David Pugh wrote:

"The
soldiers said, 'We are a small group. We cannot take control of this site'."

This is the issue, not military incompentence.

"U.S. officers say the center had already been ransacked before their troops
arrived.

Despite this statement, you choose to believe the Iraqis. Why?

They didn't try to stop the looting, says Colonel Madere, because
"there was no directive that said do not allow anyone in and out of this
place."

Once again we get back to the issue at hand. You would not have a plan to
secure a suspected WMD site unless you had enough forces to do so.

Bush has and had nothing to do with force taskings during Operation IRAQI
FREEDOM.

But he had everything to do with setting overall objectives and allocating
adequate resources.

He set the *overall* objectives, not individual tactical objectives. As far as
allocating adequate resources, Bush played the hand he was dealt. I suppose
Bush could have delayed the operation until congress authorized an increase in
U.S. force manning, then waited for that increase in manning to become a
reality, but even if he's to win a second term, he wouldn't have see that
increase take effect.

Franks was told to defeat the Iraqi army and capture
Baghdad. If Franks was never told that securing the known NBC sites was
important then it is hard to hold him responsible.

By this last statement I take it you have no military experience. "Important"
is a relative term, during a war (and even in peace) somethings are more
important than others. Because seizing Baghdad quickly was of a *higher*
priority than securing *suspected* WMD sites, doesn't mean that was not
important. We had a choice to make in regards to priority, we choose to sieze
Baghdad. If we had chosen to secure all *suspected* WMD sites prior to seizing
Baghdad and the Iraqi army had begun lobbying Sarin filled artilliary shells
killing both coalition personnel and innocent Iraqi's, you would have been up
in arms over that choice.

What happened to this concern when it came to securing the materials
that could be used to make a dirty bomb?

It was put at a lower priority than destroying the regime and severing the
control to already weaponized CW.


BUFDRVR

"Stay on the bomb run boys, I'm gonna get those bomb doors open if it harelips
everyone on Bear Creek"