When the generals talk about Afghanistan

[unhappycamper]

When the generals talk about Afghanistan
August 19, 2010

THE top brass of the United States military take a relatively unbuttoned approach to media liaison - at least by Australian standards. Even so, General Stanley McChrystal's now famously unguarded interview with Rolling Stone magazine in June, in which he vented his frustration with the Obama administration's decisions on troop deployment to Afghanistan, was enough to cost him his job. In criticising the administration in such a manner, President Barack Obama explained, General McChrystal engaged in conduct that ''undermines the civilian control of the military that is at the core of our democratic system''.

Fast-forward a couple of months and now the commander who replaced McChrystal, General David Petraeus, the respected architect of the US ''surge'' strategy in Iraq, appears to be nudging at the authority of his political masters. His comments this week on NBC television's Meet the Press are, to be sure, nothing like his predecessor's swaggering disrespect for the Commander-in-Chief. But in striking a contradictory note from President Obama and Defence Secretary Robert Gates about the timetable for US withdrawal from Afghanistan, General Petraeus lobbed a metaphorical hand-grenade at the White House. ''I think the President has been quite clear in explaining that it's a process, not an event, and that it's conditions-based,'' he said of President Obama's announcement last November that troop drawdown would start in July 2011. And if the conditions were not right, General Petraeus said, he would seek an extension on the deadline from the President.

The general is certainly entitled to seek an extension and has previously indicated his willingness to do so. In June he told a panel of the US Senate that he would recommend delaying the pullout of forces if need be, saying the security and political conditions in Afghanistan had to be right. And indeed, the general deserves acknowledgement for a counter-insurgency strategy every bit as multidimensional and sophisticated as the one that improved US fortunes in Iraq. But asking for an extension is different from asserting that the deadline is rubbery and brazenly putting words into the President's mouth.

This is hardly the territory of innocent misunderstandings nor one that allows for differences to be split in order to arrive at a vague approximation. The subsequent and forceful insistence of Defence Secretary Gates that ''there is no question in anybody's mind that we are going to begin drawing down troops in July 2011,'' confirmed that General Petraeus was indeed out of line. The questions are now compelling, particularly in light of the Taliban's stiff resistance in the south to a surge of 30,000 more US troops, due to swell to 100,000 in the coming weeks. Does the general think the July 2011 deadline is really a deadline? If the answer is ''well, yes, but …'' how does this affect ''the civilian control of the military that is at the core of our democratic system''?

And what does this mean for Australia, whose commitment in Afghanistan appears contingent on US involvement? Fresh controversy about the future course of the war played out against a grim background as the US military death toll of the nine-year war topped 2000. While different in scale, the cost of involvement is being increasingly felt here too. The death of Trooper Jason Brown in Kandahar on the weekend - the seventh Australian fatality this year - brings this nation's casualty toll to 18.

[bigtree]

1. Petraeus is as close to McArthur as anyone since

It's a constant aggravation to see the cabal of holdovers still in charge of the military aggression they began and can't seem to let go of.

[dixiegrrrrl]

2. The story literally told the truth in htis line:

"as the one that improved US fortunes in Iraq"

and did you notice Prateus was quoted as " saying the security and political conditions in Afghanistan had to be right"
political conditions?
a mega star General is basing military strategy out of "political" considerations?
I thought that was the Presidents job via the State Dept, and Congress.

Was there not a time when the military was focused only on ....well, military point of view?

[msongs]

3. Petraeus will keep squaking until "someone" takes the pentagon away from the Bush republicans nt