Dictionary time

I got this item off The Hamster, which cited a Donald Rumsfeld press conference on April 15:

Question: Mr. Secretary, can I ask you about your opening statement? You said that the challenge in Fallujah is being contained and that the situation in the South is largely stabilized. And I wonder if that is the case, why, then is it necessary to keep extra troops in Iraq for 90 days?

Rumsfeld: Well, it is - the reason it is contained is because we have the extra troops there. That is self-evident. Come on, people are fungible. You can have them here or there.

We have announced the judgment, it is clear, you understand it, everyone in the room understands that we needed additional - The commander decided he'd like to retain in country an additional plus or minus 20,000 people and that is what we are doing.

Fungible? FUNGIBLE? People are fungible? Human beings, our brothers sisters fathers mothers sons daughters cousins friends neighbors coworkers are just interchangeable parts, things to be swapped around without regard to the lives they have, the lives they are?

For soldiers, it's all the same whether they're here with their families, on a base in, say, Germany, or getting shot at in Fallujah?

I just.... I mean....

Oh my.