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*On August 1, 2003, [[Donald Rumsfeld]] replaced General Shinseki as Army Chief of Staff with General [[Peter J. Schoomaker]] after '''Shineski "questioned the [[cakewalk]] scenario, and told Congress (that February) that we would need several hundred thousand soldiers in Iraq to put an end to the violence against our troops and against each other."''' [http://why-war.com/news/2003/09/14/seekingh.html]
* This statement is a lie repeated many times by former presidential candidate John F. Kerry. The reality is that General Shinseki completed his full term as chief of staff.
"[Defense Sec. Rumsfeld] and Army Secretary Thomas White have settled on Gen. John M. Keane, Army deputy chief of staff, to succeed the current chief, Gen. Eric Shinseki. Gen. Shinseki does not retire for more than a year. Sources offer differing reasons for the early selection." (Bill Gertz and Rowan Scarborough, "Inside The Ring," The Washington Times, 4/19/02)
BRIT HUME, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: "John Kerry insisted today, as he has repeatedly over the past year, that the Army's former Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki was forced into early retirement for saying, in the run up to the war for Iraq, that not enough troops were set to be deployed to the region. Kerry said Shinseki is among the administration officials who, quote, 'lost their jobs for telling the truth.' But Shinseki was not forced out. He completed his full term of chief of staff and retired on schedule. However, his successor's name did come out a year ahead of the time, which his supporters say diminished Shinseki's influence in his final year." (Fox News' "Special Report With Brit Hume," 9/20/04)
"Also, there was at least one factual mistake in the speech. John Kerry noted at one point that General Shinseki, the former Army chief of staff, was fired for not providing the right answers that President Bush was looking for in terms of troop levels, but, in fact, Shinseki retired on his own." (CNN's "News From CNN," 9/8/04)
Reverted edit of 24.164.57.227, changed back to last version by Sheldon Rampton
:"The general wanted a new kind of army, one that could combine the adaptability of light infantry and the power of heavily mechanised forces. His new bosses had other ideas. "They had pre-decided what transformation meant," said one Pentagon source. "It meant more from space, more from air and it didn't involve the army much. That was the essence of the[ir] conflict."
Deputy Defense Secretary [[Paul Wolfowitz]] called his estimate "wildly off the mark" and said, "I am reasonably certain that they will greet us as liberators, and that will help us to keep requirements down." By July 2003, "many experts say that the worst of the chaos in Iraq could have been contained if there had been enough troops on the ground from the beginning. There's a growing consensus that something close to what Shinseki suggested might be necessary to turn the situation around." [http://why-war.com/news/2003/07/18/fromhero.html]
:Then the general said it again. "It could be as high as several hundred thousand," he told another committee.
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