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Obama's military problem is getting worse
By Peter Feaver
President Obama is presiding over a slow-motion civil-military crash
occasioned by his meandering Afghanistan strategy review. The crash has
not yet happened and is avoidable, but it also foreseeable. Of concern,
the latest reports out of the White House suggest that Obama's team is not yet
fully aware of the dangers. If it happens, it will be a problem entirely
of Obama's own making and it could have a lasting impact on the way his administration unfolds.
As Rich Lowry has observed,
President Obama rarely misses a chance to blame a challenge he is confronting
on his predecessor. This rhetorical tic served Obama well during the
campaign and probably still resonates with partisans who post anonymous
comments on blogs or who suffer from chronic Bush Derangement Syndrome. But it
gives the impression that the Administration never left the campaign bubble and
may even encourage self-defeating campaign-like behavior
such as picking feuds with news organizations.
And insofar as the Afghan strategy review goes, it is a narrative string that
is thoroughly played out because the current civil-military problem confronting
the Obama Administration is entirely of its own making. The problem is
not that Afghanistan is a difficult combat theater, nor that Karzai is an
inconvenient Afghan ally, nor even that President Obama is taking time to review
his strategic options. All of that and more is true and, I suppose, some of it
can be "blamed" on President Bush. The problem that cannot be blamed on
Bush is that the way President Obama is reviewing his strategic options is
generating needless civil-military friction and, unless the Obama team gets it
under control, could generate a genuine civil-military crisis.
Tom Donnelly produced an extensive tick-tock of the evolving Obama
Afghanistan policy that reads like the first draft of a "what went wrong"
post-mortem. For my money, the key developments were:
- President Obama opts for a misleading straddle in rolling-out the results of his first Afghan strategy review in March. He oversells the extent to which the new strategy is a radical departure from his predecessor's, but more crucially oversells the extent to which he is committed to this strategy. And, like President Johnson in 1965 and unlike President Bush in 2007, he announces the low-ball estimate of new resources expected rather than the high-ball estimate. Military audiences hear what they want to hear -- namely that the President is committed to resourcing the "new" COIN strategy --and do not hear what they do not want to hear -- namely that the President is reserving the option not to resource adequately the new strategy and, indeed, to change his mind about the strategy in a few months time.
- Shortly after the roll-out, President Obama and his key White House team take their collective eye off the ball and are largely uninvolved in the firing of General McKiernan and the hiring of General McChrystal. Indeed, President Obama has only one substantive interaction with the battlefield commander of his most important "war of necessity" for the next four months.
- The most meaningful senior White
House engagement with the Afghanistan theater over the long summer of
discontent is a remarkable late June trip that NSA Jim Jones takes and
that amounts to an on-the-record politicization of military
advice. As reported
by Bob Woodward, Jones appears to tell the military commanders to shave
their military advice in light of President Obama's reluctance to approve
new troop deployments. This episode, I believe, is the key pivot
point. Military observers draw two "so that's the way it's going to
be" inferences:
- (1) The Obama team is fully cooperating with Bob Woodward -- a tried and true Washington strategy because Woodward tends to treat more favorably people who have cooperated (i.e. shared information and access) than people who haven't. Application: it is OK to cooperate with Bob Woodward.
- (2) The Obama team is politicizing civil-military relations. Application: play the game or you will get burned.
- On 17 August, despite harboring serious misgivings about the Afghan mission -- and despite the accumulating evidence that the Afghan elections, a few days hence, will be riddled with fraud -- President Obama gives his most important speech since the March roll-out focusing on Afghanistan and uses the same rhetoric that he used on the campaign trail: Afghanistan is a war of necessity. Reasonable inference for military audience: The president is committed to fully resourcing this war.
- A direct result of Jones's late June trip, I suspect, is that Bob Woodward is put on distribution for the McChrystal report and receives it shortly after McChrystal delivers it to his (McChrystal's) chain of command in late August. However, because Woodward is in the book-writing business, he does not publish the scoop, holding it back for the book. (Many observers believe that Woodward's source was a military officer, but my own hunch is that it was someone from Holbrooke's staff. My conjecture is based largely on the fact that when the story does break, Woodward leaves Holbrooke entirely out of the story, a telling absence of the AfPak czar that makes more sense if one is protecting a source).
- Throughout September, after the McChrystal report is delivered but before it is leaked, there start to be stories that indicate growing military frustration with the White House's lack of strategic focus on Afghanistan. The military apparently believe that President Obama is paralyzed with indecision. This is the context for Woodward going to his source and asking for permission to run the report as a news story rather than as a book scoop: the White House is trying to bury the McChrystal report by refusing to act or even debate it. The result is a real civil-military problem.
- In response to the leak, the White House kicks into high damage-control mode (after a brief delay occasioned by the unfortunate timing of the UNGA meetings), but even here shows some clumsiness, at least regarding civil-military optics: the 25 hours for the Olympics vs. 25 minutes for McChrystal optic, and the surprisingly prominent participation of the political team in what is supposed to be a national security review. This coupled with numerous anonymous quotes attributed to senior Obama team members aimed at knocking McChrystal down a peg or two do more to roil than smooth the civil-military waters.
- And then, most recently, a remarkable (and rare) public disagreement between Chief of Staff Emmanuel and Secretary of Defense Gates about whether the Obama team can wait to decide on the McChrystal request until after the fate of Afghan President Karzai is resolved.
In short, President Obama has been slowly veering off into a civil-military ditch of his own digging. Despite his relative inexperience in national security matters, this was not inevitable; during the campaign President Obama showed himself to be fairly deft rhetorically in regards to civil-military relations and he carried this strong performance through the first several months of his presidency. However, in recent months he has seemed far less at ease with his wartime Commander-in-Chief role.
If Obama regains a deft touch, the crash can be averted. To avert it he needs to do more than simply endorse the McChrystal request, though that would surely help. He needs to show that he respects the civil-military process, and he needs to rein in his advisors who have been stumbling about. If he is going to over-rule McChrystal, which is his right as a Commander-in-Chief, he will have a much steeper climb out of his civil-military hole. At a minimum, he will need to forthrightly take ownership of the war and all of its consequences and spend the political capital he has hitherto avoided spending on national security issues to explain his decision to the American people and the American military. Of course, while President Obama and his team bear the lion's share of the responsibility for the current civil-military friction, they cannot by themselves get out of the hole they have dug. The military will have to help by rigorously sticking to proper norms of civil-military relations. That means they must not counter-leak, not even to defend themselves from scurrilous attacks from unnamed White House staffers; seek redress quietly, within the system, and within the chain of command. They must avoid threatening President Obama with resignations in protest if he overrules their advice; such threats subvert the principle of civilian control which implies that civilians have a right to be wrong. And they must be prepared to do their utmost to implement Obama's chosen strategy as effectively as they can with whatever resources he puts at their disposal. If President Obama errs, it is up to the electorate to judge him, not the military.
Pete Souza/The White House via Getty Images
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Not Obama's problems, ours!
We are spending $750 billion on our military, in 2009. This does not count expenditures by departments and agencies outside the Pentagon: intelligence, nuclear, veterans', etc. In 2010, the sum will be well over a trillion dollars, if not already. More than 55% of the discretionary budget goes to the military.
The evening, I was asked by a Dollar General cashier, "Would you like to contribute to schools, libraries and other community services?" Imagine! What a condition this country is in that it will not tax adequately for its communities but will support more than 1,000 far-flung military bases!
This is not Obama's problem. It is ours because we have allowed our imperfect republic to become a militarized empire. Our problem is what Chalmers Johnson called in the title of one of his books, "The Sorrows of Empire."
OK
A fine collection of anecdotes and questionable conclusions you've got their, goedel. Would you care to make a comment about the article you are supposedly responding to?
Well put, goedel! We have
Well put, goedel! We have become the nation Eisenhower warned us about: run by the military-industrial complex.
Goedel, above makes a good
Goedel, above makes a good point on the almost complete militarization of our national foreign policy. We are in the midst of the consequences of imperial overstretch and I fear we no longer have the robust economic viability to sustain a nearly one trillion dollar a year bill for it.
Obama foolishly embraced the war in Afghanistan for electioneering purposes and then essentially reaffirmed that embrace in March. Well, he has won his election but has as yet to come close to winning the political fight within his own party ranks let alone over the feckless Republicans on the entanglement in Afghanistan.
Ironically, maybe the best solution would be for the President to let the generals have their way. It would neutralize the bellicose Republicans and if the military is successful he would gain the lions share of the credit as their commander-in-chief. If the effort fails he can share the blame with the generals (who are not his political allies), Republican drumbeaters, and those Democrats who still have not lost their appetite for war.
The Moral Dimension
Significantly JPWREL observes: "Obama foolishly embraced the war in Afghanistan for electioneering purposes and then essentially reaffirmed that embrace in March."
I agree with the observation. The candidate, Obama, knew far less then than now about Afghanistan and military strategy - in 2007 (and 2002) when he declared that the correct war to fight was in Afghanistan. How does a short-time professor of law, then short-time state legislator, then short-time US Senator acquire the knowledge to make assertions about which war, if any, is the right war? He does not! Obama's bellicosity about Af-stan was to offset his position on Iraq. What does such electioneering tell us about the character of the man, so affable, professorial, polished?
How does he now support his claim that Afghanistan is a "war of necessity"? He has not offered any support for that assertion. Another blog commenter asked: Is it necessary for the US to go to war in every country that has an Al Qaida element?
To borrow from an old "Yes, Minister" (a BBC-TV satire), there is "The Moral Dimension" to consider. We are killing people, injuring them, destroying their homes and villages. We are also harming our own service-people. Is this the way to combat a bad gang - by gaining them allies? I could not care less about relations between our professional military and our President, so long as the former obey orders. Our generals and admirals swear to uphold the Constitution. If they think the President is wrong, they should ask to be relieved of command; then go public.
leadership
A quick comment on your last paragraph....good leadership is spreading the wealth on success and solely accepting the burdens of failure. You seem to have that mixed up. If the effort succeeds he should credit the generals and the military (this does not include ANY politicians) and if the efforts fail it would behoove him not to lay blame at the door of others. That is leadership.
Yes, that is true leadership
Yes, that is true leadership but since we live in the real world we must acknowledge that politics and spin trumps everything and always has. It certainly did so in the last ‘Mission Accomplished’ administration.
Unstated, but clearly, the theme:
Whatever's going on between the president and the Pentagon about Afghanistan, it's clearly impossible, unthinkable that anybody on the military side of the argument could have either made a mistake or behaved dishonestly or dishonorably.
Posit any argument on this, there's only one place for Feaver to look for error, and that's at the White House.
To support his view, he engages in such shabbiness as claiming a report by Woodward of the Washington Post is the best source about what James Jones found while touring Afghanistan, Pakistan and India earlier this year. This is shameless crap for the excellent reason that James -- himself a former general and wise in the ways of high command -- made a number of public statements on his return about what he'd been telling US commanders and what they'd been telling him. Woodward seems to have got this wrong, and it seems, to be extremely polite, that Feaver was most careless or lazy not to consult the readily accessible primary sources for his lengthy second-hand piece.
Any interested party can track down James's back-hom statements in a Google search. Should take less than five seconds.
Feaver also seems to think it was a bad idea for the president to go against the advice of his secretary and the chairman of the joint chiefs to change the general commanding in Afghanistan: now why would that be, exactly?
There is a respectable alternative view to all the other arguments Feaver presents, but since they would seem to suggest that the American people are not being well served by the current SecDef and and a wide swathe of senior military officers, it's clearly unthinkable to Feaver, and many others. Their view seems to be that it's the job of the president to be a flunky to the military, and snap to about it. I think otherwise, and it seeems that, guided in part by Pentagon-wise Jones, the White House does, too, and is prudent and good to do so.
An unwise or ignorant person reading this piece today might form the view that everything was working brilliantly between the US military and the Afghan resistance right up until the foolish American people happened to elect Barack Obama. Seems bigoted, doesn't it. The Afghan campaign has been falling short for almost a decade. Let's wait to see how Obama can be blamed for that ... .
The point Feaver is making is
The point Feaver is making is that Obama has unnecessairly dug himself a hole in civil-military affairs. Of course the Afghanistan strategy is Obama's call as commander in chief--no one disputes this. But the current Secretary of Defense and senior military commanders (Petraus and McChrystal) have proven themselves competent thus forth in military affairs. Obama hasn't. They may be wrong on Afghanistan and he has every right to overrule them, but when you meet only once with your field commander who's overseas fighting a war with US soliders, or seem to be taking an agonizingly long time to make a decision on a troop request when the field commander has noted time is not on the side of the very counterinsurgency strategy Obama himself endorsed, well, then the buck clearly stops with the White House.
Although I disagree with Feaver than general officers shouldn't resign if they don't agree with a particular decision. As a military officer, I do agree once Obama has made his decision, general officers should salute smartly without selective leaking to the press. But the decision to resign is a very heavy one for a field commander and one not taken lightly; particulary weighing the impact it can have on troop morale during a war. But if he feels he cannot successfully execute the strategy he is charged with carrying out, there is absolutely no shame or anything wrong in resigning.
Where does this nonsense come from?
I quote: "meet only once with your field commander who's overseas fighting a war with US soliders". I've seen photos of the president with McChrystal, the latter sometime in dress uniform and sometime in camos. This suggests at least two meetings: McChrystal ain't no fashion model.
Other comments in this string suggest that any president like Obama or Clinton must necessarily fail because they come to office with little or no national security experience. This implies that only persons with such experience should be available for election, and THAT implies that only candidates anointed by earlier presidents through national security appointments need seek the job. A really slippery slope, most clearly skidded down by commenters suggesting the only honorable course for any military officer is to resign his or her commission when a new president has no national security chops. That's actually a step toward the joys of military dictatorship, although those who call for it don't seem ro recognize the implication.
Tacking with the wind?
Peter Feaver seems to have changed his views since his post here shortly after Gen. McChrystal's recommendations were leaked, which suggested the fault for any breach of civil-military relations protocols rested with McChrystal. This struck me at the time as not unreasonable, since the leak apparently came from McChrystal or someone working for him. One can just imagine how the last President would have reacted to a general officer trying to influence his policy choices by using the Washington Post. But there are rules in commentary of this kind; the incumbent President now is a Democrat, and that makes a difference.
This post today puts Feaver in a less isolated position on a Bush Republican blog, its last paragraph notwithstanding. However, I note that despite many observations about what military audiences must think or probably think, he cites no source within the military. The Afghan election fiasco, the completeness of which appears to have taken Americans in uniform and out by surprise, Feaver refers to only by allusion. One is rather driven to the view that his conclusions as to military (as opposed to Republican) thinking are speculative, not to say tendentious, while his account glides over an event of substantial relevance to the question of whether Gen. McChrystal's recommended course can possibly work.
I note also the persistence of a tendency present in most posts on this blog: the reflexive defense of former President Bush even when it isn't really necessary to support commentary on Obama administration policy. One could make a plausible criticism of the way President Obama has approached the Afghan situation, for example, without mentioning Bush at all -- it is true that Obama inherited this mess after Bush had been a wartime Commander in Chief for over seven years, but that just is what it is and Obama has the responsibility to get us out of the soup now.
People who worked in Bush's administration seem unable either to reconcile themselves to the public consensus that Bush was a lousy President or make the case that he was a good one, yet they can't leave the subject alone. Their chief gripe seems to be that the people in charge now don't appreciate that Bush just had things happen on his watch that weren't his fault, and say mean things about him. That what it comes down to, really; people in the Obama administration say mean things about George Bush and his administration. This has been the working definition of "Bush derangement syndrome" for a while now -- since well before Obama began his own Presidential campaign, in fact. Obama himself has been fairly restrained on this score, but it could well be that as he contemplates the choices available to him on issues like Afghanistan he is thinking mean thoughts.
it could be worse......
I think that it is good that the military is speaking out. If you look at GEN McChrystal's entire commentary when he was in the UK and made the comments everyone is fussing about you can see he was not overly critical.
My point is it is better the folks in charge of the war make the public aware of the situation. In 2003 prior to Iraq, GEN Shinseki was practically fired by SECDEF Rumsfeld for telling it like he saw it. Perhaps if more Generals at the time had been more forthcoming on their reservations about the Iraq War it may have had a difference in how that war was handled. They owe it to the men and women under their command and to the American people.
Hopefully this alleged "clash" between the military/civilian structure doesn't become overblown and force people to take their eyes off of what matters; that being to find a prudent, realistic strategy to fight this war.
Bush Blame
Dr. Feaver-
Bush is not to blame because "Afghanistan is a difficult combat theater" or because "Karzai is an inconvenient Afghan ally" - he is to blame because Afghanistan steadily deteriorated over the last 6 years of Bush's watch without any serious administration effort to address the problems.
Only now are requisite attention and resources being brought to bear on these problems, and many knowledgable US military and civilian observers believe that this delay may have eliminated the chances for non-afghan forces to defeat the insurgency.
Obama's Choice
There are a couple of issues that I see almost no one discussing that are relevent. First is the reliance on polls of uninformed individuals. Few Americans know the details of Afghanistan. Most can't find Afghanistan on a map, and even fewer can describe the relative differences between Kandahar, Herat, Kunduz, and Kabul. Thus, it is surprising that public policy is being driven by polls of 1,000 or 2,000 uninformed folks. The second, and related issue is that winning heals all ills. If the policy is unpopular, but works, polls will eventually swing to favor the strategy that is working. Likewise, even a popular policy, if it fails, will be viewed unfavorably during the next election. So popular isn't relevent, particularly when the individuals polled don't have sufficient data to render a decent or informed decision. The third issue is one of leadership. Sometimes, the timing of a decision is more important than the decision. I think this is particularly important in very difficult decisions, where the potential benefits between the choices may not be so great.
Based on his actions, I don't think Obama wants to be a wartime President. He doesn't want weekly teleconferences with the key commanders. This is his choice as a politician. Given that desire, maybe it is best for him to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan. This clearly would not be the best for the country or the military, but politically, it might be the best choice for him in the short term with public opinion polls. I think people need to be realistic, and realize that this is a possible, maybe even likely outcome.
Rank speculation?
While Feaver (and Donnelly) could be pointing to a real situation, this storyline smacks of rank speculation to me. A selective recounting of events by Donnelly (who also apparently approves of Bill Kristol as a strategic analyst... wtf?) and repeated by Feaver is blown up into a crisis of civil-military relations.
If you want to look at a dysfunctional DoD, look back at the Rumsfeld years. This hasn't risen even close to that.
"Relative inexperience" in
"Relative inexperience" in national security matters?
No sir!
That should read "total lack of experience" in national security matters.
"Deft rhetorically"?
I think you mean: "speechifying."
It's unfortunate that Obama put McChrystal in place to do a job and now won't give McChrystal the soldiers and material resources to do the job.
Domestically and internationally, Obama is a bad joke. God help the United States of America.
Obama and the "War of Neccesity" Bull
Remember Dukakis in the tank commericial to look tough. This is what Obama did when he declared in favor of this "War of Necessity" in his campaigns. He was acting tough with skillfull rhetoric. Now he is "stuck" with having to look tough in the face of his Republican detractors, while America has gone broke, is hungry and no place for dreams of a better future anymore.
I agree with a previous blogger that what would this "part-time prof and part-time everything else" know about Afghanistan to come to this conclusion.
The military, her corporate "partners" and dangerous PAC's/"think tanks" must be reined-in radically for our economic and social survival. We are a "bankrupt" empire seeking to continue the old ways by borrowing money from China for this. It is now or never.
Deft touches...
"If Obama regains a deft touch, the crash can be averted. "
I think that this is a pipe dream. He's got an idiot of a Vice President militarily and total maniacs running the House and Senate. Even if he had a "deft touch" which is debatable given his record of requiring 24 hour mainstream media damage control to keep him marginally out of trouble, his support team will murder any hope he has of passable relations with the military.
Civilian control of the military?
They must avoid threatening President Obama with resignations in protest if he overrules their advice; such threats subvert the principle of civilian control which implies that civilians have a right to be wrong.
The above statement is not merely nonsense, it is dangerous nonsense.
Resigning in protest in order that they may resume civilian status and enter the debate with their first amendment rights intact (rights that they voluntarily relinquish by their military status) is an important safety valve that serves our country well in two ways.
One, it provides a safety valve for those military personnel whose personal opinions are so much in opposition to the policies of the Commander-in-Chief that they will be unable to follow those policies. The LAST thing this country wants is to have its defense (and most powerful weapons) in the hands of those who fundamentally disagree with the governments policies to that degree.
Secondly, Military Service is an experience that provides a valuable perspective in its own right. These people have knowledge and wisdom in areas that civilians do not. The President is entitled to not listen to or abide by the opinions of the military, but he has no right to keep these opinions from the general public - at least not if the military personnel are willing to resign to tell that story.
Yes, but the military will
Yes, but the military will judge him all the same - and for good reason. And I disagree with your suggestion that Obama has only recently started to mishandle the Afghan question - sure, when all he had to do was give a few nice speeches everything seemed fine - and he had to send off the extra troops in March in order to live up to his campaign promise, so that too was easy - but now the going gets tough and nice speeches and token gestures won't cut it. The big question with this president was always what's he gonna do when doing the right thing involves pissing off his base, the people he owes his success to - and now we have the answer: he dithers and delays, either because he's made his decision and it's going to piss off the military and he wants to give the impression that he labored long and hard over the painful decision - or because he doesn't know what to do and wants to substitute the illusion of endless debate for the cold reality of action.
You're right, he brought this mess upon himself - but not recently - the writing was on the wall long before he became president. This is simply the comeuppance.
Feaver makes a few good points, but
I think he's more wrong than right. Yes, Obama foolishly committed to Afghanistan prior to the election, and he does not really want to be a wartime president. Yes, McChrystal and others are probably playing footsie with the press. However, concentrating on the pleasantness of relations between the POTUS and the brass is focusing on minute details and missing the big picture entirely.
Some in the military absolutely despised Bill Clinton, and W did a fabulous job of humiliating the military with Iraq and Donald Rumsfeld. In the great scheme of things, it hardly matters what the opinions of the JCS and their underlings are as to the conduct of American government and foreign policy. Obama is the Commander in Chief, and that's all you need to know.
Secondly, I think Obama has considerably greater reserves of good will in the military than either of his predecessors. The real issue is whether it's really worthwhile to continue in a war in Afghanistan that military experts generally agree cannot be won by military means.
I will refer you to an International Herald Tribune column by William Pfaff, who recounts the testimony of a CIA terrorist specialist before a Senate committee lately. Here it is in a nutshell:
60 Al Queda operations
59 cases solved as to whodunit
36 cases interdicted by the authorities
10 cases failed due to internal imcompetence
9 cases caused by Algerians in Paris in the 90s
3 successful Al Queda operations (9/11,London, Madrid)
Do the math.
I understand everyones point so goodbye America!
The Bush administration still thinks what they did was Patriotic while most people regard their actions as thoughtless. I can see both points and most of you here can too. The Obama administration is trying to give some thought to the problem - that part is obvious. Too bad they are assailed left and right by pundits who care about their "bottom line" more than they care about America.
When America was threatened by Germany, everyone (and I mean EVERYONE) was behind the mission. So what we have here is a poorly defined mission that is literally just as important as the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Why aren't we behind the mission 100%? Only one answer there since we all get our opinions based on what we read and see in the totally confusing news media.
So rather than take a stand for what is right (the easiest way to get your brain straight on this topic), people are buying guns and wrapping themselves in their favorite writer's views while they wait for America to be destroyed. The entire world knows this and is hedging. But no Americans that I know even have a clue. Every single one has their own selfish unpatriotic agenda.
This writer (Feaver) needs to keep his job and it is obvious which is his agenda. And those of you agreeing are simpletons. No bullet is going to solve America's trouble or the world's. Only a change in attitude will do it - only a change in thought - only a commitment to a mission 100% will end this. But I think everyone likes to talk crap more than they want to fight. History will remember you all as cowards with missiles, right up until the moment you cannot afford to make any more missiles.
Resigned my Commission under Clinton
Because he was unqualified to be CIC. We all take the oath, but it is not for a lifetime, unless we decide so. Resignations are allowed as are early retirements. This author should consider that any commander which feels that his mission or his troops are being compromised has a responsibility to take action. Ultimately every commander fears one boss above all--that is the parent(s) of any soldier, sailor, airman, or marine that is lost under his/her command. The American people may elect leadership based upon any number of criteria, but the qualification to lead our armed forces should be among the most heavily weighted. In a time when most Americans have lost patience for our current prolonged conflicts, the election of a dangerously unqualified CIC sends a clear message to our troops to resign. Obama should follow the advice of his military "adviser", Colin Powell--the commander makes decisions with imperfect information and must aviod paralysis by analysis (decide when p>40<70), and one other thing Powell said..."the commander in the field is ALWAYS right". Thanks for the (taxpayer funded) Service Academy education...it really comes in handy calling out the flakes. Fare thee well.
You should have stayed in...
...because we were left in too many cases with the Wesley Clarks who played the other sort of political games - placing their lips firmly against the Presidential Behind.
General McChrystal shouldn't resign, either. Let Obama sack him for fighting the war as well as it can be fought. The alternative would be to invite Obama and the weasels who played leak games from the West Wing to punish Gen. McChrystal for telling the truth to find the modern equivalent of Wesley Clark to manage the fight in Afghanistan - a disastrous fate for our troops there.
It's amazing that Obama's partisans in and out of the press vied to find ways to be disrespectful to the President until January 20th, 2009; the day after that, they tried to resurrect the rules which USED to apply toward Presidents. Former and even serving general officers were recruited to pour scorn on Bush's military decisions by an eager, activist press and just plain eager activists (remember Michael Moore's mash note to Wesley Clark?); now we're supposed to revert to the old days of "the President is always right."
It won't wash. The current President and his political backers made their political fortunes under-cutting the man in charge - now it's their turn. Hope they like running a country where half the people (at least) are calling them idiots and murderers.
This is not Obama's Problem it is America's
First, understand that I am not excusing President Obama for his smoke and mirrors policy efforts in Afghanistan or Iraq. My family has served in every American conflict lasting longer than six weeks in the past 100 years. The more important issue in my mind is that the American public, the American government policy complex, and the media all have the same problem. We have managed to convince ourselves as a society that war is a manageable process in which all sides follow the same rules and uncomfortable realities can be mitigated with theories. The fact of the matter is that war is human violence at it's most brutal level, unleashed as a policy decision. It has two real speeds, on and off. Unless we, as a nation, can come together on a defined goal in Iraq and Afghanistan that is REAL and ATTAINABLE, and then commit the necessary national resources to complete the mission, we need to get out. Now.
The pretense that we can "win" a war without hurting people is ludicrous. It is compounded by the ridiculous premise that the average Afghan is really culturally just the same as someone from suburban Fairfax County VA, just wearing different clothes and speaking a different language. If our goal is to allow the Afghan people to hold elections and cooperate with whichever government they choose, we may be in for an ugly situation. After all, the voters of the Palistinian Authority chose Hamas.
This dithering around with "war light" has given us a 1 Tie, 1 Loss and 1 Win record in major conflicts since WW2 (in which far larger number of others were killed than Americans). The current wars are still in dispute. Personally I will believe all of the political mumbo jumbo from both parties about our "War of Necessity" when the draft is reinstated and all of the children of America serve equally. Until then all we are doing is killing people and allowing members of our own services to die for no real end.
Go all in, or fold. Either is fine, but stop playing political chicken with other peoples lives.
Your rational responses are welcome at PSGute@aol.com
Too few policymakers are
Too few policymakers are adequate students of Machiavelli -- not the pithy prescriptions in The Prince, but the theory of societal evolution in The Discourses. Machiavelli theorized that there was a natural progression from monarchy to aristocracy to democracy, but that each stage had an "evil twin": monarchy vs. dictatorship, aristocracy vs. oligarchy, democracy vs. anarchy and mob rule.
The idea of taking Afghanistan from its Taliban-ruled state directly to a parliamentary democracy was overly ambitious. Without a phase of total destruction of the old order in Afghanistan, the effort ran afoul of Machiavelli's warning in The Prince about the difficulty and danger of taking on the defenders of the old order and establishing a new one.
yes, it is.
This is Obama's baby. Calling it "America's problem" spreads the responsibility of Commander-in-Chief too wide.
Speaking as someone who's lost a son in Iraq, I have to say that it's incredibly naïve to demand that we completely revamp our foreign and military policy to something out of Kipling in the 21st century. "War light" is what we HAVE to work with.
No President from either of the two major political parties will risk the toxic legacy of reactivating the military draft, even if it is what is needed - and I agree that when military experts agree we are ten divisions short to do the jobs we need to do, we must re-activate the draft.
But enough of us voted for Barack Hussein Obama that they, at least, must have their noses rubbed in the mess they made. Just as those of us who failed to insist that the Republican Party give us someone better than George W. Bush in two elections have to acknowledge our part in what has happened to our nation in the past twenty years.
Please help me understand
I've never served in the military, and so I am confused about the last bit of the article: "They must avoid threatening President Obama with resignations in protest if he overrules their advice; such threats subvert the principle of civilian control which implies that civilians have a right to be wrong."
Are there not degrees of wrong? For example, some mistakes of civilian leadership might make for a less-than-optimal military result, but others might make for a catastrophic but completely foreseeable result.
If the CinC gives a lawful order that the recipient knows full well will lead to a disastrous military outcome, is it incumbent on the recipient to resign rather than execute the order, or is it still a matter of duty to carry out the order with the hope of mitigating the disaster? And in the latter case, how can the recipient of the order hope to avoid the inevitable blame for the disastrous result?
Trying to help
Track down Up the Organization by Robert Townsend; circa 1969. He has a nice paraphrase of a maxium from Napoleon. Essentially, "A general should resign rather than execute a flawed order" or words to that effect. Townsend quotes it approvingly, suggesting civilian managers in peaceful businesses should follow the same course.
I asked a general officer during Carter's time why generals don't resign. For example, none of them quit during Johnson's time when he was bragging that they couldn't bomb an outhouse without his permission. The answer was much as you suggested . . . if I quit I'd be famous for about 20 minutes but have no effect on the policy. If I stay, I might be able to reduce the damage or slowly change the policy in some aspects.
Another LBJism: asked why he didn't sack a leaker, he replied, "I'd rather have him in the tent pissing out that out of the tent pissing in."
Feaver jumps on the Jack
Feaver jumps on the Jack Keane bandwagon (supposedly the leaker of the McChrystal report) and tries to railroad Obama into upping the troop levels by raising the stakes to include a major civil-military crash.
His technique is light on facts on heavy on spin, citing the opinions of like-minded members of the commentariat.
The last report I heard from inside the Pentagon said the brass appreciated the fact the this administration has a genuinely consultative process, rather than the Bush administration policy of cutting out dissidents.
Feaver adds the red herring charge that Obama blames all on Bush. It is not wrong to note that this problem has been allowed to fester for years in the context of telling us he is going to take some time to deliberate before making a decision. He's already given the problem more attention in 9 months than Bush in 7 years.
Finally, Obama seems to be using the time to push Karzai into action. Promise the troops first, Karzai is secure and doesn't have to cede anything. Afghanistan will continue to have a government that drives people into the arms of the Taliban, and McChrystal's plan become doomed to failure even if we put in 500,000 troops. How stupid would that be?
Proved themselves competent?
Well, not exactly. In other theaters, they have conducted themselves competently, and not necessarily to lasting effect -- the compact Petraeus formed with Iraqi locals fell apart soon after he left. But neither man has proven his competence in Afghanistan other than perhaps in perception.
Both have announced that the Taliban is winning, and sronger than ever. It's far from clear that either has a plan that's going to change that much.
There is reason increasing from week to week to fear that both generals are embodying the current best display of the Peter Principle in action. Whoever leaked that confidential report to the White House evidently did not act on high moral ground. I recognize that is not to say that Obama's doing a great job. On this, we have absolutely no good grounds to present informed opinions. All we know is that Defense Department figures, the people who haven't done all that well during the past eight years in Afghanistan, are crabby about him, and some guys in uniform seem to be fighting a PR campaign dirty.
The Peter Principle?
Barack Hussein Obama is perhaps the ultimate example of the Peter Principle in action - someone rising FAR beyond his level of competence. That was clear when Obama, as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Europe, never called or attended a single session of that body (until Hillary Clinton's partisans in the press called him on it during the campaign).
Obama just can't seem to make time for decisions and thought which support our troops overseas - he couldn't when he was potentially a major player in our relations with NATO while he was in the Senate, and nothing has changed. Our men need support and backup in Afghanistan and Obama doesn't have time to resource that need; but he has the time to shill for a Chicago Olympics half of the people there didn't even want. I'd say that betrays a major case of skewed priorities.
And Obama's failure to make decisions in a timely fashion about Afghanistan is a tacit decision of its own, and one which will work against our troops and in favor of the Taliban insurgents. Not that it seems to matter to the man in the White House at this time.
Seriously?
http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2009/10/feaver-flashback.php
Also this: "[the military] do not hear what they do not want to hear -- namely that the President is reserving the option not to resource adequately the new strategy and, indeed, to change his mind about the strategy in a few months time."
We're supposed to take seriously the suggestion that our military doesn't understand these these options are always open to any president (with the caveat that if the resources are not to be available, the mission or strategy must change to accommodate)? I have a greater estimation of our officer corps' understanding of the chain of command than the author, in that case.
Not quite
The point as presented in the main post here is a partisan talking point. The real point is that resourcing Gen. McChrystal's recommended strategy is not up to President Obama alone. If the American army in Afghanistan is reinforced by as much as current American resources allow -- the figure being thrown around in the press is about 40,000 men -- and the other NATO contingents in Afghanistan do not increase at all, we are at best talking about "less inadequately resourcing" the strategy.
Even more fundamental is the consideration Gen. McChrystal himself emphasized, namely that without major changes in how allied military units in Afghanistan relate to the Afghan population and security personnel, reinforcements are likely to prove ineffective. This aspect of the situation is discussed at greater length on Tom Ricks' blog; suffice it to say here that the kind of "culture change" McChrystal is calling for would be substantially more difficult to implement in the heterogenous NATO force in Afghanistan than was the shift to counterinsurgency by the exclusively American army in Iraq some three years ago.
The Constitutional Tension Between Presidents & Generals
Let the record be set straight on why we are even having this national debate:
On 9/11, our country came under attack by terrorists under the direction of Osama bin Laden and the Al Qaeda terrorist organization. It was the responsibility of then President Bush and his military commanders (The Joint Chiefs of Staff) to execute a war strategy in order to vanquish these enemies with due haste.
Gary Berntsen, a CIA Operative, working on Operation Jawbreaker (go read his book of the same title), was inserted into Afghanistan in order to track down and kill bin Laden, his Al Qaeda operatives, and his Taliban supporters. Berntsen had been part of a CIA team that had been in and out of Afghanistan doing intelligence on bin Laden since the mid-1990's.
In November of 2001, after the initial defeat of the Taliban in the major population centers by the Afghan Northern Alliance, with the assistance of U.S. Special Forces and CIA personnel, Bertsen was given orders to find bin Laden and his "entourage" who had escaped into the mountains bordering Pakistan.
When Berntsen finally located them in the valley of Tora Bora, he contacted CentCom (Central Command at the Pentagon) by Satellite Phone and requested that several hundred U.S. Special Forces troops be inserted into the top of the valley in order to block their escape into Pakistan. Much to his chagrin, he was denied that request, but told that he could have air support (bombing runs). The reasoning was that commanders (and ostensibly, The White House) did not want to risk the potential for high casualites.
Berntsen knew that the cave complex in the area ran deep into the mountains, and was virtually impenetrable from bombs. The Soviets had tried the same tactics in 1989, failed, and left Afghanistan in abject defeat. Nonetheless, using a high-powered lasar-guiding device, he "focused" bombs dropped from B-52's flying at 50,000 feet into the valley and surrounding mountain cave complex.
Bin Laden, Al Qaeda, and much of the Taliban leadership escaped over the mountains and into Pakistan. The very objective of the war a colossul failure.
Had Bush and his commanders listened to Berntsen, we would not be fighting this war at the scale we are today. Thus, sometimes neither Presidents nor Generals are right.
But more to the point.
Going back to George Washington and the under-funded and under-manned Continental Army, the constant tension between military and civil leaders is always problematic. Lincoln experienced it numerous times during the Civil War (General McClellan would not fight, General Sherman fought "to hard"). In WWII, General Patton and President Roosevelt. In Korea, President Truman and General MacArthur. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, President Kennedy and General Curtis Lemay (who wanted to bomb Cuba and "finish off" the Soviet Union - VERY SCARY strategy. In Vietnam, President Johnson and General Westmoreland.
The invasion of Iraq was not widely supported by many of the high-ranking military leaders in the Pentagon - there were more voluntary retirements of Generals during the Bush Administration then in any previous era.
And now Afghanistan . . .
President Obama has inherited a situation much like Nixon did in 1969. A war that has escalated beyond what any of the original military advisors had ever contemplated is now thrown into the hands of a President that is caught between what his personally-designated commander recommends, and a public that is wavering in its support of a long and costly war.
Everyone seems to have opinions, but the fact is that there are NO simple nor definitive answers. Like many of his predecessors, President Obama is, metaphorically speaking, caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place. Punditry and opinions will not be the final arbiter of what the final result will bring. As in many of the previous historical examples, savvy, intelligence, and a certain amount of luck will dictate whether he succeeds in this endeavor.
What all of the so-called experts should be thankful for, is they are not walking in President Obama's shoes. I just wish him success. That's what this country needs right now.
Lance M. Haley
screwedus.com
Great post, Lance. You've
Great post, Lance. You've really captured the essence of the issues at hand much better than all the partisan shots taken earlier in the blog and comments.
Thank you
Thank you for your feedback. I try to be non-partisan, but it is getting more and more difficult these days.
The American People Don't Need an Explanation...
...since they already understand and support the rationale for a withdrawal from this failed endeavor. The military, which needs to shut up and submit to civilian control, isn't owed an explanation either. They aren't paid to comment on or make policy, they're paid to follow orders and execute policy. Obama's decision-making process is none of their damn business.
Military Involvement in Decision-Making
Your arguments are too simplisitic.
Orders received from politicians are rarely specific - military leaders require background knowledge on the decision-making process to appreciate unstated constraints. To effectly execute policy, the military must consider the effects generated by choice of force, ordnance, timing, collateral damage... Even simple operations, like freeing pirate-held captives, must consider domestic, allied, and regional splashback.
Politicians rely heavily on military leadership to outline options and provide timeline estimates, impossible to provide if the military is excluded from the decision-making process.
Aside from leaks suggesting discontent with policy, there's no evidence of US military disobedience to orders.
so much for that "citizen soldier" crap, huh?
The US military are also in the vast majority of cases US citizens. They do not lose their citizenship or the status they share with other citizens of the United States of being the people to whom Barack Obama ultimately reports.
As far as "...they already understand and support the rationale for a withdrawal from this failed endeavor" is concerned, Nierneduj, you don't seem to have checked in with the President in whom you wish to invest imperial powers - Obama called Afghanistan a "war of necessity" when he was saying other things he didn't mean on the campaign trail, then repeated the statement again when the American people were questioning his lack of leadership and responsibility on the issue.
Nierneduj, you just don't know what the American people understand and support. Why don't you try speaking for yourself instead of your betters? (Since your name is "judenrein" backwards, you are obviously an antisemitic wanker of the sort who was our President's spiritual advisor until just after his foul mouth and racial hatred became matters of public record.)
may I suggest something entirely different
PBO wants the Afgan president to be an appointee and it takes a little longer to make it appear legitimate than scheduled.
My understanding is that we're in Af-stan to provide the other jaw for the classic pincer against Persia. If we're not gonna use the pliers, Af-stan then becomes a Pakistan/India problem and we should vacate.
If we insist on providing a profit motive for Pakistan to chase "the base" around the mountain we will be in this for billions of dollars and many years.
PBO gets to choose blood or money...today its both!
thanks for the forum,
PR
He ran for the job...
...and doesn't seem to be up to it. "Commander-in-Chief" isn't just a perk of the Presidency, it's an important part of the job. Obama just can't make the hard calls. He isn't worth a damn as a commander-in-chief, because his speech writers aren't able to come up with decent military policy that will fit on a cue card.
Rollover and let the Military men rule!?
It's not always totally wise to listen to your "commanders on the ground." You pointed out that Obama set the ball low and Bush didn't. Bush's strategy towards both wars, especially Iraq, were always so completely unrealistic and Utopian that they never could have been accomplished.
Let us also not forget that Bush's civil-military conundrum led to the firing of more than a handful of generals including the Chief of Staff and decorated military man, Secretary of State Colin Powell. He had a head on collision with the military due to his administrations policies.
I do agree that Obama needs to reign in those who are speaking loosely to media outlets; I don't agree that accepting McChrystal's troop request is a do or die. Commanders on the ground get it wrong sometimes. The key is getting it right even if it creates stress between the civil-military dynamic.
Excuse me? Powell wasn't
Excuse me? Powell wasn't chief of staff when he resigned under Bush, he was SecState and a civilian. And his main problem seems similar to Mrs. Clinton's under Obama - being bypassed too many times (though Powell seemed to think he had a brief to WRITE our foreign policy, instead of EXECUTING it).
Answering your main point, what Obama seems to be doing wrong is not paying enough attention to the problem. If he was able to offer a principled reason for not acting....
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