Colin Powell: US Army is "broken"
Yesterday, on CBS' news interview program "Face The Nation," former Secretary of State, National Security Advisor, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and U.S. Army General Colin Powell told Bob Schieffer that, "I’m suggesting that what General Shoemaker said the other day before a committee looking at the reserve and national guard, that the active army is about broken. General Shoemaker is absolutely right. All of my contacts within the army suggest that the army has a serious problem in the active force."
According to reports from an unnamed senior DoD official, the entire 3,500-man 2d Brigade from the 82nd Airborne Division in Ft. Bragg North Carolina will be sent to Kuwait shortly after the holidays.
The new Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on his first day at work said that. "Failure in Iraq at this juncture would be a calamity that would haunt our nation, impair our credibility and endanger Americans for decades to come."
Retired Army Brig. Gen. Kevin Ryan, a Senior Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University, said of any prospective surge in troop levels that "The question is going to be how high."
On Friday night, the New York Times reported on its Web site that military planners and budget analysts have been asked to provide President Bush with options for increasing U.S. forces in Iraq by 20,000 or more.
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