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Kristol: We Have Not Had A Serious Three-Year Effort To Fight A War In Iraq

This morning on Fox News Sunday, Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol, one the staunches defenders of the administration’s policy in Iraq, said the war in Iraq was not a “serious effort.”

Transcript:

BILL KRISTOL: There would not be civil war if Zarqawi had not spent the last 2 1/2 years — had ex-Saddamists with him, very skillfully going on the offensive slaughtering Shia in Karbala, now blowing up the mosque.

CHRIS WALLACE: They’re there. There are going to be more mosques to blow up. What do you do about the terrorists?

KRISTOL: Kill them. Defeat them.

CHRIS WALLACE: We’ve been trying.

KRISTOL: We’ve been trying, and our soldiers are doing terrifically, but we have not had a serious three-year effort to fight a war in Iraq as opposed to laying the preconditions for getting out.

CICI CONNELLY: I think that really begs the question then: what have we been doing over there for three-plus years? You say there hasn’t been a serious effort to rid that region of the terrorists. I just wonder what secretary Rumsfeld would say in response to that or all the U.S. soldiers who have been over there all this time.

KRISTOL: Secretary Rumsfeld’s plan was to draw town to 30,000 troops at the end of major activities.

Essentially, Kristol claims the Iraq war — which he was sure would be a smashing success — isn’t working out because Donald Rumsfeld is Michael Moore.

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Another question: Mr. Kristol, if the administration’s policy in Iraq the last three years has not been a “serious effort” why have you spent the last three years defending it?

UPDATE: Crooks and Liars has the video.