Cole writes: "Since Petraeus authored that strategy and oversaw a stage of that war as commander, it actually was not fair to have him head the evaluative effort."
Former CIA Director David Petraeus. (photo: unknown)
Real Petraeus Issue was Evaluation of Afghanistan
11 November 12
aybe it is because I was brought up in part in Europe, but I just cannot understand American puritanism's obsession with public officials' private lives. I can't see that most private issues affect the quality of public service, and I don't think people's private lives are any of our business, nor become our business because they become public servants. So I am not very interested in the lurid details that caused CIA director David Petraeus abruptly to resign on Friday.
What I had been concerned about, despite my admiration for Petraeus, is that he wasn't the right person to head the CIA when among its major tasks was to evaluate the counter=insurgency effort in Afghanistan. Since Petraeus authored that strategy and oversaw a stage of that war as commander, it actually was not fair to have him head the evaluative effort, and he shouldn't have been put in that position.
Counter-insurgency as Petraeus defined it involves a four-stage process. The army has to take territory away from a guerrilla movement. It has to clear that territory of the enemy. It has to hold that territory for long enough to reassure the local population that the guerrillas are not coming back and won't punish them as collaborators if they have something to do with the US. It has to build, i.e. build up local institutions such as police, so as to provide security and prosperity in the long run. Counter-insurgency is long and slow and requires winning over local hearts and minds.
Petraeus and other officers boxed Obama in in late 2009 and more or less imposed a counter-insurgency policy in Afghanistan on him. They only gave him this one plan, when he asked for 3 to choose from.
The counter-insurgency idea derived from the view of some in the officer corps that they had had a victory of sort because of the troop escalation or "surge" in Iraq late in the Bush period. As far as I can tell, however, violence in Iraq fell through 2007 not mainly because of US GI's but because a Shiite ethnic cleansing campaign chased most Sunnis from mixed neighborhoods.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki had convinced Petraeus to begin with the Sunni armed groups, and to disarm them. Once they were helpless, the Shiite militias like the Mahdi Army went in and ethnically cleansed the remaining ones.
Through 2007 forward, as mixed Sunni-Shiite neighborhoods became more solidly Shiite, the death toll began declining. Angry Shiites who wanted to kill a Sunni would have had to get in their cars and drive for a while to find one.
Petraeus knew about the ethnic cleansing campaign. He was aware that it was creating a new wave of Sunni refugees. But he saw the troop escalation or ‘surge' as the primary reason for the fall in violence.
Based on this misunderstanding of what had happened in Iraq, Petraeus hoped to do in Afghanistan what he thought he did with Baghdad. Hence the mantra, take clear hold build.
But this kind of counter-insurgency would have required hundreds of thousands of fresh troops. Petraeus didn't have them. It was a huge endeavor.
It has largely failed, though US politicians and journalists seem reluctant to say so.
That failure of counter-insurgency in Afghanistan is dangerous and poses special dangers for our troops. It is dangerous for the future, since it cries out for clearsightedness lest we plunge into more such mistakes.
It was Petraeus's CIA that was charged with evaluating the unfolding Afghanistan disaster. I don't see how it could have done a good job of that. The author of the counter-insurgency strategy was now at the top of the evaluating agency.
As the US started planning for a post-Hamid Karzai Afghanistan, and for a massive troop drawdown, we needed unbiased reporting on the American scene. While I don't doubt that Petraeus would hve tried hard to give it to us, it just wasn't very likely.
So that's my critique. President Obama needs someone at the CIA who can openly evaluate whether the troop escalation has been consistently a success or failure. I don't care how he or she spends their time after 5 pm.
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Comments
We are concerned about a recent drift towards vitriol in the RSN Reader comments section. There is a fine line between moderation and censorship. No one likes a harsh or confrontational forum atmosphere. At the same time everyone wants to be able to express themselves freely. We'll start by encouraging good judgment. If that doesn't work we'll have to ramp up the moderation.
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November 10, 2012
Exclusive: The resignation of CIA Director David Petraeus over an extramarital affair marks a stunning reversal for the longtime media darling. But some in President Obama’s inner circle are not displeased the neocon-friendly ex-general is gone, reports Robert Parry.
The messy departure of CIA Director David Petraeus over an extramarital affair removes the last high-ranking neoconservative holdover from George W. Bush’s administration and gives the reelected President Barack Obama more maneuvering room to negotiate a settlement over Iran’s nuclear program.
BEHIND OBAMA’S BACK: As Bob Woodward reported in his book, Obama’s Wars, it was Bush’s old team that made sure Obama was given no option other than to escalate troop levels in Afghanistan substantially. The Bush holdovers also lobbied for the troop increase behind Obama’s back.
According to Woodward’s book, Gates, Petraeus and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, Adm. Mike Mullen, refused to even prepare an early-exit option that Obama had requested. Instead, they offered up only plans for their desired escalation of about 40,000 troops.
http://consortiumnews.com/2012/11/10/behind-petraeuss-resignation/
Still, the Patreaus fall seemed to be more about the woman involved having information she shouldn't have. If it didn't come from Patreaus it seems it may have come from her connection to him.
I agree that officials private lives shouldn't be a consideration of their public service.
Who ya gonna call to get the wet work done?
Is this what RSN has come to....?
What next...
"My worship of Dick Cheney" ???
As someone who was born in Germany toward the end of the war, I have always watched this development with great trepidation, as it will lead to what brought German society to its knees.
We fight too many unnecessary wars. We sacrifice our young generations on the altar of self-aggrandize ment.
We should begin to reflect.
The U.S. government knows that, but citizens appear to have forgotten what war is. Certainly, they are shielded from reality in today's highly political atmosphere, but the reality remains. And that reality is destroying the entire fabric and economy of the U.S. So you are right to worry, as many of us are.
1. Our military tradition has middle class people in the military, and many minorities. I don't see them turning against the people.
2. We have a completely different culture than Germany. It's too early to say we will never revert back to some kind of ugly racist ugliness, but every year it gets less and less likely. I worry about a backlash against whites to tell the truth, and while some whites might deserve it a lot of us do not.
HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN KENT STATE????
Do you remember Kent State?
Love these hyper-exaggerat ed comments!
But you have a point. It would prove interesting.
The problem with Petreus, if this is the real reason, is that affairs and secrecy make you liable to blackmail and extortion, which is unacceptable in the military. In the civilian sector, it's up to the people, not in the military.
Of the 5 or 6 wild guesses I've read on the internet so far, the one written in this article is the first one I've read that sounded even plausible.
The anti-Israel US "meme" is something I think was started, bought and paid for by Saudi Arabia through their contacts and financial power. Funny that it is a classified secret how much money and what percentage ownership the Saudis have in the US, and how much if not most of our military maneuverings have resulting in more power for the Saudis.
The perpetrators of these conversations of hate on both sides work to fragment and tear up the left, which is by nature very fragmented anyway, without any real leaders as the Right has.
Until we all can disavow and drive this kind of stuff out of the Left there will not not much accomplished, and Obama will mostly be able to disregard anything the left wants while fulfilling a mostly Republicans agenda without anyone really knowing or understanding.
You sound like a dupe driven by your hate - look at some facts for a change.
Never more so than during Petraeus of "surge" fame.
The CIA operational wing likes him. His most recent visit to Turkey was an attempt to pull their chestnuts out of the fire over Benghazi fallout.
His resignation has more to do with keeping him from testifying to the Senate Intelligence committee than any "love affair".
If you want to know about an "affair" that is instructive, google up Iran/Contra Affair.
The analysis on Iraq "success" and why is perfect. Now we exported Iraq, Libya civil war to Syria.
Get out of Afghanistan -
This is why attack on Iran will not go very well - there is no much potential for civil war.
In 09 when the talk of a surge was going on, the President was considering the options. As noted he had asked for 3 options....they gave him 1 and in addition they leaked that they wanted 40.ooo troops.
So Obama was under a lot of pressure. I remember that MC Cain and other hawks were on TV all the time lobbying for what the generals wanted, telling us how important it was that the generals got what they wanted.
I think MC Cain forgot that the Military is NOT in charge, the civil government IS. The generals made Obama look weak, when he did what any commander in chief HAS to do,... THINK VERY carefully before sending troops in harms way!!!
So I admire Obama for choosing Petreus as head of CIA, although personally he was not comfortable with him.
...and you should know that in the US one thinks 'officially' like a child about sex and honor, especially as a politician, and as a DCIA he IS a politician...an d they really believe that crap - or want to make the public believe that they do: it's the old story about wanting to please the Johnses, who are, of course, religious and perfect citizens...blah , blah...and we cannot disappoint them...or we might taint the other members of our club of the 'Perfect Ones' and don't stay in power ( yawn )
...how can you not understand this?
A jealous mistress who is married to someone else with 2 small children??
It stands out like a gaping whole, conspicuously absent from his presentation.
Just Google "Salvador Option" and you will have your choice of Salvador Option Iraq, Libya, Syria, and of course the original version.
Thousand of Iraqis were tortured with drills, beaten, had their eys plucked out, decapitaated and shot by death squads that we trained. This was during "the surge." We took credit for that but not for all the Salvador style death squads we trained. The thousands of people per month who were murdered by Shiite on Sunni violence drove the communities apart and terrorized everyone to the point that they couldn't react to the additional invasion of the surge.
If your idea of success is genocide and terror then Petraeus and Negropnte suceeded. I, personally would have expected better.
I will presume that everyone knows what we did in El Salvador.
According to an article published in New York Times Magazine, in September 2004 Counsellor to the US Ambassador for Iraqi Security Forces James Steele was assigned to work with Negroponte on a new Iraqi counter-insurge ncy unit known as the Special Police Commandos who were found to commit most of the crimes against humanity. http://psychoanalystsopposewar.org/resources_files/TheWay_of_the_Commandos.html ).
From 1984 to 1986 then Col. Steele had led the US Military Advisory Group in El Salvador training their death squads.
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