Believe I read where SECDEF's next stop is his home on Lake Washington outside Seattle but that could be OBE

OldLoad, you are mistaking Bob Gates for Bill Gates of Microsoft, who has quite the villa on Lake Washington. However, you’re close, Bob and his wife have a home up north from King County, in Skagit County, a bit below Mount Vernon, in a berg called Big Lake. . .or did until relatively recently?

How do I know this? I live and raise pygmy goats, dogs, cats, a ruckus, a little higher-up in elevation and south-east of there.

The choices make it clear Obama wanted to avoid a confirmation fight, and Gates needed to be replaced NOW, as his remarks (Libya in particular) were getting further and further off the reservation.

But what a mess! Petraeus at CIA? What qualifies him to run that vast bureaucracy? It does not work like the Army-- people say Yes, Sir and do the opposite.

A better move would have been to leave in-fighter Panetta at CIA and bring confirmable, steady hands like either Lugar or better yet, Hagel, in to run DOD. Petraeus could easily move to some academic position, running West Point maybe, and assume wise old Yoda status.

Rough waters ahead.

Peter wemeantwell.com

I gas up at the Safeway there, and grab tacos from Taco Time.

Maybe SECDEF and you and I could meet up for some fish tacos someday. :-)

How about the Brown Lantern Ale House in Anacortes? I'm sure "Bob" will be delighted to meet with us and discuss matters big and small, when and if, he gets back into town. : )

Well JPWREL, there may more to this, as this is not a time to demoralize the Agency by sidelining its DCI. Although I admit General Petraeus becoming, what will surely be an easy conformation, removes him from too much push back, should Obama demand a more significant than expected drawn down in forces from Afghanistan starting this July, something Obama’s party’s base will want to see.

Additionally, as a former CENTCOM, Petraeus is familiar with many of the issues and problems that will continue to face our national security interests which seem to be primarily located in that sphere, and should also bring with him some understanding of the Agency’s activities focused toward counter-terrorism adding to continuity.

Just a thought: if ever there was a time to give the Director of National Intelligence more clout, which the job title infers, but doesn't necessarily confer, this would be the time, if you are correct.

President of Washington & Lee say you? Following in the footsteps of another great soldier from a failed war that captured the imagination of both friend and foe Robert E. Lee.

Petraeus is a typically American type of fashionable phenomena that rises up into the realms of glory - until he doesn’t. He is also somewhat photogenic*, articulate, reeks of Jimmy Stewart common man gallantry but most important of all displays a political savvy rather uncommon for one in his profession. He is very un-MacArthur like in that he seems approachable and knows his place in the food chain.

*The Herman Goering like over the top uniform is almost clownish and contrary to the modesty that should prevail among military officers in a democratic republic. George Washington and George Marshall would not approve of the tin pot dictator look even if he honestly came by all his decorations. It reminds me of all the ‘flair’ a waiter wears at Chotsky’s. MacArthur ever the showman with a Caesar of an ego addressed Congress after his Korean dismissal with merely his five star rank on his uniform, very impressive.

Although they are often kept low key, and many uninformed individuals might disagree with me, CIA assessments tend to be quite candid in house, and the DCI can see the
product with analyst margin notes which are free from policy and political pressures often felt over at DIA, and State. Perhaps having Petraeus, an advocate for, but noted for carefully parsing his words for our mission in Afghanistan on board, will change his outlook and that’s the idea?

These wars and conflicts are a distraction for Obama, but he has no high profile individual in uniform to cast doubt toward the Republican's who beat the drum to continue them, but with a Petraeus nay saying, would take the wind out of their sales?

Naw, bad idea, sorry to waste your time.

TYRTAIOS makes a very solid observation that passed me by completely. The CIA may in fact be just the right spot for a guy like Petraeus to help Obama gently defang the ‘endless war’ Republican right wing!

Petraeus is a product of an Army that is in his blood and likely understands that Iraq and Afghanistan have hurt the institution that he loves. Perhaps CIA is the right place for him to be to help extract the armed forces from Afghanistan with honor intact and which no other man has the prestige (earned or not) to do.

Is he steady and constant in his beliefs? Is he wise? Does he speak truth to power? Is he the smartest person in the room? Is he the greatest soldier of his time?

I'm an unabashed George Marshall admirer. Is Petreaus the Marshall of his time--the very best man we have for the tough jobs at hand--or is he just another compliant little shit on the make?

That's the goal for many of these fellows, whether for institutional loyalties (I think Gates), career or genuine conviction. While they might not be wild-eyed neocons, I don't see these fellows as realists when it comes to addressing the budgetary bleeding that militarism represents. Even Gates much touted "cuts" were simply spending shifts.

We won't even need a new acronym as the Military Industrial Complex morphs into the Military Intelligence Complex. While Gates might be an enemy of congressional industrial boondoggles, he defends the bloated core of the Defense budget, despite economic realities. Note how he has fought real cuts, even parting ways with the Obama Administration.

The Petraeus brand has consistently been attached to the war's current expansion project, whether that was MNSTC-I's Shiite 'stand-up', or a 'surge' to pull the twelv-ers back from runnning the table. Suspect a CIA surge in the wings, when the curtain rings down on conventional/COIN warfare in two theaters. CIA don't need no stinking SOFA. Not as such.

Petraeus on the marquis promises lethal action. The huge dollop of below-the-radar SOC warfare in Iraq and AfPak has probably generated more discussion among our frenemies, than here among the stockholders at home. Over there he's known for kinetic warfare, the offer you shouldn't refuse. Sweet tea sipped over artisan carpets implies a less pleasant alternative.

Looking at it thru his eyes, the good general might relish any move that promises less of the public BS and private handholding of recent assignments. I'd also guess he took the CIA contract on a promise of more black budget and operating latitude than his predecessor. The UAV doesn't care who fuels and arms it.

I am as much a cheer leader for SecDef Gates as the next guy. However, let’s not be too hasty in the canonization process, as like many public servants who served many masters whims, Gates has been known to hedge around the truth in various matters, i.e. the Arms Export Control Act (Iran-Contra), violated with his full knowledge while at the CIA.

Additionally, some long gone Agency analysts will also tell you Gates fed Casey what he knew his boss wanted hear about Russia, thereby facilitating the Agency’s later lack of recognition that the Soviet Union was verging on implosion and collapse.

However, he who is without sin may cast the first stone, which certainly won't be I, having voted for Bush junior the first go around. . .whoops!

Or sell all that purpose-built crap to the desert dictators of the rest of this decade and beyond. Give the air guys something to blow up in a few years.

I hope you do not think the CIA is a lean, mean, fighting machine that is a super effecient arm of the US Gov't? They are more jacked up than a football bat. The Military has it's problems, I know, trust me, but those guys at the "spook house" are not long term planners, are just as much a model of gov't ineffciency and petty back biting as anyone else in our beloved gov't. Putting them with State? Yikes!!!

...I just get the impression that a shift in war-fighting command infrastructure is occurring. Dave Petraeus has now invested nearly a decade of his life in this war, I don't think he is ready to stop without closure...so something will be created among the spooks, preppies and snake-eaters with access to sensors, platforms and the metadata depositories and enabled to bust things at long reach but with precision. Maybe without asking "may I" from the space owner.

If that were to happen that would be great but I have very little faith Bill, very little faith, someone, somewhere will find a way to micro-manage the whole thing.

ERIC knows I respect and admire him as a person and his service to our country and he is probably right but for a couple of things:

Firstly, there probably aren’t enough SOCOM to hold the thing together if the conventional types depart. ERIC knows better than I that it would take ten years to recruit and train just a moderate increase in SOCOM forces at their current level of quality.

Secondly, Helmand is a good example of the levels of force necessary just to stamp down the brush fire to a modest blaze. Remove those troops while thinking the dysfunctional Afghan Army and Police will pick up the slack is likely a formula for disaster. Even a John McCain would more than likely have to admit that the Afghan security forces do not have the heart, grit and sense of mission that that the Taliban do. Or at least those members of the Afghan security forces that are not already sympathetic to the Taliban.

Thirdly, no one can tell what type of administration will take office in the future and at what level their commitment will be to a war that lacks strong public support* and is a black hole for scarce dollars. Nor what unforeseen circumstance will arise that unlike Afghanistan actually may have important national interest implications for our country that requires a strong SOCOM commitment.

Fourthly, we have continuously from day one underestimated the Taliban’s willingness to sacrifice to win back their country. We underestimate their courage in the field against the might of American combined arms, we underestimate their persistent political skill and determination and we seemingly refuse to accept the fact that they unlike we are going nowhere. If the government in Kabul is this corrupt and incompetent at the peak of our commitment how long do you think they will last if the bulk of our conventional ISAF forces leave? As of now they make the government in Saigon look like the Swiss.

As one of many on Tom’s blog who deeply love our country and admire and support our military I have no problem saying what we are doing in Afghanistan is both foolish and counter-productive to the interests of the United States, the armed forces, and in particular the SOCOM part of those forces with a special emphasis on the NSW. We have a right and duty to protect the people of this nation from attack by terrorists but invading and occupying for a generation of all places a country like Afghanistan is absolutely ridiculous in the extreme and I fear will end badly.

*Already a growing majority of people no longer supports the war as it is being conducted today and that poll number has steady if slowly increased as the years have passed by. That fact is a smoldering political fuse whose time left is not indefinite.

'Not on my watch' was a non-exclusion of future ground ops, for the simple reason that Gates had one foot out the door when he spoke. His non-commitment carried a half-life of only a few months at the most. While on-message and seemingly definitive, the phrase he chose raised a flag in my mind; it was temporary, conditional and non-binding on the admin.

Perhaps when Libya comes up on the BD board here I'll write a few words on why I think Libya's real pain works well for US realpolitik, shores up the wobbly Egyptian flank, with little downside. The indecisive coalition ops amount to light exercise for the flabby old W. Euros, and maybe a reconnection moment for NATO and Turkey.

The Libyan intervention as a moment of truth or obstinacy for Gates? US boots in support of Benghazi? I think not.

Good points Wounded.

In my opinion, the red flag "not on my watch" expressed an authority not a property of the DOD, and therefore a contradiction. A tiny faux pas, a moment of bravado, a personal view, a deliberate statement simply to pacify congress or the public, or the world? All of the above? He certainly had no authority to represent the Armed Forces with such a statement since he is not the Commander in Chief.

Either way, it was effective to that degree only, for a few short weeks people will be quiet.

JP

Everything you do is driven by endstate; the endstate is no sanctuary for terrorists. No safe place to run training camps, no terrorist regime in Kabul that is running C4 or RPGs in diplomatic pouches, no axis of evil states recognizing terrorist govt in Kabul.

Not too hard to keep the bad guys out of Kabul, NATO can almost accomplish that. What EricIII and his band of irregulars are doing is creating a buffer zone in provinces so Kabul so it is not literally under siege all the time. If you set up a terrorist camp you're likely to get blown out of bed by a HellFire or Eric comes after you at 0200 and puts an orange hat on your head.

"No sanctuary" is affordable, achievable, feasible. No reason for what is loosely known as "Afghan Govt" to kick us out because we'll will still give them medium sized pallets of money. Once we start using box for a SOCOM training area, and settle in for the long term, time is barely on the bad guys side.

which probably reflects an achievable goal. But I ask again to what purpose? How does protecting the city-state of Kabul protect the US from the blowback of ill-advised foreign policy choices and its general approach to the world (invite the world/control the world/bomb the world/redeem the world)?

So the US destroys the Taliban and drives out Al Qaida through a long, slow, small war of attrition. The US has secured the Hindu Kush, so what? At this point ongoing operations in Afghanistan are less about defense and more a desperate attempt to salvage prestige.

At the same time, domestically, the US government continues to crack down on its citizens in an attempt to nab "lone wolves," who realistically pose much more of a terrorist threat to the US than yokels with AK's on the other side of the globe.

While one front dies down, in a replay of the 1980s the US is arming some shady characters in Libya. In 10-15 years, assuming an economic collapse doesn't stop the leviathan, I'm betting we'll be having a similar discussion about the snake eaters playing a rear guard action in North Africa.

BEARCAT, I don’t dispute your schematic of the probable course of events in Afghanistan I only dispute the logic of it. It seems to me that if we are going to settle in for the long haul in a dysfunctional state perhaps Pakistan would be the more logical location since it seems to be the center of gravity of our concerns? Don’t like that idea? My kid is now up in Fayab Province with his SEAL platoon for about ten months and while for him and his team guys it is what it is for me it is a senseless waste that lack a coherent rational other than a desperate attempt to save face.

I would have hoped you would have gotten the sarcasm about the power point, it was said with tongue in cheek, figured my consistent rants about the evils of senior officers and micro-management would have made that clear ;)

The war is going that way, do not see it going in any other direction, they are increasing our presence and will be decreasing conventional units presence. If it will work depends on the commitment of the gov't, namely our gov't. The next President is not going to yank us out no matter who it is and the one after that, unless they are somehow radically different than anyone I foresee on the horizon then I doubt they will either.

As for Blaber, Delta and "others" do not have Female shooters, they are not used as assaulters, how and why they are used is not in any way shape or form in combat role and they do not do the long walk.

As for the lowering of SOF Standards, I will be my bottom dollar on that.

They will lower standards, just the nature of the beast when it comes to the demand wanted of SOF Flag Officers who have to fill the demands of the 4 Star Conventional Officers and Pentagon Civilian Types who have to fill the demands of those above them and so on and so on.

No one ever said they were in assault roles but many want them to be in that role and as is pretty obvious, the hair on the back of my neck stands up when I hear that even hinted at.

I disagree with conditioning, the SOF Soldier needs to present a professional image and they cannot do that if they cannot fit into their Uniforms ;) In the case of DAs, SRs, etc...fitness is a must. In the case of anything maritime it is even more important. So I respectfully agree to disagree on that but I get your point about the roles of typical SF Soldiers, some of that changed when they went to the 18X program and allowed kids straight off the street to go to selection in order to get more guys into their community. This causes a serious lowering of the experience level, maturity and attitudes of the guys in that units community. That maturity and patience that an older man has goes a long way towards the goals of what the primary mission of SF is. Don't worry though, most SF guys are not doing Assaults, they are doing classic Combat FID in OEF and doing FID and training Proxy forces in other parts of the world.