"artistic contingencies", no.
This whole thing is just a bunch of dedicated administration-haters beating any issue they can find. Quagmire - oops, that won't work. Iraqis hate us - oops, that won't work either. No WMDs - that's looking unreliable right now. Antiquities! That's it! We'll blame the Army for not instantly securing everything of any value in the entire country of Iraq! Yeah!
He had on a knowledgeable international culture spokesperson, a woman, who also faulted the Pentagon on this matter.
She also said coalition troops DID protect the Oil MINISTRY Building -- not the oil fields.
O'Reilly was fairly quick to get her off the air and he did not successfully rebut what she said.
The story said in part:
"A senior Pentagon official said the military had never promised that the buildings would be safeguarded.
" 'We could never guarantee ahead of time the safety of a single building,' said Dr. Joseph Collins, a deputy assistant secretary of defense for humanitarian and peacekeeping operations.
--------------------------
"At the Pentagon, defense officials said that the museum had in fact been put on the American military's no-target list in response to the scholars' warnings, and that the military had refrained from bombing it.
"But in an e-mail message Mr. Collins said that 'in no case' had his office instructed military commanders to provide protection for the museum or library.
"We leave such decisions to commanders on the scene," he said.
(END EXTRACTS FROM NEW YORK TIMES)
This shows typical deceitful spin from the Pentagon when it has been caught.
Of course the Pentagon could not guarantee ahead of time the safety of a single building. But it could TRY, which in this case it deliberately did not do.
Collins' statement that "We leave such decisions to commanders on the scene" was a deliberate cop-out, since protection of the museum was a high policy international American reputation matter, where instructions had to be issued from the top and not merely left to field commanders guided only by military considerations.
Case proved: Rumsfeld DID ALLOW looting of museum to happen and DID LIE.
Read the last quote, honey.