You go to war with the Army you have

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld delivered a "pep talk" to the troops today in Kuwait (as close as he's likely to get to heavy fighting). During the Q&A, Army Spc. Thomas Wilson, a 31-year-old member of a Tennessee National Guard unit, asked Rumsfeld:

     "Why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass to uparmor our vehicles?"

Rummy asked for the question to be repeated.

     "We do not have proper armored vehicles to carry with us north," was the reply.

Rummy mouthed some platitudes that roughly equate to "we're working on it", then came up with this gem:

     "You go to war with the Army you have, not the Army you might want or wish to have."

Words fail me. "The Army we have" is an organization of well-trained and dedicated men and women that are in the line of fire every day. "The Army we have" has the support of the American people. Sadly, Rummy doesn't think enough of "The Army we have" to get them proper protection against the enemy, forcing them to play "Monster Garage" and scrounge up so-called "hillbilly armor" to bolt to their vehicles.

Maybe Rummy ought to go out on one patrol in a "thin skin" Humvee. I'll bet he'd change his tune then. Rather than accept that armor was being produced "as fast as possible", he'd be screaming bloody murder.