WASHINGTON — The Pentagon plans to promote Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, former head of military operations in Iraq, risking a confrontation with members of Congress because of the prisoner abuses that occurred during his tenure.
Senior Pentagon officials, including Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have privately told colleagues they are determined to pin a fourth star on Sanchez, two senior defense officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said this week.
Rumsfeld and others recognize that Sanchez remains politically "radioactive," in the words of a third senior defense official, and would wait until after the Nov. 2 presidential election and investigations of the Abu Ghraib scandal have faded before putting his name forward.
Top Pentagon strategists do not have a specific four-star job in mind for Sanchez, and the officials conceded that the appointment would probably not occur if Bush were defeated in his reelection bid by Democratic rival Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), who has made his criticism of the conduct in the war a centerpiece of his campaign.
Among his duties in Iraq, Sanchez oversaw all detention facilities, including Abu Ghraib prison.
Support for the general among the senior-most policymakers in the Pentagon reflects the Bush administration's insistence that the prisoner abuse affair -- which began in Abu Ghraib outside of Baghdad and then drew scrutiny to military jails in Afghanistan and at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- was an aberration.
But an appointment would encourage a confrontation in the Senate, where Democrats and some Republicans who would have to approve the nomination have criticized Sanchez's oversight of Abu Ghraib and the conduct of the war.
"If they really felt comfortable about this and felt it was justifiable, they would do it before the election," said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), who was skeptical of the timing.
A senior Senate Republican aide was more blunt.
"I would say that he would have a snowball's chance," the aide said, on condition of anonymity. "Somebody needs to be held accountable.... He failed in his leadership role."
Earlier this year, Sanchez was Rumsfeld's choice to take over the U.S. Southern Command, a post that would have elevated the three-star general to four stars. But his name was never formally offered after Senate Armed Services Committee members challenged Sanchez's role in overseeing the war and the Abu Ghraib prison affair.
