Um...I would have recommended ending this tweet with not those two words.
It’s obviously too late and I get the symbolism that came back to bite us months later when the war turned and the insurrection grew, but there is an interesting back story to the “Mission Accomplished” story.
After our advance crew boarded the ship in Hawaii days prior to Bush’s landing on the USS Abraham Lincoln, the Navy crew told us they were returning from the longest deployment of any ship in Naval history. They were proud of what they had done.
The crew asked the WH staff if it would be ok to hang a banner saying “Mission Accomplished”. We readily agreed. We hung it in an obviously prominent place that also sent a message as Bush spoke to the nation.
In his remarks, Bush stated the danger was not over and that difficult missions lay ahead, particularly in the Sunni triangle. The nuance of his remarks, however, couldn’t compete with the message of this banner.
After Bush left the ship and we took with us all the trappings of the presidency, the banner remained up. It was still up when the Abraham Lincoln pulled into its home port in Washington State.
It was the crew’s message from start to finish. It also was the backdrop for Bush’s speech. In May 2003, everyone thought the mission had been accomplished. The insurgency did not fully develop until the Fall of 2003. The WH press corps in May did not criticize the banner.
By the Fall, the shot of Bush with the banner became a symbol of what went wrong. And now you know the full story.
