If hints from the bipartisan Iraq Study Group are any indication, the ISG meeting next week with President Bush should offer some of the “fresh perspective” the President is seeking from Defense Secretary-designee and ISG member Robert Gates. ISG co-chairs former Secretary of State (and Republican) James Baker and former Democratic Congressman Lee Hamilton publicly have indicated there is a middle ground for the war in Iraq between the status quo and opting out now. The President, in his televised press conference Wednesday, said that his Administration would “work with members of Congress; we will work with the Baker-Hamilton Commission. … We will continue to adjust to achieve the objective.” Bush then said that “stay the course … doesn’t mean staying stuck on a strategy or tactics that may not be working.”
Air Force Gen. Jacqueline D. Van Ovost—a trailblazer and one of the first 10 women to reach a four-star rank across the U.S. military—retired and passed control of U.S. Transportation Command to Air Force Gen. Randall Reed on Oct. 4, finishing an eventful tenure at TRANSCOM.