Geez, I wish we had folks representing us who know something about America. It's our guys hanging out there with their asses on the line in Iraq and Afghanistan, our money paying for these follies, and the idea that our on-the-ground leadership needs be expert on the locals in order to be effective badly misreads our interests.

Iraq has been butt-deep in US experts. Result: a morass. Let's try having someone in charge who cares about how it turns out for the USA and - if that means saying screw it to the Iraqis - so be it.

BTW, medical science is still wondering who had the brain transplant, TR or Odierno. And now, for his second transformation, Odierno is posing as representative of American political interests. All you Iraq hands: how about seeing it through an American lens ... which might just get us shut and clear of this whole (Bush-created) mess.

That's pretty disturbing.

As someone who follows Iraq only as closely as any foreign policy generalist but who specializes in North Korea, I can tell you none of us would be surprised by the problems between Chris Hill and the US military in that country. When he worked on North Korea issues at the end of the Bush administration, Hill was not willing to listen to anyone who knew the issues and had his own little team of groupies who worshipped the ground he walked on (or at least pretended to). While there are a number of reasons why we are in trouble with the North today, not the least of which is the North Koreans themselves, Hill wouldnt listen to experts or anyone else about how to deal with a country that he knew nothing about. Sounds like he is repeating his performance in Iraq. Lets hope the consequences arent as bad.

I've been disturbed about the quantity of dispatches relating to the wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan coming from what seems like the military point of view (and the military commanders' point of view in particular) to the detriment of understanding the aims of the political and diplomatic sides and even dismissing the strategic/political adjustments being made under a new administration. That Ricks would seem to give Odierno the benefit of the doubt here is an example of what I'm talking about.

These Foreign Policy blogs are a great service, but the reporting on the personalities in the news is starting to feel a bit like the rest of Beltway journalism, from health care on, in that it's lost in the blow-by-blow, missing the big picture, and constrained by the biases and agendas of the insider sources. And the nuggets of wisdom filtered through the press from the foreign policy establishment is a sign that these figures know little more about what America should do now than they did when Bush was in office.

Thanks for the good news. I'm glad we have someone like Christopher Hill doing the right thing in Iraq. It's good to know that men like Hill are taking charge and ignoring the pentagon fake expert liars. I guess if Davey boy was there every thing would be ship shape! Everything Davey does is perfect. Davey is the smartest man in the world. I just don't understand why the smartest man in the world can't produce any victories for America. Oh, sorry, I forgot, Davey doesn't work for America, he works for the pentagon. Victories are bad, the wars might end. No money in peace, ya know!

Unity of command problems? I thought the tax payers provide lavish funds for our perfumed princes to learn about this kind of stuff at their little "War Colleges". Looks like the brutal thug Odierno is college dumb, like the rest of the perfumed princes that have ruined the Army and Marines. Odierno's military bearing is pathetic, he looks like a steroid juiced bouncer at a strip club. I feel sorry for our enlisted soldiers being led by this loser.

Troubling is that we appear not to have an interest in building a broad military cadre capable of speaking the languages and understanding the cultures of Central Asia.

How many years has all this been in operation?

In fact in the other areas from Djibouti to Dakar, Tripoli to Cape Town other that GPS position points and ration requirements for a quick kill what do we understand?

Why do we continue to speak about endurance when we act always in a deployment length sprint?

Funding, well, by deficits, of course, instead of voiding high end tax reductions this year? This doesn't indicate commitment to the long haul either. (Proposing that would clear the Republican caucus faster than a Palin walk by.)

really nice post, just wish you to check out ugg de, like ugg boots de.

What was the expertise that prompted candidate Barack Obama to declare that we must transfer our effort from Iraq to Afghanistan? During the few years that he was a lecturer on constitutional law (!), then an Illinois state senator, he could not also have been an expert on Central Asia, could he? If not, someone must have been prompting him to make that declaration. Will that person now step forward?

If no such person, then there is a theory that, like all of our recent presidents, Barack Obama is simply a narcissist, and - as is the way with that personality - he likes to project authority and confidence even when he does not know beans about anything, especially foreign policy.

With our politicians in bed with corporate America and PAC-political lobbysts, we are on "auto-pilot" in search of "just" wars. The solution from this disease is so easy and yet so difficult because of the way our political system is structured.With corporate lobbysts having their on internal matters and PACs highjacking our foreign policy, we are screwed.

Someone please save America,ban lobbying and campaign contributions of all kinds.As a topping, we need term limits for Congress and the Senate.

We waited for all the Bush years to see how the new administration would attempt to solve the political differences between Shia, Suni and Kurd, not to mention the many factions vying for power. What has changed to mitigate the political imbroglio and fight for resource access and what has failed? I see nothing has improved so I will avoid asking that one. Also, are ordinary Iraqis seeing any improvement at all in their lives? And when will American and Western journalists demand an answer to how we justify the invasion and destruction of the oldest civilization on earth and the continued occupation and manipulation by oligarchs? Why is there no dispute about what these peoples are entitled to and where are the war crimes indictments, or has the entire Western press forsaken this particular holocaust against Muslim people?

Dear Mr. Ricks, isn't this getting a bit old? You have been predicting the 'unravelling' in Iraq for years now, and yet it still doesn't come. Is there an expiration date for your predictions? Are you making mountains out of mole hills regarding Odierno/Hill? Will you keep writing about the 'unravelling' until your last breath? You seem like a very important pundit, and I for one would like to hear more of your fresh opinions on places like Somalia and Yemen.

About the general and the diplomat, this tension is always going to be there. The military feels it knows it all and resist civilian input and control. Add the fact that Ambassador Hill is being opposed for purely political reason by certain sections of the Mmilitary and the Republican Party, then you have a more aggravating situation. War is too serious a business to be left to Generals alone. Civilian control ensures that we take a broader view of the situation we face. This is rightly so, because we must take into account a broader strategic goal as well as concerns about budget, support by the people and diminishing human and financial resources
Dr. Sam

In the 1950's, we were taught that Russia, or the USSR, was evil because they wanted to take over the world by force. Then we were told that cold war was over and we could see they were just like us. I always thought it meant that they were good people too, but then I realized it meant they, like us, are planning to take over the world by force, but no reason not to play along with them. I find it astonishing that the one subject going on that is most scary is one the press won't touch: The Pentagon has taken over the world and no one really knows what they plan to do about it. Obama surely has no clue, or at least he has zero say in the matter. We are officially a military state and though it isn't clear when the coup d'etat happened, it is still in full metal jacket.

Of course everyone knows war is too important to trust to the military. The problem though, is the military's civilian leaders always fail to understand their limitations as well, which is why conversely, Sun Tzu felt war was too important to leave completely to civilian authority.

Eliot A. Cohen stated, "politicians define grand policy in wars, but that it's up to the military to implement policy without civilian interference." - but points out that's in theory.

"Good morning, good morning!" the General said,

When we met him last week on our way to the line.

Now the soldiers he smiled at are most of 'em dead,

And we're cursing his staff for incompetent swine. - "The General"

It is frightening to me that the military is in a power struggle with civilian authority. The military is suppose to do what it is told by civilian authority. Churchill had a great comment concerning this subject, but I can't locate it. I bet you know it Mr. Ricks.

The military is in full splendor and you can catch their act this week testing the latest atomic styled noise bombing of civilians at the G20 sermon, ur, ugh, meeting. They will be there beating to death stupid young people who were so addled by the flop of education they received, they can't conceive of the world devised for them. The military is just thing, "if it don't make a man outta dem, it's sort em out somehow."

Plus, soon we'll all be part of the military and children as young as six will be fitted for that full metal jacket.

The hallmark of Chris Hill's pre-Iraq career was a February 2007 agreement with North Korea that the North began violating within weeks of signing it, and for which the North demanded the lifting of sanctions President Obama later had to reimpose when the North predictably walked away from the deal and tested a nuke. The deal also required Hill to coopt the Federal Reserve into returning $25 million in criminally derived funds to Kim Jong Il (see 18 U.S.C. 1957). Hill suppressed intelligence that North Korea was building the Syrians their own nuclear reactor, drawing furious reactions from Republicans and Democrats in the House Intelligence Committee. He overlooked repeated violations of UNSCR 1718, allowing North Korea to continue selling weapons abroad, thus weakening the international counter-proliferation framework that President Obama is now trying to rebuild. He was repeatedly deceptive in concealing North Korea's numerous cheats, obfuscations, and refusals to disclose or disarm.

On issue after issue, Christopher Hill excused North Korea from its agreed obligations -- to come clean on uranium enrichment, fully disclose its nuclear programs, disclose or turn over weapons or fissile material, disclose and halt proliferation activities, return the Japanese abductees (or their remains), or address its crimes against humanity. He had promised various members of Congress that those terms were non-negotiable, but then duly negotiated them all away until we were holding an empty bag. Hill knew by 2007 that his deal was falling apart, yet he spent the next year asking Congress to agree to more concessions while knowing full well that we'd get nothing in return. And we see the result.

http://newledger.com/2009/04/christopher-hill-deep-kimchee-for-iraq/

Hill alone isn't responsible for that, of course. Secretary Rice and President Bush knew exactly what was happening. They couldn't be bothered with national security interests when they had their legacies to think about.

Fortunately, Iraq is a sleepy backwater were Christopher Hill can't possibly do our national interests any more harm.

It's the new digital camouflage where you aren't supposed to see anything but ones and zeros.

An historical look (recently voiced by Rory Stewart) at British administration around the globe indicated success when the administrators lived many years in a region, knew (and were rigorously tested on) the local languages, and had to manage their own budget and security with minimal home-nation assistance. More recently, Frank Kitson noted that when it came to providing counter-insurgency assistance to another nation, the ambassador should be (without question) the lead and there should be clear relationships and organization of subordinate civil, military and police organizations. Certainly politics drives strategy. Kitson likely assumed that ambassadors were experts in their regions, which may not be the case here.

State today is bound by quality of life expectations that diplomatic staff will move more frequently than in the 18th and 19th centuries, and lacks a significant impetus to develop the kind of regional expertise of a few hundred years ago: Americans don't emigrate to the developing world.

As long as all the soldiers and all the diplomats know they're going to be returning to the USA in a matter of a couple of dozen months at most, there's little incentive to really learn the languages and customs or sort out command structure problems.

I find it amazing that 99% of the American public can talk about a situation in a country half-way around the country concerning military and strategic tactics and never have served in the military or experienced YEARS in a country where the pupulation hates your guts and sponges all available resources without any accountability. Until you have witnessd for extended periods of time, not just the jounts of two days to a week or so, and the cultural graft and corruption of the Iraqi society, stick to worrying about not transferring the wealth of our country. We are making Iraqi military officials millionaires while our citizens struggle to make home mortagages and living expenses.
Discuss something you know. Argue that by providing health care to all our citizens we are transferring wealth, a very bad thing. While the transfer of wealth by our government to bail out banks so the financial instituation employees can recieve their yearly bonuses at the rate that takes the average American ten years to earn is a good thing. There is some great conservative thinking there.

-Live for Iraq.