🚀 go-pugleaf

"CBZ" <cbz@lasalle.com> wrote in message
news:N-CdnQU-0cpkOXrdRVn-iQ@adelphia.com...
> Um. Duh

Oregon's Gen. McPeak joins other ex-military in calling for Bush
ouster

05:38 PM PDT on Wednesday, June 16, 2004

By ABE ESTIMADA, kgw.com Staff

NEW YORK CITY - Retired U.S. Air Force chief of staff Merrill "Tony"
McPeak of Oregon denounced President Bush's foreign policy as
"incompetent," and the source of worldwide condemnation that has
resulted in American popularity reaching an all-time low.

Retired Air Force general Tony McPeak. (KGW Photo)

Gen. McPeak, who directed the U.S. air campaign against Iraq during
the first Persian Gulf War and who now resides in Lake Oswego, joined
former, high-level ambassadors and generals calling themselves
Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change in urging the American
public to vote against Bush in November.

"I can recognize incompetence when I see it," McPeak said by phone
from New York City on Wednesday. "This administration is not competent
to handle the foreign affairs of this nation. It's letting the country
down. This is my opinion, and it's the opinion of all these
distinguished retired guys, most of whom are Republicans."

McPeak, who is now a security affairs advisor for the John Kerry
presidential campaign and military expert for KGW, opposed the Iraq
war. While the Bush administration did the right thing in rallying
international support for ejecting the Taliban and fighting al-Qaida
in Afghanistan after Sept. 11, it has alienated allies with the
conflict in Iraq.

In countries such as Britain and Italy - who have contributed soldiers
to the fight in Iraq - approval of the American government is low. In
France, Germany and Russia, "it's all downhill from there," McPeak
said.

"Our popularity is at an all-time low, in my memory," said McPeak, who
recently visited Italy. "Right now, in any country in the world, if
you're a supporter of the United States, it's a kiss of death."

The group has not endorsed Kerry, a Massachusetts Senator who is
likely the Democratic presidential candidate.

"This is not political partisanship," McPeak said. "This is just a
straight deal where we don't like to see the interests of this country
and its citizens subverted and sabotaged in a way that this
administration has done."

"We agreed that we had just lost confidence in the ability of the Bush
administration to advocate for American interests or to provide the
kind of leadership that we think is essential," said William Harrop,
the first President Bush's ambassador to Israel, and earlier to four
African countries.

The Bush-Cheney campaign did not immediately have a response to the
group's formally issued statement at a news conference at the National
Press Club in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday.

Among the group are 20 former ambassadors, appointed by both
Democratic and Republican presidents, and other former State
Department officials and military leaders.

Other prominent members include Gen. Joseph Hoar, who led American
forces in the Middle East during the administration of Bush's father;
Admiral William Crowe Jr., ambassador to Britain under President Bill
Clinton and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under President
Ronald Reagan; and Jack Matlock Jr., a member of the National Security
Council under Reagan and ambassador to the Soviet Union from 1987 to
1991.

McPeak said the Bush administration foreign policy transgressions
include refusal to talk about the Kyoto Protocols, a compact signed in
1997 by the Clinton administration, the European Union and Japan to
fight global warming.

"We told them to stick it where the sun don't shine," McPeak said of
the Kyoto agreement.

The Bush administration has also pulled out of the Anti-Ballistic
Missile Treaty with Russia, refused to negotiate any further on an
anti-land mine treaty with 150 other nations and withdrew support from
the International Criminal Court system, he said.

"(President Bush and his advisors) are tone deaf," McPeak said.
"They've been acting with arrogance. They haven't been pleasant to
deal with."