an inflewen shal figure. host: you write hear the best idea that counterterrorism requires more than counter terror forces. guest: we survade these people. they gave their own answers. we need civilians and agricultural specialists. our next call from texas. caller: good morning. where is thomas sole on your list. caller: i'm not surprised coming from time magazine. he is probably the clearest thinker in this country. if he writes or says it,, he can back it up with reason. to put obama as number two, he is a clear marxist. host: have you ever heard him say that? caller: everybody he has associated with have been left of center and admitted communists. guest: the funny thing is he's been criticized from the left as being a capitol sell out. sellers is one of those figures who think people think he sowed the seed for the financial crisis. take that for what you will? host: on the line fro

secretary rumsfeld said he was "not aware of a single request." i wonder, admiral, are you aware of a request for reinforcements from 2001 to 2006, or 2008 that was not heeded? can you tell the committee who made those requests? can you tell the committee who in the chain of command denied those requests? because i find the president's assertion having been a part of a very strong bipartisan support for afghanistan really astonishing. >> fortunately, another issue left hanging. the time of the gentleman expired. >> i would ask unanimous consent to permit the admiral to answer the question. >> any objection? >> just in my tenure here, sir, that general mckiernan specifically had a fairly substantial request for upwards of 20,000 forces which we couldn't meet because they just weren't there. they were in iraq. i spock out very early afghanistan was underresourced. from where i live, underresourced with military services. we didn't have them because they were pushed to iraq and we couldn't -- really didn't have the flexibility to move them nap was th

rumsfeld made a big deal. the guy really transforming the military from within rewriting the counter insurge yens. he's been an inflewen shal figure. host: you write hear the best idea that counterterrorism requires more than counter terror forces. guest: we survade these people. they gave their own answers. we need civilians and agricultural specialists. our next call from texas. caller: good morning. where is thomas sole on your list. caller: i'm not surprised coming from time magazine. he is probably the clearest thinker in this country. if he writes or says it,, he can back it up with reason. to put obama as number two, he is a clear marxist. host: have you ever heard him say that? caller: everybody he has associated with have been left of center and admitted communists. guest: the funny thing is he's been criticized from the left as being a capitol sell out. sellers is one of those figures who think people think he sowed the seed for the financial crisis. take that for what you will? host: on the line fro

it was run by war criminals like rumsfeld and bush, who initiated torture. now we have a country that it tends to justify the unjustifiable. i am a quaker from pennsylvania. so i am certainly opposed to war in general. especially unnecessary wars. which is one of the reasons we cannot have universal health care. because needlessly $3 million per day goes to the bloated pentagon budget. it is one of the reasons. the other reason is because the other half goes to the wealthy 1% on wall street. host: we have got the point. general? guest: thank you very much. i understand people's position with regard to war. the only thing i would say is that if you look at the risks to our nation and national security out there, it is important to understand what the consequences of failure are. if we fail in iraq and it becomes a failed state, rather than having some element of a democracy in the least, instead you have a failed state? what are the consequences for not only the region, but the security of our country? that is a question worth looking at. to have strong econo

one guy named tom workearrick ws infamously kicked off the team by rumsfeld. that was a big problem. they did more war-gaming in terms of congestion pricing than we did at the aftermath of a iraq. if they fell into the overconfidence trap. a lot of those problems -- we learned a lot of lessons from iraq, from an execution standpoint. with the surge, we have another thing called the evaluation phase. your reevaluating your initiatives and seeing if it were not. in this case, they did a really good job at 3 evaluating what was working or not working in iraq -- at reevaluating what was working are not working in iraq. you had terrific generals and other soldiers who were basically using this method. they decided to adopt this over a lot of opposition. with the surge, you also have a positive story of having overcome a lot of the straps that they fell into originally. >> this is such a short question with such a huge possibility of dancers. maybe you can highlight an answer. how can health care reform be effectively implemented? >> i will try to keep it really sho

in the end donald rumsfeld would not accept. and then the department of defense you have a different story. the trouble without engaging the americans with the aftermath was that they themselves did not create the office of every construction humanitarian assistance until february 2003. it was not for a lack of trying by british officials. i was not present in the meeting on january 31st 2003 when we know that the british team did say to the president what about the aftermath? that is it. and not giving you any scoops but that has been out for a couple of years. seoul officials did try to engage but the heart of the matter, on the american side they did not get their act together and then it turned out the act was not good enough any way. as it was confirmed. >> thank you. one last question. to go back to the question of the british influence on the administration, do you feel that because whatever commitment may have been bed at crawford or in the summer after crawford, that britain's ability to say say, but to influence the un

rumsfeld and cheney wanted seven wars in five years, and that is exactly what we are getting. every dollar spent to kill people over there should be spent productively in health care. i would encourage all women to rise up against the military industrial complex. american people, and to keep yourself about the trans- afghanistan pipeline, and let's bring our men home. there were no weapons of mass destruction. guest: one thing to say something good about the british, they have sent more troops to afghanistan, and they are paying for it by cutting their base line, their defense budget. host: mr. korb, thank you for being with us. >> c-span christmas day, a look to 2010 politics, including eric kanter and david gregory. buzz aldrin and fellow astronauts. a discussion of the role of muslims in america and the world. later, a former cia intelligence officer on u.s. strategy in afghanistan. and remembering the lives of william f. buckley jr. and senator ted kennedy. >> there is about a month left to enter c-span's 2010 student cam contest, with prizes for middle and high school stu

it is outrageous that the bush-cheney-rumsfeld administration failed to stop him. unnecessarily prolong this conflict, strengthened our enemies as their attention and our resources were diverted to an ideologically driven invasion of iraq. surely all americans should respond affirmatively to president obama's call last night for unity of purpose in keeping our families secure and overcoming all of those who would do us harm. i agree with so very much of what president obama said but not so much with what and how he said he would accomplish our shared goal. it's true he had no really good and easy alternatives and i applaud his deliberative effort. but the path to peace and security will not be found through a wider war. it is wholly unrealistic to expect that we can escalate our military forces in the harsh faraway landscape of afghanistan by another 40% then deescalate and begin bringing them home all within a mere 18 months. week of been fighting in afghanistan on the installment plan, a few more troops, a few more months and a whole lot more money, billions. the

rumsfeld n.j. 17 wars in five years. every dollar spent to kill people should be spent productively in health care. . we are in a situation in the senate. we are in a process right now where the parliamentary is set up in the senate. there are a number of amendments and debate still. you have the actual health care bill that was amended into the senate bill into the base bill. on top of that you have a manager's amendment. it makes a number of changes to the health-care bill that is being amended into the base bill. right now we are in the middle of the process of letting those votes happen. every time they do these because of the senate's role, you have to let 30 hours run that cut off debate to make sure that there is enough time to debate. we are in the middle of that series of a votes. we are looking at a number of hours. this will happen on thursday, final passage, before we get to the last step. they're going to the column entry procedure of having a vote, awaiting a set time, and having in other -- parliamentary p

host: former representative donald rumsfeld, "stick with one of three responses. i know, i can tell you, i know and i cannot tell you, or, i do not know." . guest: 1 is don't do a live advertisement with an animal. no explanation of it. that really piqued my interest. he is now the chancellor of texas tech. i said, "where did you get this thing? he said, "don't you remember george mcgovern? he had a deal where he had a life advertisement going and he had a dog in it and he got mad at the dog and took a swing at him, allegedly." that incredible negative impact. i had forgotten about the thing. the other goal is always asked for the vote. that came from tip o'neill. he had this lady and he said, "how are we doing?" she said, "here is the list, nine votes for you." "your name is not on the list." "congressman, you never asked for it." host: former congressman lou frey, thanks for stopping by. guest: that you very much. by the book. buy -- the book. we need to teach our kids about six. hos -- about six. -- civics. host: we will come back to the question we asked at th

it was run by war criminals like rumsfeld and bush, who initiated torture. now we have a country that it tends to justify the unjustifiable. i am a quaker from pennsylvania. so i am certainly opposed to war in general. especially unnecessary wars. which is one of the reasons we cannot have universal health care. because needlessly $3 million per day goes to the bloated pentagon budget. it is one of the reasons. the other reason is because the other half goes to the wealthy 1% on wall street. host: we have got the point. general? guest: thank you very much. i understand people's position with regard to war. the only thing i would say is that if you look at the risks to our nation and national security out there, it is important to understand what the consequences of failure are. if we fail in iraq and it becomes a failed state, rather than having some element of a democracy in the least, instead you have a failed state? what are the consequences for not only the region, but the security of our country? that is a question worth looking at. to have strong econo

one guy named tom warwick was infamous leaked kicked off the team by rumsfeld. that was a very big problem there. they did more war gaming in terms of looking it then we did and looking at the after raft -- aftermath of iraq. we learned a lot of lessons from iraq from an execution standpoint. one thing we then have to say is with the surge, we have another thing called a re-evaluation phase that we did not talk about. looking at it over time and seeing whether it works or not. in this case, they did a really good job of reevaluating what was working and not working in iraq. in some of the provinces you had some really terrific general's and other soldiers who were basically using this method. i think there are some real problems there, but in the end, there was the surge that could overcome a lot of the problems they fell into initially. >> this is such a short question with a huge possibility of answers. maybe you can highlight an answer here. how can health care reform be effectively implemented? >> i will try to keep it really short. the health care reform, w

one guy named tom warrick was infamously kicked off the team by rumsfeld. that is a big problem. they did more war gaming, in terms of looking lending congestion pricing, then we did at looking at the aftermath of iraq. it was obviously a huge problem. they also fell into the overconfidence trap where we thought we would be treated as liberators and so forth. we learned a lot of lessons from iraq from an incident -- from an execution standpoint. with the surge, we have another thing called re-evaluation, where you reevaluate your initiatives. in this case, they did a good job at reevaluate what was working and what was not working in iraq. in some of the provinces, you had some really terrific the generals and other soldiers who were basically using this method and decided to adopt it over. but there was a lot of opposition. there were some real problems there. but, in the end, you have a real positive story of being able to overcome some of these traps that they fell into initially. >> i almost hesitate to ask this question. it is such a short question with a huge possibility of

secretary rumsfeld did attend. that but that was -- that was really a one-time thing. what we're looking for is a sustained strategic partnership and having these talks with the undersecretary level with the pakistani minister of defense counterpart is exactly what level that we can sustain. we want to make sure that we can have regular meetings but we're actually looking to have them on a yearly or more frequent basis in the future. it's been a three year gap. one of the problems when you try and tie everything to just the availability of one high-level person is that it's difficult to do that. but in this case the commitment of undersecretary floynoy to these talks and to their future is a real sign of progress in our relationship. >> can i go back to drones a minute. two-part question on drones. first, i know it's not your habit to do so but can you confirm what pakistani intelligence officials are telling the wires this morning that there were two u.s. drone strikes in the tribal areas and that -- >> you really want to try and make news, don't you? >> yes. and the