“We support the troops.”

President Bush, in Dec. 2004, told families of servicemembers: “we’re doing everything we possibly can to protect your loved ones.” LIAR.

Pleas from commanders in Iraq since at least Dec. 2003 for blast-resistant vehicles went unheeded, for years, and this inaction cost the lives of an estimated “621 to 742 Americans.” Obviously, thousands more were more badly injured than they otherwise would have been. No one can tell me that this is how we should “support the troops.”

Meanwhile, the Pentagon made great efforts to obtain these same vehicles, for Iraqi troops:

“On Dec. 22, 2004—two weeks after President Bush told families of servicemembers that “we’re doing everything we possibly can to protect your loved ones”—a U.S. Army general solicited ideas for an armored vehicle for the Iraqis. The Army had an “extreme interest” in getting troops better armor, then-brigadier general Roger Nadeau told a subordinate. [Later] Nadeau clarified his request: ‘What I failed to point out in my first message to you folks is that the US Govt is interested not for US use, but for […] the Iraqi military forces.’ ”

Read the whole gruesome and hideous story at USA Today. Read it and weep.