US Analysis: What General Petraeus' Move to CIA Means for Pro-Democracy Movements

This week the Obama administration announced a major change in its national security team. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, who has served in the position since 2006, had previously announced that he wanted to retire before the end of the year. Obama has named current CIA director Leon Panetta as Gates' successor, while moving General David Petraeus, current commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, to the CIA director's position.

Much of the analysis I've encountered thus far has focused on the experience of both men, their paper qualifications, or how the stability --- or instability --- of these moves in leadership will affect current US military operations. CBS News national security correspondent Bob Orr and senior national security analyst Juan Zarate offer this analysis:

On the surface, the move makes sense. The US is not at war in two countries --- Iraq and Afghanistan --- it is now in a conflict in four countries, bringing in Pakistan and Libya. In Pakistan in particular, the Obama Administraiton is running a proxy war, through the direction of intelligence operatives, military contractors, and predator drone strikes. The CIA is the primary weapon in that larger fight.

In Libya, there are already reports that CIA agents are running the show, directing airstrikes, acquiring intelligence, and potentially training rebels. It makes sense, then, to turn a leader in the intelligence community (Panetta) into a top military advisor, and vice versa.

Add the element that, despite the four wars, the American military is likely to have its funding decreased in the near future. Panetta has experience in cutting budgets by increasing efficiency, as a member of the budget committee in the House of Representatives and as Director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Clinton.

Underneath this move, however, may lurk a more interesting shift in leadership. General Petraeus has been widely credited as the key counter-insurgency strategist since he took over the Iraq War operations, where he focused on outreach to local leaders, providing security to civilians, and reconstruction projects, accomplishments that are credited with turning the tide in Iraq. So what does Petraeus' move to the CIA signify for US foreign policy?

Petraeus represents a counter-intuitive thinking that has improved the military situation on the ground in Iraq, and in some parts of Afghanistan, through a focus on non-military goals supplemented by military action. When the US forces initially pursued campaigns in Iraq and in Afghanistan, the focus was almost entirely on traditional military goals: eliminate enemy infrastructure, destroy enemy assets, push the enemy out of territory, continue forward momentum, and find and eliminate enemy leaders. In both locations, this approach was a failure.

Petraeus' belief was that if people on the ground, the civilians and local leaders, saw the U.S. as an ally instead of a threat, then the insurgency would be starved of new recruits. The General focused on reducing and preventing civilian casualties, securing locations and infrastructure important to the civilian population, and empowering and cooperating with the local population.

More broadly, Barack Obama has been trying to transform US foreign policy based on these principles. Obama has shifted focus to securing human rights, fostering pro-democracy movements, and using the Internet as a tool to outreach directly to individuals in other nations (see a previous analysis, "Human Rights and National Security: Go vs Chess"). Obama's general goal is to improve the standing between the US and the citizens of the world by promoting engagement, supporting human rights campaigns, expanding internet access through the fog of censorship, and attempting to champion democratic movements abroad. The President hopes to use this improved relationship between the people of the world and the US Government as leverage for political reform in places like Syria.

One example of this is the report from The Washington Post, released April 14, that declare the US was "secretly backing Syrian opposition groups." Citing a secret diplomatic cable from April 2009, the Post said that London-based satellite channel Barada TV and several other organizations, had been receiving financing from the American government in an attempt to weaken the Assad regime. According to the leaked documents, President George W. Bush started funding several organisations, comprised of human rights activists, expatriates, and other opponents to Bashar al-Assad's regime in 2005, after diplomatic relations between Washington and Damascus began to falter. Though it is not clear whether Syrian opposition groups are still being funded, according to the documents, parts of the program were funded through September 2010.

(For a particularly sharp analysis, see Syria WikiLeaks Special: How the US Government "Supported Opposition Groups" --- and for How Long?)

Big news, right? Obviously, this is exactly the kind of news story that the Assad regime was looking for, as it endangers the legitimacy of the opposition movement. In the Middle East, no one wants to be America's stooge. One need look no further than Iranian state-run Press TV, which ran the headline: "Syrian people under US proxy attack". But the US media also ran with headlines that, if slightly less sensational, were also misguided.

The really big news was that the United States had been trying to challenge Syria on its human rights record for many years, to no avail. In fact, according to the leaked cable, the more the US spoke out, the worse things became. In 2005, as US-Syria relations began to fail and the US military was developing its new approach, the strategy with Damascus shifted. The US begins to fund Barada TV, and other outreach programs, to give the opposition in Syria a voice. The plan was to empower the human-rights and pro-democracy movements, until it became in the best interests of the regime to speed up reforms.

Before 25 January, when the uprising started in Egypt, or even 14 February, when it began in Bahrain the Syrian regime looked stable. Now, the entire Middle East is on the brink of revolution --- with Syria and Libya beyond the brink ---, pro-democracy movements are surging, regimes are crumbling, and the intelligence community is struggling to keep up. At the same time, deficit hawks are slashing spending, even defense spending, and many Americans are weary of getting involved, militarily, in the Middle East. As a result, the US has had to rely on covert operations more than overt ones. Everything is changing.

In the midst of this process, it makes a lot of sense to place General Petraeus at the head of the CIA. As commander in Afghanistan, he is working alongside the American proxy war in Pakistan. He understands the power and importance of the role that the intelligence community is playing in America's foreign policy. He also understands that the military might of the United States, whether overt or covert, needs to be executed in a way that fosters security through improving relations with the citizens of the Middle East.

Expect Petraeus to use his new position to build bridges with pro-democracy movements, and expect the US to back more opposition movements soon. Because if there is one thing that the Arab Spring has taught us, it's that the only certainty right now is that the people have all the power. Petraeus understands this, he's built his career on the concept, and I predict that this is exactly what Obama is counting on him to do as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.