clarke isn't exactly an exemplar of political nous. remember the hat-swapping fiasco with general mladic of the bosnian serb army? how he accepted a present of a pistol from mladic, which did not go down well when clarke and entourage passed through croatian territory - wearing a serb hat, autographed by the butcher of bosnia!

and, um, wasn't wes clarke the chap who ordered american tanks to fill in iraqi trenches, after the ceasefire at the end of gulf war 1, thus killing possibly hundreds of surrendered personnel after hostilities had ended?

if i'm wrong on that last thing, who was it?

You're probably thinking of some of the accusations that sometimes get made against General Barry McCaffrey, who went on to be President Clinton's "drugs tsar".

Actually, the trench filling occurred at the start of the war when we crossed Iraqi lines. We broke through and planned spots and ACE (armored combat earth movers turned left and right and filled in the trenches. Much better that having them take shots at everyone as the moved by, and much, much better than trying to winkle them out at the point of a bayonet. C'est le guerre. Should have surrended when we asked you to the first 100 times...
As far as I know, Gen Clarke was not even in theatre, but in any case the CINC holds ultimate responsibility, and that was Gen Schwarzkopf.
I don't doubt the trenches were filled in after prisoners were collected and the shooting stopped. They were so desparate to give up some surrendered to an UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) that had crashed landed...

General Clarke is exactly the type of person we do not need in the White House. He is arrogant and self Serving just as the other idiot Rhodes Scholar from Arkansas was. Clarke was one of the Generals who would do anything for personal gain at the expense of soldiers.

I was a soldier for twenty Years starting in 1981 and retiring in 2001. Clarke and others like him would never speak the truth about how bad we were stretched. No for him and others like him it was, give us more and we'll do it. The only reason was to advance themselves. They did not think of the Welfare of the Troops, so we suffered badly. But Clarke didn't let his wife suffer. She flew in his aircraft on pleasure trips and took his vehicle out for pleasure. This was documented in I believe the Army Times but I have not yet been able to find an archive copy.


I pray we don't get him. but the mainstream American public is STUPID and would vote for someone just because the media paints him to be someone he is not.

who the hell are you to say americans are stupid, fuck you. if you actually knew something about american government, you would know that the american public doesn't technically vote for the pres. we have the 'college' to do it...i didn't come up with the rules, but shit, we get to vote but it doesn't 'really' count...its fucked up...but yeah, dumbass just because our politicians are doing stuff doesn't mean us americans agree w/it.

i don't

dude, just stop being so judgemental of us americans...most of us didn't agree to the war(s) . but we can't stop it...we can only protest and shit.

so fuck you britians and your fucking tony blair starting war w/fucking dumbass Wbushy. assholes :)

ok, i got my bitching out...peace and love to the world :)

Wow there is a lot of anti-Clarke hostility on this board. I live in Canada and I watch and follow American politics as a hobby. Personally, I thought Clarke was the best nomination for the Democratic party. He is incredibly smart (unlike the current "leader" in the U.S.) He has credentials as a successful leader (unlike the current dick-tree commander and cheat) I don't know how you can call Clarke a war monger when he didn't start the wars he fought in, he merely won them for you. Talk about ingrates. You'd rather have had a general that didn't know how to win? Or perhaps one that would show the Iraqi's the mercy that they would never receive in kind? I'm glad that Canada does not go to war at the drop of a dime, but I for one would hope that if we ever did, that we had a kick @ss general like Retired General Wesley Clarke. He's charismatic. Holds important liberal virtues. Most importantly, Bush is a deserter, Clarke is a war hero. Bush likes to start wars because he's never had to fight in one. Clarke is not pro war, he just knows how to win one if he ever gets in to one. I know who I'd rather have as leader. I also like the fact that he stood up to Bush when Bush tried to get him to take one for the boys over the WMD's. Bush asked Clarke to say that there were WMD's in Iraq and Clarke told him he would, if he saw evidence. Evidence not being one of the Bush admin's strong points.

Anyway, peace from up North and hopefully you have a democratic president with in a years time. Any of them are better than Bush, heck I'd rather have Rev. Al Sharpten or Dennis K. as president, and that says a lot.