Generals Have to be Politicians, But They Need to be Diplomats

The relationship between General David Petraeus and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Kemal al-Maliki is so strained that Mr. Maliki may ask Washington to withdraw the general.

Mr. Maliki, a Shi’ite, is a seemingly reluctant leader. He spent years in exile during the Hussein regime, and he vociferously protests arming Sunni insurgents under the guise of “fighting al Qa’eda.” His loud complaining has come to little – It has resulted in a pledge by U.S. forces to let al Maliki’s security vet the recruits. Aids say he complains bitterly about delivery delays of promised materiel.

And while he is at loggerheads with Petraeus, the United States forges ahead with the arming of Sunni Sheiks.

In short, al-Maliki is feeling put upon and unduly burdened, and not entirely without justification.

From Air Force Times

Petraeus says his ties with al-Maliki are “very good” but acknowledges expressing “the full range of emotions” on “a couple of occasions.”

U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker, who meets together with al-Maliki and Petraeus at least weekly, concedes “sometimes there are sporty exchanges.”

Al-Maliki has spoken sharply — not of Petraeus or Crocker personally — but about their tactic of welcoming Sunni militants into the fight against al-Qaida forces in Anbar and Diyalah provinces.

As for Petraeus, he really is facing a nightmare scenario. The Iraqi police and military forces are only nominally under the control of al Maliki, and in many cases those forces act not in the interest of the Iraqi government, but in sectarian – that is to say Shi’ite – interests. In addition, al Maliki has proven unwilling to cut his ties to fundamentalist Shi’ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who controls the Mahdi Army militia.

Meanwhile, Ambassador Ryan Crocker has his own issues with the stagnation of the political process. (Imagine. The Iraqi parliament is not bending over backwards to meet externally set benchmarks.) Crocker can not continue to insist that American G.I.’s are fighting and dying to give the Maliki government “breathing room” when al Maliki either can not or will not make an opportunity from it.

The ambassador, one of the State Department’s most seasoned Middle East diplomats, appeared to be genuinely fond of al-Maliki and profoundly understanding of the Iraqi leader’s troubles.

“We are dealing with existential issues. There are no second tier problems ... so there is a lot of pressure. And we all feel very deeply about we’re trying to get done. So yeah, sometimes there are sporty exchanges,” he said.

“And believe me I’ve had my share of them. That in no way means, in my view, strained relations. I have great admiration for Prime Minister Maliki, and I know General Petraeus does as well. And I like to think it is reciprocal. Wrestling with the things we’re all wrestling with here, it would almost be strange if you didn’t get a little passionate from time to time.”

Generals, who obtain flag rank and continue to advance with presidential and congressional approval, are politicians. Get your head around that fact. To advance to O-4 takes a degree of political acumen (well – it used to, and it will again) and to go beyond O-4 – you have to display the appropriate political ability; and you have a career.

That’s how it works, in a nutshell.

Generals aren’t just politicians. They are also perpetually fighting the last war. Newsflash fellas – Desert ≠ Jungle. (And by the way, it was stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid to deemphasize counterinsurgency after Vietnam like that was an anomaly, ya morons.)

I would like to say that that is all well and good; but I can’t because it isn’t.

All sides spoke with the critical September reports by Crocker and Petraeus to Congress clearly at the front of their minds — the need to make it clear to an increasingly hostile U.S. legislative branch that progress is being made and it would be wrong to start pulling out troops and cutting support now.

It will be a tough sell, but not for lack of getting their views before the public in advance of walking into Congressional committee rooms about seven weeks from now.

In 4-G warfare, what Generals really need are not so much political skills, but Diplomatic skills.

This is, apparently, not a gift that David Petraeus possesses or that the Army engenders.

Keep this in mind. September is right around the corner.

This is it. They do not get any more Friedmans.

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Meanwhile...

From the Washington Post:

Rep. Henry A. Waxman (Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said documents obtained by his panel suggest that the appearances by the drug control officials were part of a larger White House effort to politicize the work of federal agencies that "may be more widespread than previously known."

Waxman cited a memo written by former White House political director Sara M. Taylor showing that John P. Walters, director of the drug control office, and his deputies traveled at taxpayer expense to about 20 events with vulnerable GOP members of Congress in the three months leading up to the elections.

In a letter to Taylor, Waxman also pointed to an e-mail by an official in the drug policy office describing President Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, as being pleased that the office, along with the Commerce, Transportation and Agriculture departments, went "above and beyond" the call of duty in arranging appearances by Cabinet members at campaign events.

"This recognition is not something we hear every day and we should feel confident that our hard work is noticed," said the e-mail, written by Douglas Simon, the drug policy office's White House liaison. "The director and the deputies deserve the most recognition because they actually had to give up time with their families for the god awful places we sent them."

The drug control office has had a history of being nonpartisan, and a 1994 law bars the agency's officials from engaging in political activities even on their own time.

Light, disinfectant, y'all know the rest...

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What IS the Color of the Sky in Your World, Bill Kristol?

A little more Kool-Aid to go with your pie?

Can there be a better example of the 26% deadenders than William Kristol? In Sunday's issue of the Washington Post, he displays such self-deluded self-interest that my jaw still hurts after having struck the floor so hard.

I suppose I'll merely expose myself to harmless ridicule if I make the following assertion: George W. Bush's presidency will probably be a successful one.

Let's step back from the unnecessary mistakes and the self-inflicted wounds that have characterized the Bush administration. Let's look at the broad forest rather than the often unlovely trees. What do we see? First, no second terrorist attack on U.S. soil -- not something we could have taken for granted. Second, a strong economy -- also something that wasn't inevitable.

Are these the criteria that Kristol really wants to use? Because if so, then the administration of Bill Clinton must have been a stupendous success. After all, no terrorist attacks on American soil after 1993, right? As for the economy, more peacetime growth than any American economy ever, and an era of deficits turned into an era of surpluses.

So we've not had another terrorist attack on American soil since 9/11. Can we credit Bush with that? Hardly, for blind luck seems to be our benefactor here.

As for the great economy, no doubt if you're a member of the robber-baron elite, things are going quite swimmingly. But as for the average American, well not so much. If Americans were confident in this administration's handling of the economy, why then do Democratic candidates for president gain such traction by pointing out how badly the vast majority of citizens are simply being left behind?

Clearly influenced by some of their most successful candidates in last year’s Congressional elections, Democrats are talking more and more about the anemic growth in American wages and the negative effects of trade and a globalized economy on American jobs and communities.

They deplore what they call a growing gap between the middle class, which is struggling to adjust to a changing job market, and the affluent elites who have prospered in the new economy.

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, Democrat of New York, calls it “trickle-down economics without the trickle.”

I think these are the people Kristol refers to, when he touts this great economy.

The tributes to Sanford I. Weill line the walls of the carpeted hallway that leads to his skyscraper office, with its panoramic view of Central Park. A dozen framed magazine covers, their colors as vivid as an Andy Warhol painting, are the most arresting. Each heralds Mr. Weill’s genius in assembling Citigroup into the most powerful financial institution since the House of Morgan a century ago.

These days, Mr. Weill and many of the nation’s very wealthy chief executives, entrepreneurs and financiers echo an earlier era — the Gilded Age before World War I — when powerful enterprises, dominated by men who grew immensely rich, ushered in the industrialization of the United States. The new titans often see themselves as pillars of a similarly prosperous and expansive age, one in which their successes and their philanthropy have made government less important than it once was.

Those earlier barons disappeared by the 1920s and, constrained by the Depression and by the greater government oversight and high income tax rates that followed, no one really took their place. Then, starting in the late 1970s, as the constraints receded, new tycoons gradually emerged, and now their concentrated wealth has made the early years of the 21st century truly another
Gilded Age.

Ah, the Gilded Age...if it can return, one can only hope the tenements & workhouses of old can as well.

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Senator Smith defends about-face on Iraq war to GOP conference

Sen. Gordon Smith tells a conference that we should leave
"this ancient civil war, because we can't fix that"

On Friday night, Senator Gordon Smith (R-OR) addressed the Dorchester Conference in Seaside, where he vigorously defended his about-face on the war in Iraq.

Recall that in December, Smith, from the well of the Senate denounced the presidents war strategy as “absurd” and went so far as to say it “may even be criminal.” He has become a strident opponent of Bush’s “surge” plan in recent weeks.

"If you're really going to do a surge, you don't do it with 20,000, you do it with 250,000," he said, noting that Baghdad is a city of nearly 7 million people. But he said the United States cannot afford such a response; instead it has to come from the Iraqi Army.

Smith said he recently spoke with Gen. David Petraeus, the new top military commander in Iraq, who told him the troop surge has only a one in four chance of succeeding.

He said his views are aimed at showing the Iraqi government that U.S. patience is "not inexhaustible."

[SNIP]

Smith has been blunt about his concerns for holding on to his seat, given the political climate in Oregon and nationally. But he said his changing views on the war have nothing to do with being re-elected.

"That's their opinion," he said, in an earlier interview Friday with The Oregonian. He said he has raised his objections at every opportunity with top administration officials, including the secretary of defense and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.

"I was always told to be patient, that it would get better," he said, "and it did not."

He said he decided to become more outspoken after an incident in October, in which the Iraqi government ordered the release of a captured militia leader. "At that point, I recognized we did not have a winning strategy," he said.

Smith was one of the 14 Senators to vote against General Casey’s confirmation as Secretary of the Army.

I want to believe that he is truly converted, but I dunno. Smith is the only Republican senator representing a Pacific Coast state. Oregon is the deepest shade of blue there is. And Smith is a craven opportunist and a politician to the max. What he has for breakfast is a political decision.

So it is no surprise that his rhetoric began to shift around the second week of November. He claims he started having doubts around May of last year, but those doubts did not dissuade him from continuing to cheerlead for the war. Those doubts only crept into his public statements after his party lost both houses, however, so color me skeptical on his sincerity.

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