AP. 25 September 2001. Rumsfeld: Campaign Will Be Long. WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon called nearly 2,000 more reservists to active duty Tuesday as Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said the new war on terrorism will be long and not start with a massive offensive.
"There is not going to be a D-Day, as such, and I'm sure there will not be a signing ceremony on the Missouri, as such," he told a Pentagon news conference. He referred to the final allied push in Europe in June 1944 and the signing of surrender papers aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay in 1945. "This is not something that begins with a significant event or ends with a significant event," he said. "It is something that will involve a sustained effort over a good period of time." Rumsfeld predicted the campaign would last "not five minutes or five months," but years. Rumsfeld's remarks continued a Bush administration effort to prepare the public for a difficult, costly and sustained anti-terrorism campaign that is likely to suffer deadly setbacks as well as secret successes. "It will not be an antiseptic war, I regret to say," he said. "It will be difficult. It will be dangerous. And ... the likelihood is that more people may be lost." The Pentagon announced that another 1,940 reservists from 16 states, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia were called to active duty. They bring to 12,243 the number of Reserve and National Guard members called so far, under a partial mobilization order President Bush signed after the Sept. 11 attacks. Bush authorized the Pentagon to call as many as 50,000 to active duty. Also, officials at Fort Campbell, Ky., said a small number of soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division have been sent elsewhere in the United States to provide extra security. They provided no other details. The military campaign -- separate from the financial, diplomatic and law enforcement tools being mobilized against terrorism -- has been code-named "Enduring Freedom,'' Rumsfeld said. The name first chosen, "Infinite Justice," was scrapped after the administration recognized that in the Islamic faith such finality is considered something provided only by Allah, the Arabic word for God. The U.S. forces being assembled in the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea include at least two aircraft carriers, with two more reportedly headed in that direction, from the Atlantic and Pacific. Each ship carries about 5,000 sailors and 75 aircraft and is accompanied by about a dozen warships, generally including attack submarines capable of firing cruise missiles. The United States also has warplanes at land bases in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Persian Gulf region, and it plans to put Air Force B-52 bombers on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia. A key element of the military campaign is expected to be U.S. special operations forces, the clandestine warriors who operate behind enemy lines, sometimes in helicopter-born raids to kill, kidnap or sabotage. ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby Rad-Green List: Radical anti-capitalist environmental discussion. http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green ---- Leninist-International: Building bridges in the tradition of V.I. Lenin. http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht _______________________________________________ Leninist-International mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international
