My bet is that Gen. Stanley McChrystal
will be gone within a week or so. Defense Secretary Gates canned Admiral Fallon
as Central Command chief in the spring of 2007 for less pointed remarks, so he
will look like a hypocrite if he does less here in response to McChrystal
dissing Obama, Biden, and the White House in a new article in Rolling
Stone.
At any rate, it may be time for a whole new team in
Afghanistan. My nomination is for Petraeus to step down an echelon and take the
Afghanistan command. You could leave him nominally the Centcom chief but let
his deputy, Marine Lt. Gen. John Allen, oversee Iraq, the war planning for
Iran, and dealing with Pakistan and the Horn of Africa. But more likely is that
Petraeus will ask for another Marine general, James Mattis, who is just
finishing up at Jiffycom,
and who had planned to retire later this year and head home to Walla Walla,
Washington. Petraeus and Mattis long have admired each other. The irony is that
Mattis has a reputation -- unfairly, I think -- for speaking a little too bluntly in
public about things like killing people. I think Mattis is a terrific,
thoughtful leader.
I do wonder if this mess is
the result of leaving McChrystal out there too long-he has been going non-stop
for several years, first in Iraq and then in Afghanistan. At any rate, his
comments reflect a startling lack of discipline. He would expect more of one of
his captains. We should expect more of him. I know, I've said worse about
Biden. But part of my job is to comment on these things, even flippantly
sometimes. Part of his job is not to.
COMMENTS (6)
Read More
