It wasn’t a Gen. Anthony McAuliffe moment, but President Bush’s response to calls for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s resignation will do. It was a prompt and in-your-face “no.”

McAuliffe, of course, was the U.S. general at Bastogne in the Battle of the Bulge. Three years into World War II, surrounded by the enemy, he was awakened by a German invitation to surrender. The 101st Airborne Division commander had a crisp response sent to the enemy: “Nuts!”

Bush might have tried that. Indeed, if he didn’t have to worry about being presidential, the unprintable word McAuliffe first used would be the proper reply to recent “Rummy must go” cries from the handful of retired generals and the army of armchair generals in the Democratic Party and media.

Sorry, but let’s not pretend the “Dump Rumsfeld” calls merit anything more than what the German surrender demands required at Bastogne. This “Get Rummy” campaign isn’t worth treating with sober arguments on each side. It’s about power and politics, pure and simple – maybe not on the part of every retired general, but certainly on the part of Bush-phobic political and media types who made this their story of the week. It’s just another front in our war over the war. It’s just the 2004 presidential campaign by other means. Bush is right to treat it accordingly.

After all, we’re talking about six or so retired generals in a universe of thousands of retired and active-duty generals and admirals. It’s also worth noting that for every anti-Rumsfeld retiree, a pro-Rumsfeld retiree or active-duty general steps forward. It would be different if this assault were met with silence on the part of the men who’ve worked with him. The Anthony Zinnis, John Batistes and Paul Eatons don’t speak for the top brass – it only seems that way in an echo chamber that magnifies critics’ claims and ignores their motives. (Did they oppose the war? Did they oppose Rumsfeld’s transformation of their service? Were they demoted and forced to retire for violating Pentagon rules?)

Whatever the merits of their arguments, the retirees gunning for Rumsfeld have hardly conducted themselves in a way to enhance their credibility or honor. Leave aside the matter of whether these retired generals should be calling for a defense secretary’s head in the middle of a war. What are we to make of officers who felt they just couldn’t speak up?

Nuts! That’s not the way retired Gens. Tommy Franks or former Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers remember it. Or Marine Gen. Peter Pace, the current Joint Chiefs chairman who helped plan the Iraq war.

“We had then and have now every opportunity to speak our minds, and if we do not, shame on us,” Pace said last week. “The articles that are out there about folks not speaking up are just flat wrong.”

Franks’ book “American Soldier” begins on March 3, 2003. He’s in Saudi Arabia right before the Iraq war. Bush is at the White House. Over a video link, the president starts by asking each commander if he has “everything you need to win” and is “pleased with the strategy.” He stopped asking after two generals and an admiral all answered in the affirmative. The rest of the book makes plain that Franks and the brass weren’t clicking their heels for the civilian leadership.

What if some generals weren’t tough enough or sharp enough to stand up to Rumsfeld? Well, maybe they shouldn’t have been generals in the first place. Or maybe they should have resigned in protest if he failed to heed their advice. Myers offered another suggestion last Sunday: “If we don’t (give the secretary our best military advice), we should be shot.”

A war council is no place for careerists.

Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste is making the media rounds now, calling for Rumsfeld’s resignation. This is puzzling to Rumsfeld’s associates, according to the Washington Times. The former commander of the 1st Infantry Division never offered any complaints when he met privately with Rumsfeld in Iraq in December 2004.

“This is a man,” Batiste told his soldiers, “with the courage and the conviction to win the war on terrorism.”

Many politicians seem to have forgotten what they said about the war and weapons of mass destruction in years past, but we’ve come to expect this. Do we now have a mini-outbreak of the same convenient amnesia among some retired generals?