Set out below is a rough draft of a post I was working on when the story hit today about an interview to be published later this week in Rolling Stone with General Stanley McChrystal. My post was about what I thought might be a dispute between President Obama and the military in December of this year (when there will be a review of operations in Afghanistan) or in July of next year (when we are supposed start to withdrawing). I was wondering if there might be a public disagreement between the military and President Obama if things are not going as well as we hoped, and he still wants to start pulling out in July of 2011 while they think a few more troops and little more time might get the job done.
While General McChrystal may have accelerated the timeline for such a dispute, he has more likely changed the dispute from one about the wisdom of the President’s policy to one about civilian-military lines of authority.
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Here is the draft I was working on:
Recent reports indicate that things are not going well in Afghanistan. As we have focused on health care, and the economy, and the Gulf oil leak, Afghanistan slipped from view. Until about two weeks ago, the last big stories out of Afghanistan were at the time of the offensive in Marjah in February. There were encouraging stories at the time the offensive started*, but then things pretty much went quiet.
But what we have seen in the last few weeks makes one wonder – and worry – about how things are going. While we are getting more troops in Afghanistan, and actually have more troops in Afghanistan than Iraq, we are still not up to the number President Obama talked about last December.**
The offensive in Marjah was not as successful as we hoped. The idea was to clear out the Taliban and establish the Afghan national government. The first part was done, to some extent. The second part has not been done, and without good civilian government, counterinsurgency will not work.***
The Kandahar operation, which has been talked about for a long time, is being downgraded. Instead of an "offensive," it is now a "partnership operation". You know things are in trouble, when military spokesmen say things like this: "The media have chosen to use the term offensive. [W]e have certainly talked about a military uplift, but there has been no military use of the term offensive." Neither is the fact that President Karzai told local leaders in Kandahar that there would be no offensive (or operation) without their assent.
Also, there are reports from Afghanistan that President Karzai is telling his aides and associates that he doesn’t think the U.S. can win, so he is trying to make whatever accommodations he can with Pakistan and the Taliban. Not surprisingly, President Obama’s promise to start withdrawing troops in July of 2011 is making Afghans, both at low levels and the top level, leery of allying with us. We’re going to start leaving in thirteen months; the Taliban isn’t. For some people the conclusion is obvious.
But perhaps the most concerning report is this excerpt from a book about Obama’s first year in office by Jonathan Alter. Before he agreed to send in an extra 30,000 troops to Afghanistan, President Obama had this conversation with Defense Secretary Robert Gates, General David Petraeus, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mike Mullen:
"Obama asked Petraeus, 'David, tell me now. I want you to be honest with me. You can do this in 18 months?'
'Sir, I'm confident we can train and hand over to the ANA [Afghan National Army] in that time frame,' the general replied.
'Good. No problem,' the President said. 'If you can't do the things you say you can in 18 months, then no one is going to suggest we stay, right?'
'Yes, sir, in agreement,' Petraeus said.
'Yes, sir,' Mullen said.
The President was crisp but informal. 'Bob, you have any problems?' he asked Gates, who said he was fine with it.
The President then encapsulated the new policy: in quickly, out quickly; focus on al-Qaeda, and build the Afghan army. 'I'm not asking you to change what you believe, but if you don't agree with me that we can execute this, say so now,' he said. No one said anything.
'Tell me now,' Obama repeated.
'Fully support, sir,' Mullen said.
'Ditto,' Petraeus said."
So, if things are not working as we had hoped by December of this year (when a review of operations is to be conducted) or by July of next year (when we are to start withdrawing troops), what is going to happen? Wars do not always go as intended. (Heck, getting bills passed in Congress doesn’t always go as planned.) If we haven’t accomplished enough, but the generals think that, with a little more time and/or a few more troops, they can succeed, what are they going to say? Are they going to be afraid to ask for more troops and/or time, given what their conversation with the President in December? Alternatively, if they do ask for more troops/time because that is their best advice, what is President Obama going to do?**** Is he going to be willing to listen to them or is he going to go try hold them to what they said a year or more ago even though facts have changed?
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* Mathew Rosenberg and Habib Zahori, "Outreach Precedes U.S. Offensive," The Wall Street Journal, February 12, 2010; Saeed Shah and Janan Zerak, "Allies get drop on Taliban, Chicago Tribune, February 14, 2010.
** When Obama spoke last December, he said the increased troops would be there by summer. The generals had planned to take longer than that, but he wanted to do it quicker. Well, the full number of extra troops is not there. The generals were right. Logistics isn’t easy.
*** Alan Cullison, "U.S. Offensive Stalls In Key Afghan City," The Wall Street Journal, June 11, 2010.
**** During the 2008 primary campaign then-Senator Obama did not support an individual mandate for health care and criticized Hilary Clinton for doing so. Once he became president, President Obama changed his mind.
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