Tuesday
May122009
Now It's Petraeus' War: US Replaces Top Commander in Afghanistan
Tuesday, May 12, 2009 at 8:04 
GENERAL DAVID MCKIERNANYesterday, I was speaking to British high school students when one asked, "What are President Obama's three greatest challenges today?" After putting the economy Number One and listing (but dismissing) Republican opposition as a potential Number Two, I said:
But I'm concerned that it will be Afghanistan and Pakistan that will bring him down. I think he's being overtaken by his own military, especially General David Petraeus [the head of US Central Command] and their ideas of "strategy".
Before I got home, the news came through: the Obama Adminstration had replaced the commander of NATO and US forces in Afghanistan, General David McKiernan.
My initial reaction was, OK, generals get replaced. They are moved to other military posts or return to Washington for a break from the field. Then, however, the details piled in. McKiernan had done only 11 months of a command tour that normally last 18 to 24 months. He had been ousted, even as the US is planning to pour more troops into a "crisis", and replaced with General Stanley McChrystal, the director of the military's Joint Staff and, before that, head of US Special Operations Forces in Iraq.
All of which pointed to the re-branding of the Afghanistan conflict. This is not Secretary of Defense Robert Gates' war. This is not President Obama's war.
This one has been claimed by David Petraeus.
Gates, announcing McKiernan's departure, was not shy about kicking the general out the door. McKiernan had "probably" had his career cut short because “a new approach was probably in our best interest”. He added, "Fresh eyes were needed."
So what were wrong with those eyes? After all, the commander was no lightweight: he had led US ground troops in the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Pentagon officials piled on the criticism, "General McKiernan...had been removed primarily because he had brought too conventional an approach to the challenge." His honour was to be "the first general to be dismissed from command of a theater of combat since Douglas MacArthur during the Korean War".
In contrast, the officials noted that General McChrystal had led the American forces who captured Saddam Hussein and later killed insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq: "his success in using intelligence and firepower to track and kill insurgents, and his training in unconventional warfare that emphasizes the need to protect the population, made him the best choice for the command in Afghanistan".
Translation? McKiernan is a "big force" leader. His background is an officer in armoured units, and he led the calls in Iraq for a much larger ground force than that used to occupy the country. McChrystal, on the other hand, is able to organise and direct small, elite units that can strike quickly.
Make no mistake, however. As The New York Times politely frames it, "The change also reflects the influence of Gen. David H. Petraeus." Their emphasis is on a personal battle: Petraeus served under McKiernan in Iraq but eventually overtook him in rank and, again according to Pentagon officials, "the two men did not develop a bond after General Petraeus inherited General McKiernan as his Afghanistan commander".
More importantly, Petraeus is preparing his supposed strategy for victory. His reputation has been built on the mythical or real success of the Iraq "surge" from 2007. While that relied on an increase in US troops, it emphasized the deployment of specialist units to work with local Sunni militias while using Special Forces in "surgical" strikes against the bad guys. The big military idea is that the same approach can work in Afghanistan. Hook up with some of the local leaders and use airstrikes and covert operations to capture or kill key figures in the insurgency.
This is not solely a Petraeus notion. The White House spokesman was quick to say the President agreed with Secretary of Defense Gates and Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that “the implementation of a new strategy in Afghanistan called for new military leadership". And, perhaps ironically, Obama has played into Petraeus' hands. Even though he effectively approved the military's request for an additional 30,000 troops this years, the President's hesitation reinforced the idea that the US will have to succeed with smaller but mobile units rather than overwhelming force.
To call this a fantasy too far would be kind. Iraq, a country of 25 million, could not be pacified by US operations in 2003. (Indeed, if McKiernan wanted to strike back at his critics and the compliant media, he could note: his complaint that the American force for post-Saddam occupation is now generally accepted wisdom.) Now Petraeus is pursuing the same goal in a country of 75 million. He is doing so with a Karzai Government that is trying to establish some independence from Washington and with little apparent knowledge of the intricacies of Afghan politics. Even the symbolic of General McChrystal's record with US special operations has a downside: "He will be confronted with deep tensions over the conduct of Special Operations forces in Afghanistan, whose aggressive tactics are seen by Afghan officials as responsible for many of the American mistakes that have resulted in the deaths of civilians."
In the end, little of this may matter to Petraeus, who could be in a no-lose situation: if his strategy checks the insurgency, he gets the credit. If it does not, he can put the blame on political superiors who didn't give him enough troops or on an Afghan Government that is beyond redemption.
For now, it's David Petraeus' war. But the beauty of his strategic move --- not in Central Asia but in Washington --- is that he can always hand it back if it goes wrong.
Reader Comments (6)
It certainly seems like Petraeus and the COIN-dinistas are chipping away at the administration and who knows what else Obama and Gates are likely to concede. But at the same time, I doubt it was that difficult to convince Obama and Gates. They are probably content to frame this, at least in part, as a reaction to the recent civilian casualties, especially in Farah. McKiernan had done little to restrict the kind of close air support that was causing those casualties.
On another note, anyone remember in the Vice Presidential debate when Palin referred to McKiernan as General McClellan, the Union general ousted by Lincoln after his unsuccessful Peninsula campaign of 1862? So Palin wasn't that far off- you might even call her a visionary
Here's the problem: While you see Petraeus in a no-lose situation, Obama can't win no matter what. He's handed a disaster. Quit today and go home? Stay and try to find some sort of 'victory'? Either leads to disaster for which Obama gets blamed, not Bush. It's not so much bullying by generals, it's from the bullying legacy of the previous administration.
Petraeus largely rose because of his counterinsurgency theories. They may look remarkably like the failed 'hearts and minds' campaigns in Vietnam, but at least they put on the table the idea that someone out there may be a simple civilian and not someone who needs to be tortured or shot on sight. Who knows how that's working, but it has been the most thoughtful stuff coming out of military thinking for a long while (which isn't saying much).
Michael,
This is an excellent comment which troubles me. In principle, I would like to support a counterinsurgency startegy that is genuinely based on worked with local and national groups, recognising their autonomy and supporting their ideas of development. In practice, I don't think Petraeus' approach is this type of strategy.
Will have a think and possibly put fuller response in a blog tomorrow.
S.
It is not only dangerous, but also tragically naive for Americans to think that hey can 'win hearts and minds' in Afghanistan. For the Afghans, no matter how fanatical, no matter how bloodthirsty, corrupt, angry, cruel or ignorant a bearded Taliban may be, he is still and foremost "one of their boys", a Muslim like them. The affinity in hearts and minds is unbreachable. No matter how you may put it, in the end the American military are still the army of the kafirs, representing the unbelievers, the infidel. The Taliban has an access to the hearts and minds of the Afghans the Americans will never have. This is not a question of "fresh eyes" or "new faces", but one of identifying correctly what is the prevalent and living ideology in Afghanistan, the one that inspires and fills the hearts of its people. As long as the ideology of the Taliban remains what is most holy for Afghans, changing a general makes absolutely no difference.
Scott,
I wonder why you doubt that this is Petraeus' approach given that this is exactly what Petraeus and the 'COIN-dinistas' have been advocating for some time and is effectively what they did in Iraq? Do you think that Petraeus acknowledges that the same strategy won't work in Afghanistan? That would surprise me because I always thought he had an unshakeable faith in COIN theory as a kind of exact science. And although we are constantly reminded by the COIN-dinistas that the approach has to be tailored to local conditions, I thought that Petraeus was overlooking some of the major issues.
By the COIN-dinista book defeating the insurgency will require a population security centred approach, development and some form of political reconciliation with the least hard core of the insurgency. The elements that allowed for this in Iraq (if only temporarily at least) aren't present in Afghanistan.
Petraeus knows that Obama is not going to give him the necessary number of troops for a population security approach (upwards of 100,000 according to John Nagl). And I doubt the Obama administration relishes the prospect (in terms of cost in money, time and political capital) of supporting a large enough Afghan army, let alone the task of training one competent enough, to do the task. If you include the eradication of the poppy crop as part of a COIN strategy, the ability of Kabul contributing in anyway financially to this is impossible.
When it comes to development the same practices can't simply be transferred from Iraq which was by comparison a relative modern state. In any case is development what Pashtun tribesmen, who make up large parts of the insurgency, really want? I'll leave that for the COIN-dinista/anthropologists to answer. But again in terms of money and time, development in Afghanistan could take a decades long commitment and billions of dollars per year on the part of the US. And to pour all that development money into an already corrupt political system would be insane. Corruption and networks of patronage would become even more entrenched.
On the political conciliation front, again the situation differs from Iraq. The Sons of Iraq had lost their jobs, status and positions of privilege. By offering them these once again they could be weaned away from the insurgency. But incorporating them into the Iraqi government structure has proved difficult and failure to redress this issue may in the end be the unravelling of the 'peace' in Iraq. But maybe for insurgents in Afghanistan, being a member of the insurgency offers more status and privilege than being incoporated in the Afghan government structure. And maybe political conciliation with insurgent or nationalist elements is impossible as long as the US sticks around (which would be required for the other two elements- population security and development). Even if the US did negotiate a withdrawal based on conciliation between the various Afghan parties what might occur could be a very fragile piece that would unravel after a few years.
So those may well be the reasons that Petraeus will not follow the Iraq surge strategy as you suggest. That begs the question, what the hell is his strategy because it certainly hasn't been clearly articulated? And is Obama already trapped by his own rhetoric on Afghanistan; how does he get out?
Sorry just thinking/typing out loud here
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