[island_dude]

I have been reading the book since newsweek published a excerpt. Rumsfeld certainly doesn't come off well. I had issues with him from the begining and the book really defines what bothers me about him. Basically, he is on a power trip. He has a mission that he is pursuing to fix all that is wrong in defense. The problem is that he is seems to want to have it both ways. He wanted Bremmer to report through him and then claimed to be out of the loop when he realized that the results were not positive. Rice comes out of the books looking very principled it reniforces my impression that she has her head on her sholders.

I haven't read the other two books, and I would like to. I have to say though that it appears that they basically planned for failure. They focused on the early conflict and not the stability and rebuilding. Rumsfeld's lack of concern for this is down right scary. It doesn't bother him that decisions he made directly resulted in the early failures.