War on the Cheap

Excellent article. This comes as close to summarizing my views on the war as anything I've seen in print lately.

But there is more to waging war than fielding an appropriately sized battle force. The domestic economy must also be mobilized. Franklin D. Roosevelt could get Henry Kaiser and other shipbuilders to produce two large cargo ships every day during World War II, but George W. Bush can't get the huge American economy to produce enough ceramic inserts for safety vests for soldiers in Iraq. Or armor for their vehicles. That the great American production machine cannot be marshaled to keep the lights on and the air conditioners humming in Baghdad suggests that we are not serious about winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people.