Earlier this morning I participated in a conference call with MGen. Bill Caldwell, Multinational Force - Iraq spokesman. Caldwell made two interesting points.

First, the release of the militia leader, Sheikh Mazen al-Saedi - part of Moqtada al-Sadr's organization - was requested, not demanded by the Maliki government. Equally important is the fact that Saedi was arrested (at about 3:30 am on the 17th) on charges of being part of illegal violent activities against Iraqis, not for organizing or participating in attacks on Coalition troops. He added that the MNF had a special organization that was tracking the illegal militias and had detained about two dozen leaders and more than five hundred members this month alone.

There has been a lot of misreporting of what the president said to George Stephanopoulos who posed the comparison between Iraq and Vietnam (written by NYT columnist Tom Friedman). I asked Caldwell about his understanding of what the president said. He agreed with my characterization of the president's remark as being limited to comparing the enemies' attempts to influence US public opinion. Caldwell said, "We've already seen on jihadist websites that they've said US elections are coming and they want to inflict the maximum number of casualties to influence the US people" to get out of Iraq. Those saying that Bush agreed to any broader comparison between Iraq and Vietnam are reporting what they wanted to hear, not what the president said.

The other news is a counterpoint to the recent rebellion against civilian authority by British Gen. Sir Richard Dannatt I wrote about a few days ago. Dannatt, in an interview with a UK paper, blasted the Blair government's Iraq policy. Here, Army chief of staff Gen. Peter Schoomaker is arguing with Defense Secretary Rumsfeld over the 2008 Army budget, but he's doing it the right way.

Rumsfeld's relationship with the Army began badly when then-chief of staff Gen. Eric Shinseki slow-rolled Rumsfeld's plans for transforming the army into a more flexible force. When Shinseki retired, Rumsfeld reached into the ranks of retired generals to bring back Schoomaker, an old special forces hand, to lead the army and transform it under fire. But now Schoomaker thinks the Army is being shorted by about $25 billion in 2008 and Rumsfeld disagrees. Their disagreement reached a low point when the Army refused to submit a 2008 budget based on the lower number. But the disagreement is professional, not personal, and it's being handled just that way. Rumsfeld agreed that Schoomaker could take his case directly to the White House and argue with OMB to get the additional money. I'm told by a Pentagon source that one or more senior members of the Defense Department controller's office went with Schoomaker. Schoomaker, unlike Dannatt but like almost every US general officer since Douglas MacArthur, understands that civilian control of the military is essential in a democracy. It's ok to argue with the boss and be upset with his decision, but you work within the system to resolve the dispute. Though the disagreement is serious, Rumsfeld and the Army are not at war with each other. But each respects the other enough to resolve policy differences the right way.