Advisor to Condi and Petraeus: "Invading Iraq was F*cking Stupid"

Amazing levelheadedness from a bad-ass Australian.

Former Australian Army officer David Kilcullen, who helped Gen. David Petraeus “design his 2007 counterinsurgency strategy in Iraq,” is currently an adviser to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. In a recent interview with Spencer Ackerman, Kilcullen, the main author of an upcoming handbook on counterinsurgency for senior policy-makers, said he tells them they should “think very, very carefully before intervening” in other countries. As an example, Kilcullen called the invasion of Iraq “f*cking stupid“:

More bluntly, Kilcullen, who helped Petraeus design his 2007 counterinsurgency strategy in Iraq, called the decision to invade Iraq “stupid” — in fact, he said “f*cking stupid” — and suggested that if policy-makers apply the manual’s lessons, similar wars can be avoided in the future.

“The biggest stupid idea,” Kilcullen said, “was to invade Iraq in the first place.”

Word. And McCain was right there predicting a cheap war against a dangerous foe, easily won, with no resistance after the fact. And yet he attacks Obama's judgment? That's a transparent dual Rovian attack. First, you attack your opponents strengths. Second, you attack your opponent for your own weakness. In so doing, you inoculate yourself and establish the narrative. Our "liberal" press eat it up.