If the Sec. of Defense doesn’t know whether a country we conquered is in civil war, who does?
[Reporter:] Is the country closer to a civil war?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Oh, I don’t know. You know, I thought about that last night, and just musing over the words, the phrase, and what constitutes it. If you think of our Civil War, this is really very different. If you think of civil wars in other countries, this is really quite different. There is — there is a good deal of violence in Baghdad and two or three other provinces, and yet in 14 other provinces there’s very little violence or numbers of incidents. So it’s a — it’s a highly concentrated thing. It clearly is being stimulated by people who would like to have what could be characterized as a civil war and win it, but I’m not going to be the one to decide if, when or at all.
Rummy’s “Oh! I don’t know!”, is the only honest thing that has come out of his mouth in more years than I care to count!
It is a wonder indeed that his tongue, so use to telling lies, did not spontaneously catch fire when those words rolled over It!
Oh, I don’t know. It is so different from our civil war. I heard there were some people in Southern California who were living in relative peace during our civil war, so was it really a civil war? I just don’t know. These things involve nuances, shades of grey, things I’m just not equipped to handle. I prefer the old black and white situations, you know, like terrorists vs. thugs and things like that. This civil war business is just one of those known unknowns so I don’t know.