Little Rock - General Wesley Clark had strong words in response to a memo by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, voicing deep concern about this Administration's missing strategy for the war on terror and in Iraq. "I'm concerned to read that Secretary Rumsfeld is only now acknowledging what we've known for some time - that this Administration has no plan for Iraq and no long-term strategy for fighting terrorism," Clark said today.

In Rumsfeld's own words, "The US is putting relatively little effort into a long-range plan, but we are putting a great deal of effort into trying to stop terrorists. The cost-benefit ratio is against us!" Rumsfeld also describes the future of US involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq as a "long, hard slog."

"I find it incomprehensible that we entered into a war in Iraq with no plan," Clark said. "Somehow, this administration took all the lessons we learned over the past decade, especially in Bosnia and Kosovo - and even the first Gulf War - and did the exact opposite. No clear definition of success, no international mandate, no integrated political-military strategy to win the peace, and no exit strategy."

According to a Pentagon spokesman, Rumsfeld wrote this memo to "keep a sense of urgency alive." Urgency? Clark has been expressing a sense of urgency for months. "Attacks on our troops in Iraq are spiking," Clark said. "We're seeing the violence spread from the Sunni triangle into Shi'ite areas that should be our bastion of support. If that doesn't impart a sense of urgency, I don't see how a memo is going to do it."