Bloggers fanning the controversy over Rumsfeld

WASHINGTON -- The war of words between Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld and former generals has spread to the lower ranks as soldiers, recent war vets, and Pentagon civilians alike use a growing number of Web logs on the Internet to sound off on their current and former bosses.

Many who run the independent sites, which tend to defend the Iraq war against criticism by politicians and media, are backing Rumsfeld, while some bloggers, most writing under assumed names, have joined the call for a fresh start.

One widely accessible site operated by those still in uniform, the ''Countercolumn" at iraqnow.blogspot.com, has awarded one of the retired generals a ''that-was-then-this-is-now" award for criticizing the invasion even though he had previously said Iraq was a danger to the United States.

The site, which serves as a portal for other military blogs such as ''American Citizen Soldier," ''BlackFive," as well as official military websites, also links to a ''Let's Get Rummy" timeline dating back to 2003 -- an obvious slap at opponents who have called for his removal before but have failed.

Soldiers can be dismissed or sentenced to one year in prison for uttering ''contemptuous words" about the commander in chief and other government leaders, but there is no penalty for criticizing them. Still, public criticism is unusual in the military.

But in the relative safety of anonymity, some military bloggers have fanned the controversy swirling around their civilian bosses. One man, describing himself as a helicopter pilot, ''Outlaw 13," who posts on guidons.blogspot.com, wrote that ''a lot of folks in the head shed have heartburn with" Rumsfeld.

Others posting comments don't hold their fire: ''The whole [expletive] bunch, from the [secretary of defense] on down did a [expletive]-poor job. So, as usual, the grunts pay the price," wrote another blogger on the site.

Web logs have provided a unique window into the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, allowing troops to bypass the mainstream media to detail their exploits. But these so-called milblogs are increasingly serving as forums for policy debates, such as the effectiveness of the war strategy or how to deal with Iran's nuclear program.

There are hundreds of milblogs, and the Pentagon, which has cautiously supported some of them but also has deep concerns about the ability to control them, recently ordered a top level advisory panel to study the issue.

'' 'Googling' and 'blogging' are making their way into military operations at all levels," Kenneth Krieg, the undersecretary of defense, wrote in a recent memo requesting that the Defense Science Board look into the matter. ''But the full implications of this revolution are as yet unknown, and we have no clear direction and defined doctrine."

Indeed, some say the new venue brings an institution that has long sought to remain apolitical perilously close to the public square.

''There has long been a separation between the military and political world," said John, an active-duty Air Force officer who runs the blog op-for.com and asked that his full name not be used to protect his identity. ''I don't want to say that milblogs cross that line, but they do gray it."

The vast majority of milblogs focus on day-to-day military operations around the world; many are run by troops in combat. Others focus on weapons and technology.

But the recent furor over Rumsfeld has highlighted how many blogs have become venues for political debates.

''A portion of the milblog world has morphed into debating how things should get done," said Charlie, an Army officer who also writes for op-for.com.

The op-for blog, for its part, has refrained from directly addressing the Rumsfeld fracas to avoid the appearance of taking sides. Rumsfeld is their civilian boss, while many of the former generals who have been critical of Rumsfeld retain friendships in the current forces.

For other military bloggers, however, the Rumsfeld controversy is fair game.

One popular conservative blog run by ''an American warrior and his wife," the Mudville Gazette, has posted a variety of news articles and other commentaries in support of Rumsfeld. Meanwhile, Iraqnow.blogspot.com attacks one of Rumsfeld's recent detractors, retired Major General John Batiste, who was commander of the 82d Airborne in Iraq, accusing him of rewriting history when he contended that Army Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki was retired early because he urged Rumsfeld to provide far more troops for the invasion of Iraq.

''The problem is, it didn't happen," the blog asserts. ''Shinseki was not retired early. That's an old wives' tale right out of the John Kerry playbook."

Yet others have lined up with the former generals.

Jason Sigger, a civilian Pentagon employee who blogs as the ''armchairgeneralist" said: ''This concern that the generals speaking out are somehow a threat to civilian control [of the military] is crazy. This is not Pakistan or some third-world nation. These are 30- or 40-year professionals. They ought to have the freedom to comment on what they believe is a fatally flawed strategy."

John, the Air Force officer at op-for.com, contends that the Pentagon leadership appreciates the need for the kind of connection between the military and the public that the military blogs provide.

''The lieutenants and the captains of the Vietnam War are the generals of today," he said in an interview. ''They saw us lose not on the battlefield, but in the halls of Congress, the universities, and with the public. They understand the importance of fighting a political war when the military is engaged in a long police action and occupation like Iraq."

But, he added, ''I am afraid that unless we are constantly checking each other, there will be an incident when someone blogs on information they shouldn't have blogged on."

Bryan Bender can be reached at bender@globe.com.