ìRestoring Our Honor: Itís time for Rumsfeld to go,î by Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times, 6 May, p. A31.

When Tom Friedman starts talking about Secretary Rumsfeld needing to resign, you know the matter is getting awfully serious. Friedman is just about alone among major columnists in his support of the Big Bang theory behind the Bush Administrationís decision to topple Saddam Hussein.

The prisoner-abuse scandal is big enough to demand some heads and not just a mea culpa from the President on Arab TV, which was unprecedented enough in its own right to leave my mouth open in stunned amazement.

All I would say on this subject is this: fine to can somebody really big to clear the air on this issue and show Americaís commitment to do the right thing, and SECDEF is probably the right guyóin that Japanese sort of top-guy-takes-the-fall show of good faith and serious remorse.

But removing Rumsfeld from power is only going to help things if the White House is prepared to cut some major deals with major allies in getting the occupation of Iraq dramatically internationalized beyond its current limited base. So if canning Rumsfeld means a month from now there are tens of thousands of peacekeepers from new statesóand Iím talking big boys like an India, China or Russiaóthen thatís one thing. But if the White House simply offers him up as a sacrificial hawk and doesnít engineer something big in terms of subsequent deals with allies, then I do think it will be a pointless gesture that robs the Pentagon of a good leader.

Still, it would be fitting for the Secretary of War (one of the most able weíve ever had) to be felled by the Pentagonís continuing inability to think through the Everything Else that follows war. In reality, its that missing Secretary of Everything Else who should have prevented this fiasco. But since that job is non-existent, and my Sys Admin force still embryonic, our Secretary of War may end up paying the price for this institutional gap in our national security establishment.