"They attacked us!"

The cocked-up "Petraeus" Report on our glorious adventure in Iraq that's actually being written by the White House [1]? General Petreaus will be delivering it on September 11 [2]. Can you imagine anything more cynical?

Kind of reminds me of General Westmoreland's return to the United States in November of 1967. He said "we have got our opponents almost on the ropes," that "the end begins to come into view," that there was "light at the end of the tunnel." It worked, at least for its intended purpose: public relations. Time reported on November 17, "so wide-ranging is Allied surveillance...that few safe spots remain to the Communists in South Vietnam," then promised on November 24: "slow but promisingly tangible progress.... Viet Cong recruitment, running last year at a rate of some 7,500 per month, has now dropped to 3,500," then on December 8, "In recent weeks in South Viet Nam, Communist troops have been regularly beaten back, hurled from prepared positions, put to flight and slaughtered in huge numbers," then on January 12: "Administration officials, long convinced that there is no realistic hope of peace negotiations until after the 1968 elections--if then--were admitting last week that they may have been too pessimistic."

That immediately preceded the enemy's Tet Offensive, which proved every utterance of Westmoreland false. Why should we trust them any more now?

[VOCAB. UPDATE: Two friends of The Big Con have expressed confusion at the phrase "cocked up," thinking I meant "cooked up." Well, that too. But I'm glad to introduce those who don't know it to an excellently useful Britishism: "cocked up" means twisted beyond all usefulness. Which is precisely what, of course, the "Petraeus" Report will be.]