Switch to Petraeus betrays war crisis
By Gareth Porter
WASHINGTON - Despite United States President Barack Obama's denial that his
decision to replace General Stanley McChrystal as commander in Afghanistan with
General David Petraeus signifies any differences with McChrystal over war
strategy, the decision obviously reflects a desire by Obama to find a way out
of a deepening war policy crisis.
Although the ostensible reason was indiscreet comments by McChrystal and his
aides, reported in Rolling Stone magazine, the switch from McChrystal to
Petraeus is clearly the result of White House unhappiness with McChrystal's
handling of the war.
It has become evident in recent weeks that McChrystal's strategy is not working
as he had promised, and congress and the US
political elite had already become very uneasy about whether the war was on the
wrong track.
In calling on Petraeus, the Obama administration appears to be taking a page
from the George W Bush administration's late 2006 decision to rescue a war in
Iraq which was generally perceived in Washington as having become an
embarrassing failure. But both Obama and Petraeus are acutely aware of the
differences between the situation in Iraq at that moment and the situation in
Afghanistan today.
In taking command in Iraq in 2007, Petraeus was being called upon to implement
a dramatically new counter-insurgency strategy based on a major surge in US
troops.
Obama will certainly be put under pressure by the Republican Party, with
Senator John McCain at the forefront, to agree to eliminate the mid-2011
deadline for the beginning of a US withdrawal and perhaps even for yet another
troop surge in Afghanistan.
But accounts of Obama administration policymaking on the war last year make it
clear that Obama caved in to military pressure in 2009 for the troop surge of
2010 only as part of a compromise under which McChrystal and Petraeus agreed to
a surge of 18 months' duration. It was clearly understood by both civilian and
military officials, moreover, that after the surge was completed, the
administration would enter into negotiations on a settlement of the war.
Petraeus' political skills and ability to sell a strategy involving a
negotiated settlement offers Obama more flexibility than he has had with
McChrystal in command.
Contrary to the generally accepted view that Petraeus mounted a successful
counter-insurgency campaign in Iraq, his main accomplishment was to make the
first formal accommodation with Sunni insurgents.
Petraeus demonstrated in his command in Iraq a willingness to adjust strategic
objectives in light of realities he could not control. He had made it clear to
his staff at the outset that they would make one last effort to show progress,
but that he would tell congress that it was time to withdraw if he found that
it was not working.
As commander in Iraq, Petraeus chose staff officers who were skeptics and
realists rather than true believers, according to accounts from members of his
staff in Iraq. When one aide proposed in a memorandum in the first weeks of his
command coming to terms with the Shi'ite insurgents led by Muqtada al-Sadr, for
example, Petraeus did not dismiss the idea.
That willingness to listen to viewpoints that may not support current strategy
stands in sharp contrast to McChrystal's style in Afghanistan. McChrystal has
relied heavily on a small circle of friends, mainly from his years as Special
Operations Forces commander, who have been deeply suspicious of the views of
anyone from outside their circle, according to sources who are familiar with
the way his inner circle has operated.
In an interview with Inter Press Service, one military source who knows
McChrystal and his staff described a very tight inner circle of about eight
people which does everything together, including getting drunk.
McChrystal surrounded himself with yes-men, said another source who has
interacted with some of those in the inner circle. When people have challenged
the conventional wisdom, he's had them booted out, the source said. The
McChrystal inner circle has been accustomed to the insularity that Special
Operations Forces have traditionally had in carrying out their operations, the
source added.
The primary example of McChrystal's rejection of outside expertise that
challenged his beliefs is the case of David Kilcullen.
Kilcullen, a retired Australian army officer, is recognized as one of the most
knowledgeable specialists on insurgency and was an adviser to Petraeus in Iraq
in 2007-2008. Kilcullen is known for speaking his mind, even if it conflicts
with existing policy.
After McChrystal took command of US and North Atlantic Treaty Organization
forces in Afghanistan last year, Kilcullen was slated to become an adviser on
his staff. But after some early interactions between Kilcullen and the
McChrystal team, that decision was reversed.
Kilcullen's views on targeted killings as wrongheaded clashed with the
assumptions of McChrystal and his inner circle.
McChrystal's staff was also supposed to create a "red team" of outside
specialists on Afghanistan who could provide different perspectives and
information, but after McChrystal's inner circle tightened its control over
outside information, the idea was allowed to die, according to one source.
Several members of McChrystal's inner circle are officers who worked for the
general during his five-year stint as head of the Joint Special Operations
Command (JSOC), which carried out raids aimed at killing or capturing insurgent
leaders in Iraq and Afghanistan from 2003 to 2008, the sources say.
Two of the key officers on McChrystal's staff who were part of his former JSOC
inner circle were his intelligence chief, Major General Michael Flynn and his
Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, Major General Bill Mayville. Flynn was
McChrystal's director of intelligence at JSOC from 2004 to 2007 and then his
director of intelligence at the Joint Staff from 2008.
McChrystal's political adviser, retired army Colonel Jacob McFerren, is not a
veteran of JSOC. But he is described by one source familiar with McChrystal's
team as one of the general's old army drinking buddies.
Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specializing
in US national security policy. The paperback edition of his latest book,
Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam, was
published in 2006.
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