Panic In (And Near) The Oval

The really huge buzz last week surrounded the firing of Shirley Sherrod. The woman, a functionary in the Department of Agriculture's Georgia state office was summarily fired after a carefully extracted and edited snippet from a speech she had made to the state's NAACP last spring went on Fox TV and the web.

A flurry of phone calls from the highest reaches of the department and White House demanded Ms Sherrod immediately resign due to the obvious racism expressed in the snippet. No effort was made by her accusers, including the national office of the NAACP, to hear her side of the story. Nor was any effort expended to assess the snippet and its apparent anti-Caucasian sentiments in the context of the entire presentation.

The firing, which was later retracted by President Obama, like the condemnation made by the NAACP, showed an unmistakable panic. It was a rush to judgement of the most intemperate sort. For Ms Sherrod the affair did finally break her way when the entire speech was viewed, the alleged victim of Ms Sherrod's "racism" located, and a few deep breaths taken by the crowd surrounding the Oval Office. The woman received an apology from President Obama and the offer of another, presumably better, job.

"Hey, Geek! I thought you wrote a foreign policy blog. What's the deal here? Have you unilaterally put the Ag Department in the national security establishment? Or just gone, you know, a bit funny?"

Well, Bucko, it's like this. The Sherrod affair has a perfect parallel in the sacking of General Stanley McChrystal whose retirement ceremony went down yesterday evening at Fort McNair. The general was just as much a victim of blind panic in and near the Oval as was Ms Sherrod.

General McChrystal was accused of violating the hoary doctrine of civilian supremacy by virtue of having said uncomplimentary things about Mr Obama and others in the civilian chain of command to a Rolling Stone magazine writer. The comments, unkind as they were, made by either the general or members of his staff, in no way constituted insubordination or even a criticism of the civilian supremacy. (Nor were they inaccurate.)

The general was not given any opportunity to tell his side of the story. Nor were the unkind remarks considered in context. In these ways the situations of Ms Sherrod and General McChrystal were identical.

Any number of pundits and retired conventional soldiers showing the long standing bias against special forces personnel played the role of the NAACP in the Sherrod Affair. This Greek chorus brayed after McChrystal's scalp just as the politburo of the NAACP did in the case of Ms Sherrod. In both cases the chorus sought blood for sins uncommitted but merely imagined on the basis of snippets, edited versions of the totality.

The firings of both Ms Sherrod and General McChrystal were the actions of persons demented by fear and panic. The Nice Young Man (Of The People) From Chicago and his cronies were under the intense pressures of failure grudgingly admitted in the days and weeks before both summary sackings. The president and his "team" had been repeatedly and accurately excoriated for a collective and personal inability to make decisions, act decisively, or even give the appearance of giving the slightest damn about what was happening in and to the US.

The Great Transformational Agenda was falling apart in both its domestic and foreign affairs aspects. The more the president and his surrogates spoke, declaimed, hectored, the less anyone anywhere paid any attention. In the days immediately preceding the McChrystal firing (as well as the Sherrod dismissal) the president was looking more and more as if he had become the walking, talking version of Mao's description of the US--a "paper tiger."

In this situation panic is expectable--but not forgivable. While there were many far better ways in which Mr Obama could have handled the temporary embarrassment of the McChrystal remarks in ways which would have redounded to his credit, Mr Obama acted out of both pique and panic. As a consequence he undercut gravely the national interests of the US not only in Afghanistan but around the world. He also deprived the US of the future services of one of the finest soldiers and warriors to come down the pike in the last half-century or more.

While Mr Obama did the same in the Sherrod Affair, acted out of pique and panic, he could reverse the personal damage, the ill-considered and overly hasty rush to (miscarried) judgement done to the woman personally. And, with all due respect to both Ms Sherrod and the Department of Agriculture, the loss of her services to the US now and in the future did no harm to our national interests.

It is impossible for the president to undo the damage his loss of poise, his succumbing to pique and panic inflicted upon the US in the firing of General McChrystal. All Mr Obama can do is to start writing on volume three of his memoirs, specifically the chapter in which he will try to exculpate himself for the defeat in Afghanistan.

A Covenant With Death--And "Winning"

There is a brutal, unstated, and universal reality which applies to all warriors. Whether or not any particular individual recognizes this reality, whether or not any particular individual articulates this reality does not matter. The reality is still there; it still governs.

The reality? The ground truth which controls all aspects of a warrior's existence?

The warrior, each and every one, has signed a personal covenant with death. The agreement stipulates that the warrior will use his brain and body, his skills and abilities, his every fiber of mind and muscle to stay alive. The agreement also provides that no matter how able and motivated, how skilled and able, how fast of reflex and quick of mind, there can be no immunity from death.

In the fabled French Foreign Legion the covenant was once summarized in a brilliantly brutal and succinct way: "Legionnaires! You are in the Legion to die. The Legion will send you to where you will die."

The Covenant With Death is offset in a very small way by a belief held by many (but not all) warriors. This belief is also held by many of those associated with the warrior: buddies, family, lovers. The belief gives some slight measure of comfort to those who survive the warrior's death, or who suffer with him after he has copped a major league clobber, the kind of clobber which in a blasting small part of a second takes away swaths of the warrior's body or mind.

The belief?

That the warrior's life will not be sacrificed for any end of lesser goal than that of "winning." It is hoped and believed that the body, mind, life of the warrior will not be wasted in the pursuit of a false goal, thrown away on some obscure purpose of state, lost in the ego driven strivings of a superior officer or political leader. All warriors at the least secretly hope that if death claims its share of the covenant, the reason will not be shallow, superficial, transient, or of no lasting purpose.

In the warrior's world the goal is--must be--winning. Even should the warrior die, the victory is secured. It may be the smallest and most intimate of victories, the survival of a buddy. It may fall in the endless midrange of winning, the objective which is taken, the hill cleared, the village secured, the battle ended with the enemy in full flight. Or, it may be victory of the greatest sort, the obliteration of the enemy force and state.

However, and here is the rub, "winning" or "victory" are slippery, protean concepts. A clear and decisive "winning" is rare, particularly when the "victory" is sought on the largest scale.

This is why, for Americans, World War II has been so long and so often characterized as "the good war." Really it was the perfect war. When the guns fell silent two enemies had been destroyed, obliterated, conquered.

For the US the war had been one of a total nature, a total war for national survival. When it ended each of the two major enemies, each of the two regimes seen as being both implacably hostile to the US as well as comprising existential threats, had been utterly and completely defeated. The victory was seen as having such a complete and final nature that it fully justified each and every American warrior claimed by Death's Covenant.

Total wars of national survival are rare in modern history. Far more common are small, often intentionally inconclusive wars on the far frontiers conducted for reasons of state. Also far more common are interventionary wars, nasty conflicts where warriors are killed and maimed but where "winning" is either impossible or illusionary.

The Korean War has become the paradigm for Americans in defining the limited war in support of policy, the cruel little war undertaken for reasons of state in which conclusive victory is either impossible or, at the least, undesirable or unachievable. The warriors die in droves, are maimed in their multitudes, but all that hangs in the air is an anguished question, "For what?"

If the "For What?" question is central to understanding the limited war in support of policy such as that waged in the cold and snow of the Korean mountains, how much more is it apropos when considering the interventionary operation (or, to use currently fashionable circumlocution,) the overseas contingency operation? The survivors, those who have buried their dead comrades, mourned their dead lovers, sons, fathers, brothers, can wail even louder the question, "For what did they die?"

The fine words, "winning" and "victory" have little, if any, relevance in any absolute sense to the outcomes of interventionary operations, of the grim and savage war of insurgent against counter insurgent. True, on the micro level, on the level of the individual warrior who has survived more or less intact in both body and mind, it is possible to say, "I won, damn it! I'm still here." It is possible to assert in the midrange that "We accomplished our mission. The hill was taken. The town was secured. We did bring peace to our valley."

But, on the largest level, the level of states and their policies, the terms, "winning" and "victory" have no genuine applicability. The best which can be said with honesty is, "We achieved our policy goals--more or less."

And, bucko, this ground truth is very, very thin comfort for those who bury and mourn the dead warriors. It is equally thin payback to the warrior claimed by Death's Covenant.

Which brings us to another brutal reality: It is the only reward for being true to the Covenant. It is the only comfort to the survivors. It is the only balm for those who have been cruelly maimed by the battle and the policy which brought the battle.

A policy success--usually of the less complete sort--and the military accomplishment of achieving the minimum strategic need of "not-losing" is the only reward which can be expected in the waging of interventionary war, particularly one of the counterinsurgent sort. At the end, no insurgency is marked by the obliteration of the enemy.

There are no victory parades when the counterinsurgent succeeds. There will be no photo-ops surrounding the defeated insurgent signing a surrender document. There will be no glorious upsurge of national pride as the victorious counterinsurgent forces come home to a grateful public.

Insurgencies do not end with a bang. They don't even end with a whimper. They simply fade out. The noise of battle, of bomb and gun, fades away to the silence of politics. One morning the counterinsurgent wakes to find there is no more war. He stretches, looks around, listens to the silence--and goes home.

Or, in the alternative, the noise continues but the counterinsurgent simply goes home. The war goes on, but the outsider is now a major non-participant. He is absent with leave from the fighting and the dying. The warrior is given permission by his government, by the folks back home to come home.

In short, under this alternative, he is defeated. The warrior may be happy or, at least, greatly relieved to be exempted from Death's Covenant. He may be happy, or, at least, greatly relieved to be spared the fear of impending combat, of death being present at one's shoulder night after day after night after day.

This does not offset the reality that he has been defeated. Even if "victorious" in the field in battle after battle, skirmish after skirmish, the counterinsurgent warrior nonetheless has been defeated. So also has the policy, the government, the country which sent him.

And, as history shows time after time in century upon century, defeat always brings consequences, the majority of which are bad. Countries, particularly those which have aspired to and achieved Great Power status, do not long survive major defeats.

Signing the Covenant With Death is not enjoyable. Neither is facing the reality of death night and day seemingly without end. No warrior can be blamed for doing all in his power to stack the odds in his favor. It is human to seek every advantage against death, to use all the means, all the technology to save one's only skin. It is expectable that no additional risks will be undertaken by the warrior without a very compelling reason.

As a result it has come as no surprise that many of the American and other ISAF troops in Afghanistan were angered by the "courageous restraint" doctrine put into effect by General Stanley McChrystal. It is totally without shock that one reads of the resentment felt against the doctrine felt by so many under McChrystal's command as well as the relief felt with the promise by General Petraeus to review (and, at least, by inference) change it so as to reduce the perceived risk to the troops.

Courageous restraint did bring a rapid and extreme lowering of casualties inflicted by US and other ISAF forces upon Afghan civilians and Afghan National Forces personnel. An indication of what is to be expected should the McChrystal doctrine of courageous restraint be modified significantly--or at all--has occurred within the past twenty-four hours.

An air strike was called upon a contingent of Afghan National Forces when someone didn't interpret the imagery correctly. Five Afghan troops were killed by precision guided munitions. The Afghan government is hopping mad. The same may be presumed, but is not mentioned in the media with respect to the Afghan forces generally and at least some civilians.

On the US/NATO/ISAF side of the fence, the reaction has been pure pre-McChrystal. There was no immediate hospital visit to the injured survivors by the commander in theater; there was no immediate and compelling statement from the highest command levels of dismay, sincere apologies; rather an investigation was ordered. This back-to-business-at-the-old-location is a lot of yadda-yadda in the ears of the Afghans.

So, why the hell should we care?

We should care about this incident as well as the context of modifying the courageous restraint doctrine because it matters greatly as to whether this insurgency ends in a way favorable to American interests or in an American military defeat. The only way in which the US and its allies have even a slight chance of achieving the minimum strategic goal of "not-losing" is by fighting in a way which puts our warriors at greater risk but provides greater physical security to the Afghans.

The only way in which the war will simply fade away allowing our warriors to come home without dragging the can of defeat behind them is by placing a greater burden of risk and fear on our warriors, by insisting that more, perhaps many more, be claimed by Death's Covenant. The only way in which we can justify the deaths of those already killed, or the physical and psychic damage done to so many others is by forcing the war to a conclusion which is favorable to our standing and influence in the world. Then and only then will the deaths be given meaning.

The US government--and We the People--decided to cut and run from our war in Southeast Asia. The US government--and We the People--concluded to pack up and leave, resigning the South Vietnamese to whatever fate might have store.

By this decision the US government--and We the People--declared that all those Americans, more than sixty thousand, who had been taken by Death's Covenant, had been killed for nothing. The US government--and We the People--cancelled even the thin comfort of the deaths having not been without meaning or positive effect.

While the defeat in South Vietnam did not damage the US in its long term national and strategic interests, it did damage us at our core. No nation can write off the lives of thousands of its young men without doing damage to its central values, its belief in itself, or its confidence in its own worth.

A defeat in Afghanistan, no matter how concealed or how colored, will do the same to our national soul as did the self-inflicted loss in Vietnam. Beyond that, a defeat in Afghanistan unlike that in Vietnam will impair our long term national and strategic interests by emboldening those who espouse violent political Islam around the world.

What this means today is simple and unpleasant in the extreme. There must be no backsliding from the doctrine of courageous restraint for to do so is to seek defeat. More American warriors must, perforce, be placed in harm's way, made to hold Death's hand, feel Death's eternally cold breath on their necks.

Only by showing a will to die rather than to risk killing the wrong Afghans can we sanctify the losses of our warriors. Ironically, we cannot kill our way to "victory" in Afghanistan, but we can restrain our killing capacities and achieve all that can be achieved in this kind of war, an incomplete policy success and, more critically, 'not-losing."

The "War" Behind The War

The real conflict is being fought not in Afghanistan but rather over Afghanistan. The war behind the war is the one over how the US should fight in Afghanistan. It is a war between opponents even more bitter in their opposition than is the ISAF and Taliban.

The semi-covert war behind the overt one in Afghanistan is waged between conventional soldiers and the special operators. This war started long before Osama bin Laden came to realize that Allah or someone was calling upon him to wage jihad against the "Crusaders." It is a war which has been fought with greater and lesser vigor ever since the first conventional forces were sent to a predictable failure in Vietnam. It is likely to continue long after the last American boot has shaken the soil of Afghanistan from its sole.

The conduct and outcome of the war behind the war will do much to determine the degree to which the US succeeds or fails to achieve the minimum necessary strategic goal of "not-losing" in Afghanistan. The process of the war behind the war will also do much to dictate not only if the US will have to stage a rematch of the Civilized World versus the Islamists but also whether or not it will succeed or fail the next time around.

The firing of General McChrystal was one small skirmish in the war behind the war. McChrystal was the very definition of special operator. His entire active career was in special operations. McChrystal's intellectual focus was on the requirements for success in the most difficult of unconventional military operations, those of an interventionary nature, the wars of insurgency and its counter.

The astute observer would have counted McChrystal's days as numbered the moment he released his operational doctrine with its curtailment of American usage of artillery and air delivered firepower. With his reorientation on protecting civilian lives even at the cost of placing more Americans at greater risk, General McChrystal directly challenged a definer of the uniquely American way of war which has existed nearly long as the doctrine of civilian supremacy. The American way of war gelled in the aftermath of the War Between the States and its overwhelmingly high butcher's bill.

Ever since the Civil War, the sine qua non of US military operations has been the curtailment of American losses. Over the years and through the many, many wars which have occurred since 1865, the US has spent much time, much money, and a very great deal of industrial and technological innovation on the challenge of replacing loss of blood with the expenditure of munitions.

The defining profligacy of American firepower has been commented upon repeatedly by our allies and adversaries alike. During World War II, where either the British or the Germans would have sent a patrol, the Americans heaved tons of munitions downrange from artillery tubes almost beyond counting and aircraft formations which darkened the noon sky. The lavish expenditure of munitions went a very long way to assuring that American troops came home on their own two legs and not on a stretcher or in a body bag.

There is no doubt that in a peer-to-peer conflict, the American way of war is both effective and easily justified by its results. Even in a limited war in support of policy such as the Korean War, the American way of war limited costs to mere dollars and not lives. Nonetheless, the US did have to spill blood at meaningless terrain features such as Pork Chop Hill so as to convince the Chinese that we had the political will to fight on regardless of loss.

Hostile observers have long concluded that the American unwillingness to shed the blood of its troops constituted a fatal weakness. When this reluctance was linked (as it inevitably has been) to our equal distaste for expending time on something so wasteful as a war, some adversaries have become convinced that the sovereign counter to the US was to be found in combining the infliction of casualties upon us with the prolongation of the war.

The second part of the How To Defeat The Americans Theory has been called into question by the evident willingness of two presidents to keep on keeping on regardless of the prospect of "victory" or the growing unpopularity of the war with We the People. However, the first part, the more important part of the Recipe For Defeating the American Infidels, is still operative, still to be placed to a full and effective test.

Insofar as General McChrystal's operational concept of "courageous restraint" provided a real change in the views held by Afghan civilians toward the Americans, it was an operational and tactical success. A comparative consideration of enemy initiated versus friendly initiated and meeting engagements covering the months before and after the McChrystal ordered change shows the balance was shifting decisively in favor of the foreigners.

Not to put too sharp a point on the matter, the McChrystal doctrine turned the battlefield and political tides from the negative to the positive. McChrystal's sound understanding of the political and psychological nature of the insurgent-counterinsurgent conflict with its emphasis upon protecting the uncommitted majority from the harm of battle was paying off.

Ironically the successes, preliminary and incomplete as they were, had no impact upon the majority of the troops, particularly the officers, carrying out the new order of battle. To the men on the sharp end of the stick, the new rules of engagement were tantamount to fighting while leaving our best, most lethal, weapons left back at base.

No man, as the Geek well knows, likes the idea of taking more risks than the minimum necessary. The nature of operations in Afghanistan assures there are risks enough without seeming to add to them by limiting the use of artillery and air support. There is no surprise that the McChrystal approach would result in more than a little bit of bitching and moaning--particularly as the operational tempo ticked up with casualties doing the same.

The degree of complaint was far greater, however, than could easily be justified by actual combat losses, which showed no undue increase given the enhanced tempo of operations. But, the McChrystal approach did more than simply enhance the perceived (as distinguished from actual) risks on the battlefield, it called into question the entire "find, fix, and destroy" doctrine which has governed US military doctrine since before World War II.

Despite the fact that the "firepower kills and killing equals victory" approach to war was proven massively irrelevant in the Vietnam War, it was followed both in Iraq and Afghanistan far too long.

In Iraq, the change in American fortunes came with the "surge" but not because of the "surge." Rather the increase in American success came with a decrease in US inflicted Iraqi casualties. It came because the Marines and some Army units went from the "shoot-move-communicate" understanding of war to one which emphasized the human factors, the reality that the battleground which mattered was the perceptions and attitudes of the uncommitted majority of the Iraqi population coupled with constant pressure on the hard core of insurgent true believers.

General McChrystal's special forces played a very key role in the successes in Iraq attributed in the media and on the Hill to General Petraeus. McChrystal carried the lessons of Iraq along with the broader lessons of counterinsurgency with him to Afghanistan.

The mere fact that McChrystal, a lifelong member of the Special Forces, the red-headed stepchild of the Army, was jumped to command in Afghanistan was a major irritant to the conventional soldiers. McChrystal's predecessors were all good conventional troops, distinguished treadheads in the main. Nonetheless, they had lost control of the battlefield to the enemy.

When McChrystal's new approach bore immediate positive results, the irritation grew to overwhelming proportions. Making the irritation all the worse was SecDef Gate's view that the US would be facing asymmetrical conflicts and not peer-to-peer wars in the near- and mid-term future. If McChrystal's new doctrine were to succeed, the future for the treadheads and big bore tube meisters of the conventional army would be grim to say the least.

With that as context it isn't surprising that no voices were raised in defense of McChrystal's ill-advised words in Rolling Stone. It isn't surprising that all ran for cover behind the spurious notion that the outspoken spec-ops guy was an out of control rogue. Nor is it shocking that he was speedily replaced by a man, General Petraeus, who is a good, conventional man at heart.

Petraeus' dedication to the "firepower kills and killing brings victory" notion became evident during his confirmation hearings when he promised to "review" the limitations imposed on artillery and air delivered firepower. He will conduct the review and, in highest probability, slacken the restrictions.

Any slackening, any backing off from "courageous restraint" will inevitably result in collateral civilian causalities. With the best of intents, the closest of command and control, big guns and fast movers will kill non-combatants. As a result, the uncommitted majority of the Afghan population will once again swing toward Taliban and away from the US and ISAF. The situation will return to the status quo ante McChrystal.

At the same time, responsibility for the American failure will be offloaded to the Afghan government and security forces. There is much reason to do so. The Karzai government has a very laid back attitude toward the massive corruption which is and always has been a component of Afghan political life. The Karzai government is given to the notion of a separate peace with Taliban as such is in its own best interests given the conviction that the Americans will not stay the course and lack both the will and ability to defeat Taliban et al militarily.

While it matters only slightly to the US what sort of government rules in Afghanistan, it is a matter of key national importance as to whether or not the future government of the place thinks it is safe in offering safe haven to Islamist entities planning harm to the US and its interests or those of its allies. It is a matter of great national importance if other Islamist groups around the world are emboldened by the perception of an American military failure in Afghanistan.

However, it appears that these larger, longer term potentials resident in an American military failure is of far less concern to the conventional soldiers of the high ranks. Their lodestone is the superiority of the treads, tubes, and gunships of the "real" Army. Their hope is that another "incomplete policy success" in Afghanistan such as that experienced in Vietnam will end any consideration of future US involvement in these nasty little wars of intervention.

"No more Afghanistans" will join "No more Vietnams" as a way of allowing the generals and other budgeteers to get on with the real mission of preparing for wars the US is less likely rather than more to be fighting in the years to come. The "peace at any price" and "blame America first" contingents of the American political and media elite will embrace the same two slogans in their never ending campaign to assure the US drops to the second tier of nation-states.

It's Reset Button Time In Afghanistan

President Obama assured all that cared to hear and heed that the change in commanders did not mean a change in strategy in Afghanistan. He went on to animadvert that all hands (including his) were in agreement on goals, strategy and, presumably, operational approaches although "tactics" would be open to change.

Fer sure, Mr President. You might not know it, but that isn't the way things work. Not in the real world of actual soldiers, real insurgents, and if-they-hit-you-you-die bullets. Whether you know it or not, whether you intended it or not, you have hit the reset button in your war in Afghanistan.

To get a grip on this ground truth requires starting with a very basic observation about the nature of successful counterinsurgency in general and what this means for Afghanistan. A primary reality of counterinsurgency is that one cannot kill one's way to victory. Killing people and breaking things plays a role in counterinsurgency, but a very limited one.

The focus of competition between the insurgent and his opponent is is the collective mind of the uncommitted majority of the affected population. Each side seeks to mobilize the support of the uncommitted majority to its side while denying the opponent the opportunity to do the same.

Simultaneously and at a more fundamental level each side--insurgent and counterinsurgent--is seeking to progressively reduce the political will of his opponent while maintaining that of his side. This dual track war means that the side which can maintain its political will while reducing that of his enemy as well as attracting a greater deal of active support from the uncommitted majority than the opponent will succeed.

This twin, interlocking dynamic is seen to have been at work in every insurgency throughout history, particularly the history of the past two or three hundred years. It is at work in Afghanistan today.

Killing people and breaking things plays a role in accomplishing the tasks of undercutting the enemy's political will as well as mobilizing the uncommitted majority at the expense of the adversary. This does not imply that the traditional characteristics of war--killing people and breaking things--is unimportant. Rather, it means that the traditional aspects of war are very important.

The strategic and operational level concepts as well as the tactical approaches which implement the first two on a daily basis must properly define who to kill, how to kill, and when to kill in a way which maximizes the effectiveness of killing in both the undercutting of the enemy's political will and the attracting of the greater percentage of the uncommitted majority. The unique requirements of counterinsurgency call into question the traditional US military algorithm of firepower kills and killing brings victory.

General Stanley McChrystal's understanding of insurgency and the twin, interlocking dynamics which serve to define success or failure prompted him to place the highest value on using US, Afghan, and other allied forces to protect civilians even at the cost of making combat operations more difficult to undertake and complete. His view of the dynamics of successful counterinsurgency also pointed him in the direction of accepting higher friendly casualties if doing such would assure safety for the uncommitted majority.

This understanding is not one easily accepted by conventionally oriented soldiers as well as the civilians who must take the political heat for casualties. The conventional American soldier has been raised in a school which places the highest priority on protecting our troops. The next highest priority is that of killing the maximal number of hostile forces in a minimum amount of time.

The slogan of the conventional soldier, a slogan which is perfectly suited for peer-to-peer wars, is "find, fix, and destroy." That is, use superior technologies of reconnaissance and surveillance to locate the enemy force. Then, employ high volumes of indirect and air delivered fire to fix him in place, to deny him the chance to move. Finally, by superior mobility put enough friendly troops in place to destroy any enemy which survived the fix-in-place stage.

The use of the firepower heavy approach to war proved most counterproductive in Afghanistan (and scarcely less so in Iraq.) General McChrystal came to his job already aware of the limitations of conventional doctrine. Even if he hadn't, the all too obvious rebirth of Taliban as well as the profound hostility felt to "foreign" forces by the uncommitted majority of Afghans would have made it so.

McChrystal replaced the "shoot, move, communicate" so as to "find, fix, and destroy" approach to the war with one which correctly changed the emphasis to protecting the uncommitted civilian population, offering inducements to the soft-core supporters of Taliban, and placing ever increasing direct pressure on the hard core insurgents with the intent of mobilizing support from the uncommitted majority and undercutting the political will of the Talib to continue fighting.

In practice this approach meant the US willingly put aside most of its advantages in indirect and air delivered firepower, put its troops at greater risk of being wounded or killed, and, of necessity, slowed the tempo of combat. Each and everyone of these features violated long standing practices of the US Army (and, to a much lesser extent, the Marine Corps.)

It is not at all surprising that this approach, dubbed "courageous restraint," did not sit well with the more conventionally minded officers and senior NCOs who comprise the majority of the US forces in Afghanistan. It is not surprising either that General David Petraeus has promised to "review" the policy of courageous restraint.

This review will undoubtedly be greeted by hosannas on the part of the conventionally minded men in Afghanistan. It will also be met with sighs of relief by the grunts at the sharp point as no one who occupies that necessary and very uncomfortable place is happy with the notion of placing his one and only skin at risk in order to protect the host civilian population. Then, of course, the legion of hairy-chested politicians, pundits, and TV watching super-strategists who have the bravery of being out of range will cheer a more robust way of fighting the war.

In Afghanistan, the locals have shown their opinion of "courageous restraint" in very real and really beneficial ways. As the incidents of civilian deaths and injuries collateral to US, ISAF, and Afghan National Forces operations have decreased, the flow of actionable intelligence from locals has increased. This has resulted in a steady and steadily accelerating shift in initiative from the insurgents to the counterinsurgents.

Taliban has reacted to the palpable shift in battlefield initiative by resorting to terror tactics which smack of desperation. Taliban has increased its use of indiscriminate IEDs which results in civilian casualties. Taliban has employed assassination of low ranking pro-government tribal leaders and officials. It has even hung an eight year old boy as a spy for the British Army. The net effect of these methods has been the demobilization of Taliban support and its remobilization to the "foreigners" and even the Kabul government.

In short, the courageous restraint concept has resulted in Taliban killing its way to defeat.

Even the thought of change in the McChrystal concept should perturb anyone interested in an ultimate American success in Afghanistan. The fact that General Petraeus would even consider reviewing an approach which is so clearly working is alarming. As a political general, David Petraeus may be more concerned about the mutterings in the ranks about the additional burden placed upon American warriors by the McChrystal understanding of the requirements of successful counterinsurgency. If this is the case, he is worried about the wrong matter.

The fact that General Petraeus was in command in Iraq during the time that the elements placed into play by others took effect gives no reason to believe that he is perceptive enough to see the nature of the great differences between Iraq and Afghanistan, the differences which make Afghanistan the far more difficult venue. Nor should one take undue comfort from General Petreaus having been in overall charge of the process of fabricating the new field manual on counterinsurgency. There is a world of difference between writing an abstract doctrine of theoretically universal application and fighting one, specific war in one, specific human terrain.

The take away is simple to state; hard to practice. General McChrystal developed a comprehensive and accurate understanding of the nature and character of the war in Afghanistan. He developed a strategic and operational concept for waging that one, specific war which showed success from the moment it came out of the box.

Unfortunately, it appears that General Petraeus is all too willing to compromise the success from the moment he accepted the new assignment. Even more unfortunate is the reality that President Obama did not know (or pretended not to know) that a change in command automatically means a change in strategy.

Firing A General Won't Make The World Better

The MSM as well as some of the new media have been looking for the bright side in the firing of General McChrystal. Reading these assorted attempts at top spinning a major disaster of the self-inflicted sort leads one to alternate tears with laughter.

There simply is no bright side to Mr Obama's exhibition of toughness, his resolute protection of civilian supremacy against the nonexistent threat of General McChrystal's negative assessments of the collection of time servers, people suffering under a delusion of adequacy, and lofty thinking lamebrains.

Tossing McChrystal off the troika to the wolves just as the time sensitive Afghanistan war is reaching the critical moment makes as much sense as inviting Osama bin Laden to help himself to the contents of the large nuclear warehouse not far from downtown Albuquerque. Not even the dual hatting of the politically acceptable and Iraq experienced General Petraeus alters the facts on the ground.

The removal of McChrystal will not boost morale and confidence among the US, allied, or Afghan National Forces. The removal will, however, give a boost to the morale and confidence in victory within the forces of the enemy.

Beyond the AfPak area of operations, the Obama decision will have consequences which equal or exceed those within the theater. Mr Obama's move will, for example, engender good cheer in Tehran.

So far, Mr Obama's dealings with Iran have been a record of continued complete failure. It is perfectly OK, considering this, to ask just how canning McChrystal makes matters worse. To do this, we have to get down to the basics.

The most basic fact of late is this. The Iranians have announced that their efforts at enriching uranium to twenty percent have resulted in producing seventeen kilograms of the stuff. This implies that their current rate of production is at least five kilos per month. A quick extrapolation shows that Tehran will have enough twenty percent feedstock to produce sufficient weapons grade uranium for two Hiroshima sized devices by the time of the midterm elections.

Another, equally basic fact is this. The sanctions including the fourth round of UN Security Council impositions as well as the additional measures taken by the European Union and those wending their way through Congress (against the opposition of the Man In The Oval) will not, can not, have a desired, positive effect on the quest for the "Mahdi Bomb."

The failure of both diplomatic engagement and sanctions implies that the US now has only two options regarding Iran. The first is the oft mentioned (in hushed tones) military option. The second might be called the Dr Strangelove approach. Remember the film's sub-title? That's right, "How I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb."

This translates to some version of containment. Now containment worked when directed at the Soviet Union. It worked because both the US and the USSR shared a common value: There is no profit in committing national suicide.

To assume the Iranians have the same calculus of rationality is dubious at best. The Shia form of Islam as practiced in Iran is notably eschatological in orientation. The leading clerics as well as the country's president share an end-of-time world view which celebrates the necessity of a final war for the coming of the Mahdi. Given this consideration, it is not at all prudent to base policy on the efficacy of containment even a containment backed by relatively effective ABM systems and the threat of American nuclear retaliation.

The Iranians have been justifiably worried about the US employment of the "military option." The removal of General McChrystal from command on the eve of an operation which even Iranian observers believe would be successful shows Tehran that the US is most likely to blink first when standing eyeball to eyeball on the precipice of war.

The Iranians came to know General McChrystal quite well during the general's duty in Iraq, during the time when his special forces units cut great swaths through the ranks of the Iranian trained, Iranian supplied, sometimes Iranian commanded Shia insurgents. The mullahs and their Revolutionary Guard Corps bully boys also took McChrystal's measure during his abbreviated tenure in Afghanistan.

Frankly, General McChrystal assumed the same role in the mind's of Tehran's military leaders that George Patton did in the estimate of the German high command--the bogyman from hell. The removal of McChrystal proves to the mullahs and their men that Barack Obama has not been and never will be serious about any use of the "military option." Tehran has concluded with a certainty never felt by Mao that the US is "a paper tiger."

Not to put too fine a point on the matter, no president who is serious about the possibility of waging war in support of policy would remove a genuine, successful fighter of wars. Not even the replacement of McChrystal by Petraeus changes the algorithm as General Petraeus, no matter how beribboned, is not the warfighter that McChrystal is.

Beyond Iran lurks a legion of Islamist or Islamist leaning governments. The evident withdrawal of American support for Israel has encouraged the Islamist states to become more so. It has also forced other governments to lean ever closer to the more extreme stance of political Islam.

The muscle flexing of the adherents of political Islam has become more evident with every day which has passed since the IDF stopping of the "humanitarian flotilla." The fifty-seven member OIC has taken the point in both the UN Human Rights Council, and, most recently, in the Security Council. Our "allies," Turkey and Pakistan, have been carrying the OIC freight. Now these two stalwarts of political Islam have been joined by Malaysia in calling for an emergency UN session on the question of the IDF boarding of the flotilla.

The intent of Malaysia and its fellow members of the OIC is the launching of yet one more diplomatic assault on Israel. President Obama's previous efforts at "outreach" to the Muslim countries coupled with his transparent appeasement of the "frontline" Arab states provided the basis for this move. However, his firing of McChrystal has served to turbo-up the political courage of the OIC bloc.

Once again, the firing of a competent warfighter shows the hostiles of political Islam that the US has no "big stick" to support its softly spoken diplomatic words. The ground truth which has eluded Mr Obama and his "team" is simply that all diplomacy, hard or soft, spoken or acted, must finally rest upon the credible capacity and will to use force. Putting a successful warfighter out to pasture on the verge of a critical campaign because of a few poorly chosen (if accurate) words incautiously spoken near the ears of a "progressive" journalist shows the US is not currently willing to countenance the use of war as an instrument of international politics.

Mr Obama has shown he can be decisive. He has shown a willingness to seek revenge for attacks on members of his "team." It is to the misfortune of the US, to that of the civilized countries of the world, that he chose to demonstrate how tough and decisive he can be in a way which gives direct and real aid and comfort to the enemy.

Obama Steps On His Dick With Golf Shoes

To nobody's great surprise but to the total dismay of any American who cares whether the US fails in Afghanistan or not, the Very Thin Skinned and Shallow Minded man who currently occupies the Oval fired (or, technically speaking, "accepted the resignation of") General Stanley McChrystal today. The president is scheduled to do the impossible--explain and justify his decision later today, as soon as the TelePrompter can be loaded with the appropriate platitudes.

Mr Obama has dual hatted General Petraeus to serve as commander in Afghanistan in addition to his current job as CINCENTCOM. (Well, it does simplify the chain of command as Petraeus is now his own boss.) General Petraeus did an adequate job as commander in Iraq and, is well thought of by Republicans. Most importantly from the perspective of the Oval Office Inmates, General Petraeus has spent most of his career in billets requiring a nuanced interaction with journalists and politicians.

General McChrystal, as is shown by the ill-advised remarks so eagerly seized upon and quoted by the writer of the Rolling Stone piece, is by background, training, experience, and orientation a warfighter, a special operator. Men of this variety as the Geek can attest from much personal experience, are given to blunt honesty, eschewing the finely nuanced speech so beloved by politicians, journalists, and academics. In short, General McChrystal calls it as he sees it to the best of knowledge and belief.

Blunt honesty and the integrity which sustains and permits honesty constitute an anathema to politicians and others who must make deals regardless of actual cost. One may be certain that General Petraeus will never rock any administration boat, insult any civilian lamebrain, or perturb the sleep of even the unjust.

Whether General Petraeus can win the military portion of the war in Afghanistan is a more open question. While there are never any certainties in war--other than men will die--the informed, impartial observer would have been reasonably sure of backing a winner with McChrystal and his radically different approach to the war in Afghanistan. That degree of confidence can no longer be said to exist, if for no other reason than the impact of the McChrystal sacking on the morale of American forces and on the willingness of the Karzai regime to put a high degree of trust and confidence in the will and ability of the Americans to win.

Another very real impact of the Obama decision to rid himself of the troubling general resides with the enemy. There is no doubt but the Taliban and others of its ilk will be encouraged in their will to resist by the removal of the only senior American commander to have bested the black hats in both the military and political arenas of war.

Where the McChrystal strategy and operational doctrine focused in large measure on disrupting the organizational integrity of the insurgents, the Obama action has been to disrupt, perhaps fatally, the American organization. Where McChrystal had taken great pains to demoralize the senior echelons of Taliban et al, the Obama action has done the same to the good guys--to us and our allies including the Afghan National Forces.

In the forthcoming rationalization there is a high likelihood that Mr Obama will echo the words of all too many writers of editorials and others of the pundit class. He will aver, or at the least, imply, that General McChrystal was both insulting and insubordinate in his words and the words of his staff.

This justification is, at best, a crock of caca.

The characterizations offered of Joe Biden, and Messrs Eikenberry and Holebrook to say nothing of the other "wimps" in and around the White House may have been ill-chosen but they were accurate in the extreme. With the exception of SecDef Gates and SecState Clinton (exceptions that were made explicitly by General McChrystal and his staff), the members of "Team Obama" have demonstrated repeatedly that they were incapable of understanding and appreciating the realities on the ground in Afghanistan. If not evil counselors, these worthies have shown themselves as inept counselors. They merit the disapprobation heaped upon them by the general and members of his staff.

The truth, particularly when presented in a very blunt way, may be both inconvenient and painful, but that does not make it any less of the truth. The president had put on the combat boot of the general's words and loudly announced by his action that the boot both fits and pinches.

As for the insinuation that the general was being in any way insubordinate or rejecting of civilian supremacy, that accusation is utterly specious. It has utterly no validity. If one wants to witness insubordination in action he need only revisit the Affair of General of the Armies Douglas MacArthur.

Dugout Doug directly and repeatedly violated explicit orders given him by the president of the United States, Harry Truman. For that, General MacArthur well deserved being fired as he was by President Truman.

Nothing said by General McChrystal is in the same universe with what MacArthur did. General McChrystal violated no orders. Nor would he. A man of the background and experience of McChrystal would obey any lawful order he was given. Or, if obedience would violate his greater oath to the Constitution or his responsibility to and for the lives of the men under his command, then General McChrystal would do the honorable thing--he would resign his commission.

The Geek has heard men say far worse words concerning their superiors both uniformed and in mufti than anything attributed to General McChrystal or his staff. Heck, the Geek has said far worse during the stress of a war ill-fought and the sight of men dying without useful outcome. But, the Geek and others like him were fortunate that they were of low rank--and that they had no rat of a journalist pretending collegiality while in their midst.

It is a personal misfortune for General McChrystal and a national tragedy for all Americans that the general was not similarly situated and thus able to speak openly, honestly, and candidly about people of high station who by their actions betray the trust which had been placed in them.

The Downside Of A Professional Military

Forty years ago, as the traumatic debacle of the Vietnam War was reaching its penultimate stage, two waves ripped and later roared through the American public and the government. The first of these was of lesser importance--the replacement of the complex and easily abused system of classification and deferments which had made the Selective Service System a model of abuse with the far more fair in appearance lottery. The second, the wave which broke to great applause as the last American troops were leaving Vietnam, was the replacement of the conscript army by an "all volunteer force."

The senior echelons of the American military were all in favor of doing away with the draft. The prevailing view was--and is--that large, relatively low skilled forces were obsolete. Rather, the changes in military technology required and allowed smaller forces of much better trained, longer service troops.

The politicians in D.C. were also enamored with the notion of an "all volunteer" armed force. The denizens inside the Beltway had learned during the long years of Vietnam that the political will of the American public was inversely proportional to the number of "boys next door" who came home in fiberglass boxes. A similar equation was seen to have existed regarding opposition to the war: The draft, and only the draft, bred opposition by both potential draftees and their families to the war which required conscription.

As long as the country was at peace, or, worst case, fought only very short and low casualty wars, the "all volunteer" force in practice seemed to provide all the advantages predicted in principle. The Army and Marine Corps became organizations of people who wanted to be there. The changes in all forms of military technology assured that these (relatively speaking) manpower light forces had combat power aplenty. Lean, mean, and equipped very well to move, shoot, and communicate, the ground combat forces of the US were proportionately far more potent than their much larger predecessors had been only a couple of decades earlier.

At the time of discussion and implementation, there were a few voices opposed to the return to the old American concept of a vocational armed force, particularly a vocational ground army. This negative view focused primarily upon the probable consequence of an army which was increasingly divorced from the society which gave it birth and whose political institutions told it whom to fight, how to fight, and where to fight.

Among the critics of the "all volunteer" idea were those who argued that such a "mercenary" force would make it easier for presidents to send the troops and for congresses to support their dispatch. Analogies were constantly drawn between the "all volunteer" force and the old frontier army or the colonial forces of the US in the Philippines or Great Britain throughout the world. Critics of this school argued that the US would be in search of enemies, preferably small but possessed of critical resources. This position has some merit as events of the past twenty or so years have shown.

A far more trenchant criticism was offered by analysts who foresaw protracted interventionary wars. Given the small size of any affordable American ground combat force (a term which includes both the Army and Marine Corps) and the nature of interventionary operations, particularly those of a predominantly counterinsurgent character, the same units, the same men, the same officers would be cycled through the area of operations repeatedly.

As a result these individuals, particularly senior NCOs and officers who might see four or more tours of duty at ever higher rank, would begin to feel quite proprietary about "their" war, would have an increasing sense of what might be called entitlement regarding the war and how best to fight and win it. Coupled with the automatic separation of members of the ground combat force from the civilian society, these interlocking notions of "ownership" and "entitlement" would lead inexorably to increasingly tense relations between the military command structure, particularly the one in theater, and the larger civilian leadership echelon.

The tendencies of isolation, ownership, and entitlement would, if anything, be intensified within the special operations communities. At the same time, it would be the special operators who possessed the mindset, the experience, the operational imagination best suited for interventionary operations generally and counterinsurgency more specifically. The nature of the wars of the future (seen from the perspective of the 1980s) dictated that the Big Army of tanks, artillery, fast sweeping maneuvers would be irrelevant to the realities of what we now term "asymmetrical warfare."

The men needed in the future (again from the perspective of the Reagan days) would be those of the special operations forces, the most isolated, most indoctrinated, most committed members of the vocational army. As a result, there would be greater and greater friction between the professionals of the "Small Army" forces and both the diplomats and political leaders.

All of what was predicted by the second group of critics thirty years ago has come true during the long years of the Afghan and Iraqi wars. The "Big Army" professionals, the treadheads, the big gun guys, the men who reigned supreme during the short, sharp, and inconclusive days of Desert Storm were not the right people to run the war Afghanistan.

In a real sense the current flap of the McChrystal Comments is the necessary product of the "all volunteer" force as well as the necessary reliance upon the hard and idealistic minds formed almost automatically in the special operations community. As was prognosticated by a handful of critical observers of the coming "all volunteer" force, the combination of duration and small numbers assured the same units, the same men, most importantly, the same officers, would cycle through the AOs repeatedly.

First important fact: Where multiple tours, particularly more than three, were unusual in the Vietnam period, they have become the norm since the invasion of Afghanistan.

Second important fact: Not until the spec ops officers drifted to the top of the command structure in sufficient numbers did a "winning" theory of victory emerge.

Third important fact: The forecast sense of "ownership" and "entitlement" in a context of "isolation" has emerged with concomitant frictions or at the least fissures between the civilians and the military.

Fourth important fact: The conduct of the wars by the civilian leadership of two successive administrations has not and does not inspire confidence on the part of the commanders responsible for both the lives of those under their command as well as avoiding a disastrous defeat at the hands of a highly motivated enemy.

Fifth important fact: The supremacy of civilian command is fundamental to the American way of understanding and waging war. Whenever this bedrock principle seems to be called into question or challenged--whether by an improvident comment as was the case sixty plus years go when General George S. Patton, Jr suggested arming his German POWs and marching on to Moscow or the clear insubordination of General Douglas MacArthur in 1951--the balloon goes up, fast and hard.

In his comments to the reporter for Rolling Stone, General Stanley McChrystal appears to be challenging his civilian lords and masters. And, in a way he was. However, more to the point, General McChrystal was expressing the net effect of the first four important facts. His remarks and the context which gave rise to them are the consequence of waging war, long and frustrating war for reasons of state, by an "all volunteer" force.

Arguably, had the troops been what they were during Vietnam, the "boys next door," both We the People" and the government would have been more engaged with the conduct of the war and willing to think better about the goals of the war(s) as well as the methods used in fighting. With equal plausibility it can be argued that a conscript army would have assured no disconnect between the troops on the ground and the society which gave rise to them--and issued their marching orders.

In many respects conscript armies are both larger and less efficient than vocational ones. The same may be said of democracies, at least as far as inefficiency is concerned. Countering this accurate accusation is an affirmative defense. Democracies are best served by armed forces which fully and completely represent them as to makeup, values, and tight integration.

Even a man such as General McChrystal, the most complete and professional man of war the Geek has ever met, could and probably would agree that an administration as well as a military command structure would have to think longer, harder, and better before committing the US to war if it was fought in large part by civilians temporarily in uniform--draftees rather than by "volunteers." Probably the general would also agree that having draftees under his command would go a long way to assuring that he thought better, explained more completely, and elicited the cooperation and support of those over him as well as those under his command.

It is easy to understand the frustrations and stresses which caused General McChrystal and his staff to blurt out the intemperate remarks attributed to them. It is even easier to understand the well intended desire to remake the US forces into an "all volunteer" form with the untended consequences embodied in the first four important facts.

Mr Obama--This Isn't The Time To Kick Ass!

Rolling Stone magazine living up to its founding tradition as a pillar of the counterculture and deep opponent of the US War in Vietnam is bringing out an article on General Stanley McChrystal which has caused the overly sensitive Nice Young Man From Chicago and his henchmen to go ballistic. As a result General McChrystal has been forced to apologize for saying unkind words about various Team Obama heavyweights and has been recalled to Washington to explain his remarks to SecDef Gates and, presumably, the thin-skinned Obama.

Worse than this recall--which at the least serves to undercut McChrystal's moral authority in theater--the POTUS may well fire the man who has the best chance of pulling something less than total defeat out of the Afghanistan morass. Should Mr Obama take this action either directly or using a safe cut-out such as Secretary Gates or Admiral Mullen, it would constitute a self-inflicted wound with potentially fatal consequences.

In the upcoming profile style article, General McChrystal and his staff are reported to have made less than flattering comments about (1) Vice President Biden, (2) Obama Special Envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke and (3) US Ambassador to Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry. Others high in the ranks of Team Obama may have been skewered as well, since only Hilary Clinton was reputedly unscathed. (It is to be hoped that had Mr Gates been the target of a barb or two that his vast experience in Washington has served to cushion their impact.)

The foundation for the critical comments made by either McChrystal or members of his staff resides in the events of last Fall during the unnecessarily prolonged pseudo-debate over the correct American strategy for Afghanistan and the number of additional troops which would be needed to execute that strategy effectively. The Obama orchestrated exercise in foot-dragging was marked by leaked memos, rumors, counter-rumors, and other sorts of typically mean and petty bureaucratic infighting.

It was at this time that Ambassador Eikenberry leaked documents which were critical of McChrystal's request for extra men as well as casting aspersions on both the character and election of Hamid Karzai. To infer that Eikenberry's CYA oriented exercise torqued off General McChrystal and others genuinely seeking a path other than defeat by which to exit Afghanistan would be an exercise in accuracy.

It deserves mention that Ambassador Eikenberry's most undiplomatic excoriation of Afghanistan's president not only hindered General McChrystal but also marked the beginning of the steep and slippery downward slope of Afghan-US relations which has continued to date. The ventilation of frustration and anger with Eikenberry's self-serving act in the presence of a journalist was most unwise, most unfortunate, and most regrettable. But, the basis of the charge was both accurate and fair.

McChrystal and others have been frustrated and angered by Special Envoy Holbrooke as well. Mr Holbrooke has made the mistake of reading and believing his own press releases with the result that he considers himself to be The World's Leading Expert on Hostilities Termination and Conflict Resolution. This preposterously inflated self-assessment is based upon Mr Holbrook's role in brokering the Dayton Peace Accords, which played a less than considerable part in helping bring the ethnic and religiously based violence scarring former Yugoslavia to an end. The hosannas sung to Mr Holbrooke by press and Bill Clinton's White House do not merit Mr Holbrooke's conclusion that he Knows Everything Worth Knowing about both the political and military aspects of interventionary operations. If Mr Holbrooke's emails drip the same smugness and rectitude his remarks on camera and before Congress do, it is easy to see why General McChrystal and his staff are more than a tad annoyed to receive them.

Vice-President Biden is, of course, a cretin. Joe (The Biggest Mouth This Side Of Hugo Chavez) made his intellectually challenged position abundantly clear during the "debate" over AfPak strategy when he seriously proposed that the US withdraw from Afghanistan. At the same time we would cover Pakistan or at least the FATA with horizon-to-horizon swarms of Predators and Reapers so as to snipe al-Qaeda members at very low risk to ourselves.

The fact that this ludicrous idea was not met immediately with gales of derisive laughter but rather was given what appeared to be a respectful hearing in the corridors of power speaks volumes as to the level of strategic and operational thinking (that word used generically only) in the Obama administration. If General McChrystal was called upon to explain to the Policy Level wallahs just what was wrong with War According To Joe, full justification for any number of statements of jocose persiflage is to be found.

Gates and Mullen have engaged in preemptive damage limitation. Both men have severely chastised General McChrystal. This was done, not because the general deserved it but rather in the hopes it might head off some disastrous presidential act of pique.

The word on the street is President Obama likes everything "nicey-nicey" around him. Only the POTUS is allowed to have a temper tantrum, to show outrage, or, even, to be pissed off. We all know that Mr Obama has been looking for some "ass" to kick.

If the president is not in a hurry to be in the Oval while the US loses the war in Afghanistan, he had best decide that General McChrystal does not possess an ass worthy of kicking.

Pull Out Now! The UN Says The War Is Lost

The UN has taken a look at the security situation in Afghanistan. The worthies and experts at that strategic think tank didn't like what they saw.

But, being willing to look defeat square in the face without blanching, the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon who is, as everybody knows, the finest military theorist since Karl von Clausewitz as well as an operational level commander on a par with George Patton, has informed the Security Council that Afghanistan is going to hell in a high speed, low drag wheelbarrow. Using the ever reliable indicators of roadside bombs, assassinations of low to mid-level government personnel in the provinces, and "complex" attacks, the SecGen all but declared the Taliban to have won.

The SecGen is not alone in his dismal appraisal of American and allied fortunes in Afghanistan. Over the past few weeks, those two pillars of independent, disinterested, and agenda-free impartial assessment of American success or failure in both war and diplomacy, the WaPo and the NYT, have made reached the same conclusion, at least by implication. The only feature lacking in either outlet is an editorial demanding a prompt American surrender to the Mighty and Pure Defenders of the One Truth Faith.

Admittedly, there are a number of good reasons to feel both gloom and doom hovering over the valleys of Afghanistan. The Afghan National Forces are far more a myth than a substantial reality capable of effective action in the field. The Karzai regime is corrupt, inefficient, self-serving, and far more interested in continuing its hold on power than seeing hostilities termination leading to long term conflict resolution. Mr Karzai himself is an excellent Afghan politician but a very infuriating partner with whom to engage.

At the same time Taliban deserves credit. It is comprised of tough, resilient fighters led by reasonably competent commanders. It has a set of clear goals. A very definite agenda well founded on religion. Beyond that Taliban has the support and assistance of the Pakistani Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence and, thus, constitutes a branch of the armed forces of Pakistan. As if that were not sufficient, Taliban receives support from Iran. Training camps are located convenient to the Afghan border in the wastes of rural Iran while the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps provides instructors. In a gesture of religious fraternity, the Iranians also provide explosively formed penetrators and other useful gadgets.

Even with the augmentation of American combat forces, the manpower available to the US and ISAF for combat missions is minimal (to put it charitably.) The correct decision by General McChrystal to limit the use of indirect and air delivered fire places more of a burden on the ground pounders, thus making the war even more manpower intensive. In order to assure that few (preferably no) Afghan non-combatants are killed by the "infidels," it is necessary to conduct each and every operation no matter how large or small on a retail basis, up close and personal.

Longer term this self-imposed constraint on the lethality of the battlefield is not only good, it is absolutely necessary. McChrystal understands perfectly that if civilians are to be killed, it is essential that they be killed by the insurgents. Insofar as Taliban et al kill civilians, non-combatants, women, children, and old men, whether by a roadside bomb, a suicide IED, or a "complex" attack, the resulting body count strengthens the counterinsurgent while weakening the insurgent.

That consideration constitutes a critical nuance unnoticed by either Generalissimo Ban Ki-Moon or the Deep Strategic Thinkers at the WaPo and NYT. The primary victims of the increased usage of roadside bombs and similar IEDs have been Afghan civilians. The same is true of attacks carried out by "martyrdom seekers" whether using suicide vests or vehicle borne IEDs. Even many of the larger attacks, characterized in the UN report as "complex" have resulted in more civilian than foreign combatant deaths.

The roadside bombs, the assassinations of minor government, police, and military personnel, even the majority of the "complex" attacks such as the strikes on foreign occupied guesthouses have not only resulted in an increased loathing for Taliban on the part of Afghans but show a high measure of desperation driving Taliban.

In previous insurgencies, assassination of local personnel have been a prominent feature either of the beginning of the insurgency or as a strong indicator of its being defeated. The same applies to indiscriminate attacks resulting in a high level of casualties among the uncommitted majority of the civilian population.

Previously in Iraq, in Pakistan, and in Afghanistan, when the insurgents have started killing civilians in large numbers, there has been an immediate push-back on the part of the threatened civilians. This is being seen again in Afghanistan in the past few months--the same period employed by Feldherr Ban Ki-Moon as a base for his prognostication of impending defeat.

Increasingly, local villagers equipped with (to use the term employed by US military sources) "personal assault weapons" have joined Afghan, US, and ISAF units to engage and destroy Taliban cells. The same upward trend is seen in the flow of unsolicited and actionable intelligence from locals who have had it up to their beards with Taliban.

Afghans, not unlike most people everywhere, are not strong on the idea of getting killed. They don't even appreciate the fine theological distinction between being killed by an "infidel" or an "apostate" rather than a good Muslim, a jihadi. Not surprisingly, the Afghans are ready, willing, and eager to seize the moment and abate the Taliban nuisance.

Rather than being indicators of near-term defeat, the increased Taliban reliance upon IEDs, assassination, and the odd media spectacular points to a loss of confidence within the command echelons of the insurgents. Taliban has lost the initiative in the quotidian conduct of operations; as a comparison between friendly initiated, hostile initiated, and meeting engagements shows, the capacity to control the pace and direction of operations has shifted increasingly in favor of the US and ISAF.

This pleasant reality in no way lessens the underlying reality that the war is not over. The US and its allies are not yet sure of achieving the minimum strategic goal of "not-losing," but the vectors have shifted in that direction. The next six to twelve months will be a long, hard pull in Afghanistan. Marja is not yet fully secured. The Kandahar operation has been delayed. Most importantly, the Afghan national government and forces have not yet shown either the will or the ability to carry their share of the freight.

Right now the major lost opportunity is not military but falls rather in the area of governance. The US and its allies have fallen too far into the trap of believing that the central government of Afghanistan is just that--a government. The US has also allowed itself to believe that success in Afghanistan cannot occur without the existence of a strong, credible, and effective central government.

These twin notions are bogus. For much of its existence, Afghanistan has gotten along quite well without a strong, credible, and effective central government. The Afghan culture states that a person's primary loyalty is to the extended family, secondary loyalty is to the clan, and the tertiary loyalty is to the tribe. This hierarchy allows but does not compel a loyalty to the central regime in Kabul.

This situation implies that Afghans have a high propensity toward and a good capacity for self-organizing. The self-organizing process moves from the most local to the more distant and has the automatic advantage of assuring high group coherence through the necessity for voluntary collaboration in the search for mutual self-interest.

The operational consequence of this orientation within the human terrain of Afghanistan is obvious. The US and its allies should--must, perhaps--put Kabul to the side and deal with the local power structure. The winning political approach is that of empowering the self-organizing capacities of the Afghan villages, the neighborhoods of Marja or Kandahar. Working with and backing the needs of the locals in all aspects of security, governance, and economic development would allow the effective circumvention of the obstructionists of Kabul. Doing things this way would have the additional advantage of cutting off Taliban from any pretense of legitimacy, by denying it the large target of central government corruption, cronyism , and flat out inefficiency.

There is a very high probability that General McChrystal is as aware of the self-organizing and provincial orientation of the Afghan human terrain as he is of the grave inadequacies of the central regime. If his lords and masters inside the Beltway can be brought to see the light, there is a better than good chance that the next few months will see a political success parallel the probable military defeat of Taliban.

There is, of course, only the slimmest of chances that the Obama administration can wake up to the tribal and family realities of Afghanistan so as to give a green light to adding the final ingredient which would well neigh onto guarantee success of an acceptable sort in Afghanistan. And, there is absolutely no chance in hell that the WaPo-NYT Strategic Studies Academy or Geo-Political Genus Ban Ki-Moon will ever get it.

Push Comes To Shove Time For Taliban

Reversing the customary military practice of secrecy prior to the launch of a campaign, the US, UK, and their Afghan and NATO partners have announced in advance not only where but when they plan to open up in a major way on Taliban. The public announcements which have been carried around the world were not just a good idea, they were a brilliant ploy.

General McChrystal has made a priority of protecting Afghan civilians from war's devastation. The announcement has made sure that beaucoup noncombatants are leaving the projected zone of operations in Helmand province focusing on the city of Lashkar Gah.

Operation Moshtarak bodes to be not only one of the largest but perhaps most decisive actions in the long, long, long and previously poorly waged war. The exodus of civilians from the area, which has been a center of both Taliban strength and opium production for years, is an essential for the operations success. Knowing this the Talib forces have sought not only to prevent civilian departure but to so intimidate the local population that it could use civilians as shields against the allied troops.

No one has ever accused Afghans of being particularly slow on the uptake when it is their lives which are on the line. The last generation or so of constant warfare has honed the sense of self-preservation to a fine edge which has been in no way dulled by the Taliban's Islamist views of the love of death being more godly than a love of life. Thus, the massive display of a very timely "feet don't fail me now" mentality on the part of the civilians.

Encouragement for the flood of departure has been provided by the highly visible preparatory moves by the British troops as well as the US Marines. In this area the Brits have been the more deliberately obvious as they have staged "shaping" operations in recent days. There can be little doubt that any civilians watching these preparatory moves would find a potent reason to have important and pressing business elsewhere.

The British Army in large measure due to its superb training, very high quality leadership at all levels from the section to the brigade, unit cohesion, presents a picture of uncompromising, remorseless dedication to victory which gives it a powerful moral ascendancy over its opponents. While the Taliban are not the Argentinians of the Falkland Island fracas, they cannot be immune to the looming reality of defeat, purposeless "martyrdom," and final futility.

In a very real way the British Army is better than the legends of the Texas Rangers. (You might remember the yarn of a Ranger saying, "No one can stop a man who knows he is in the right and keeps on coming.") Even when let down by their political masters, provided with deficient or inadequate equipment, the British other ranks and the officers leading them are more than willing to "keep on coming" even against an enemy qualitatively superior. (Think Western Desert before Monty came along.)

The same may be said of the US Marines who are taking the biggest combat bite. As fighters the Marines are undeniably at the top of the heap. Looking back at the debacle in Vietnam, the historian can only conclude that the Marines of Eye Corps did the most successful, continuous, effective heavy lifting of the war--even though the Marine grunt had a bit less than a fifty-fifty chance of getting through his thirteen month tour both undead and unwounded.

With many civilians out of the way, both the Marines and the British Army have a good to excellent chance of macerating the Taliban despite prepared IEDs, fortified villages, and suicide bombers. Taliban will take a lickin' and most probably will not keep on tickin'.

Of course the operation will not be a walk over for either the Americans or the British. The good guys will take a hit--perhaps even a heavy one. In exchange the war in Afghanistan may very well have finally reached a necessary turning point. At the end of the op the Taliban may finally realize that there is no way it can achieve a military victory over the "infidels."

The biggest unknown of the upcoming fracas is the performance of the Afghan National Army. The attached Afghan force is comprised of units which have reached the highest level of training performance. But, as anyone who has felt his balls creep upward as an angry round flies by, "all training is simulated."

If the Afghan units perform successfully there is real reason to hope for the timely achievement of the minimum necessary American (and British) strategic goal: not-losing. A successful performance by the Afghan National Force would also provide substance to the concept of an Afghan polity. Finally, it would give Afghanistan a genuine national institution transcending most tribal, ethnic, linguistic identities. It would show the Afghan National Force to be what George Washington said of the post-Revolutionary War US Army, "a school for citizenship."

Should the US, UK, NATO, and Afghan forces come out way on top in the upcoming campaign, there is reason to believe that Taliban would seek to find a political accommodation with the Kabul government. As everyone realizes no internal war can be finally decided by only military means. Military operations may lead to hostilities termination but only a process of political accommodation can bring about conflict resolution.

In short, the military must smash Taliban sufficiently that the leadership is willing to accept the messy process of reaching compromise outcomes with the in-power regime. The regime must also accept that it cannot kill its way to unchallenged authority and settle for operational dominance of the nation.

At the moment Karzai seems inclined to accept that reality--if his words can be taken at face value. His less than spectacularly legitimate regime can do no other if it wants to stay in power--which it does ever so much.

Operation Moshtarak will not in and of itself bring about hostilities termination. That will take more operations, more yomping the mountains and deserts, more killing, more dying.

This implies that the essential nature of the contest in Afghanistan has not altered. At root, it is a battle of political will between the Afghan supporters of Taliban and the publics of the US, UK, and other Western countries. If we in the US or our counterparts in the UK and elsewhere lose heart before Taliban comes to grip with the new realities, then all the bravery, sacrifice, and effort will go for nothing.

While chewing on that basic truth we must consider another. When the day of conflict resolution finally arrives, the Afghanistan which emerges will not be some sort of imitation Western democracy with pluralism, tolerance, free institutions, an independent judiciary, and shopping malls. It will be a mess not unlike contemporary Iraq. When the shooting stops Afghanistan will still be heavily tribal, strongly Islamist, stone broke, and reactionary in many ways.

The best that can be hoped for is that Afghanistan in the future will not repeat the fatal error of Taliban chieftain Omar and extend "Islamic" hospitality and protection to an Osama bin Laden or a group such as al-Qaeda. Not a lofty end to envision, but a highly necessary one.

Playing Politics With History

Bruce Ackerman teaches law at Yale. Being a lawyer by trade, Professor Ackerman is good at making an argument. It does not bother the professor that he shoots history in the neck.

In his WaPo op-ed piece last Saturday, Professor Ackerman compares General Stanley McChrystal's forthright statement at the previous day's conference at the Strategic Studies Institute with the insubordinate actions of General Douglas MacArthur during the Korean War. The comparison is specious. It is misleading in the extreme. It is historically as wrong as a cat barking.

Professor Ackerman is not the only person pontificating from a basis of historical ignorance--willful or otherwise. Today in the WaPo, Eugene Robinson plays the same game albeit without referencing the famed Truman-MacArthur donnybrook. Richard Cohen completes the WaPo trifecta. Mr Cohen does drag the ghosts of Truman and MacArthur back into the spotlight.

Now, for the edification of pundits great and small, here is why the analogy between the comments of the bluntly spoken and honest minded General McChrystal and the statements, letters, and actions of the prima donna of the US Army, Douglas MacArthur, is wrong. And, bucko, here is why any comparison between the bluntly spoken and honest minded Harry Truman and the present incumbent are wrong as well.

First it is essential that the context of the Truman-MacArthur contretemps be established. The general was a legend in his own mind--and the popular perception of We the People. Having defied orders, failed to take precautions despite warnings, and generally fouled up the defense of the Philippine Islands at the outset of World War II in the Pacific, MacArthur was turned into a "hero" by the press with the connivance of the Roosevelt administration. The president was in desperate need of a "hero," genuine or not, in the darkest days of the war.

For the balance of the hostilities in the Pacific, MacArthur was an adequate but far from brilliant commander. He was, however, a genius at public relations so that his halo glistened ever more brightly as the war continued. (It might be noted that the grunts bestowed upon the General a far from flattering nickname, "Dugout Doug.")

At the end of the war, MacArthur became the de facto ruler of Japan. Most but not all historians reckon that the General did a decent job of running Japan, but it must be noted that his major accomplishment was allowing the Japanese to rediscover their democratic experience which had been masked with the rise of militarism during the late Twenties and Thirties. He invented nothing, but didn't stop the Japanese from exercising their remarkable capacities for self-organization in both political and economic matters.

When the North Koreans invaded the South in June 1950 it came as a bolt from the blue to Washington--and MacArthur. MacArthur had precluded the CIA and its predecessors from operating in his geographic areas of responsibility both during and after World War II. As a result there was no American intelligence agency operating in the Korean peninsula which might have provided adequate warning.

In the confusing opening days of the war as first South Korean and then American troops were defeated--badly, it was Harry Truman and his administration which acted both decisively and effectively. Truman and his people (which group included some of the most gifted foreign policy personalities in recent American history) made a number of critical and time sensitive decisions which had two important consequences.

First and foremost, the decisions assured the war would be limited in scope, goals, and means. There would be no widening of the war geographically. The goal was initially limited to restoring the status quo ante. The means strictly eschewed the nuclear option.

The first turning point in the war came with the twin successes of defense and offense. The defensive success was that of stopping the North Korean Peoples Army at the Pusan Perimeter. The offensive success was, arguably, MacArthur's finest moment--the amphibious landing at Inchon, far behind the NKPA lines.

MacArthur's finest moment left as fast as it came. Almost immediately he lost sight of the initial goal and replaced it with one of his own--the defeat of the NKPA, occupation of North Korea, and the forced unification of the two Koreas. The Truman administration went along with the General.

The movement of US, South Korean, and other UN forces into the North had the result of bringing the Chinese into the war. Despite ample warnings through diplomatic channels, the General poo-pooed the possibility of the Chinese entering in any number.

He was wrong. The Peoples Liberation Army moved with dramatic effect into the war. The US, South Korean, and other forces were compelled into rapid and sometimes disorderly retreat. MacArthur lost it.

He demanded that the atomic bomb be used. He proposed sowing a radioactive band of death along the Yalu and Tumen rivers. He demanded that the Chinese Nationalist forces be "unleashed" against the Mainland.

All of this was contrary to the limited war policy which had been decided upon by President Truman. The General was (as the military terminology has it) "counseled" and even gently, very gently reprimanded. Privately of course. The General was touchy. His ego was quite easily bruised.

MacArthur was a man upon whom subtlety was lost. He ignored the "counselling" and "guidance" provided by the Joint Chiefs and the Secretary of Defense. He shot off his mouth criticizing the Truman decisions. At one point he violated orders regarding an upcoming effort to start ceasefire talks by imperiously and publicly demanding the virtual surrender of the NKPA and the Chinese.

That torpedoed the first effort at talking peace.

Then the General allowed the public release of a letter he had written to the Republican leader in the House of Representatives. The letter was tantamount to a declaration of war against the Truman presidency. No US commander before that (or since for that matter) had ever penned such a bitter and baseless diatribe against his commander-in-chief.

Had the MacArthur strategy been put into effect as it was laid forth in the letter and other public statements, the US would have taken on a land war in China and a nuclear war with the Soviet Union. MacArthur's strategic view would have resulted in an American defeat to say nothing of costing lives beyond counting.

Truman faced the rank and dangerous insubordination with firmness, decisiveness, and a willingness to run enormous political risks. In his decision to fire MacArthur he was backed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff including its chairman, Omar Bradley. The bantam from Missouri fired the General from Megalomania.

Truman was excoriated in the majority of the press. The Republicans yelled for his scalp. In the end, Truman and his administration survived the storm of congressional hearings, press abuse, popular disapproval. Ultimately, the General as he predicted in his speech to a joint sitting of Congress simply "faded away." History (or at least historians) pronounced Truman right and MacArthur wrong.

There it is. History, complex events, in a small capsule. Easy to understand. Even a law professor ought to be able to wrap his brain around it.

General McChrystal has not been insubordinate. He has done nothing other than to follow his orders. He was tasked with assessing the state of the war. He did. He was told to be blunt and honest. He has been.

The London remarks were not out of line in the slightest. No orders were given that were of the gag variety. Even the President has acknowledged that.

However it is more than passingly strange that members of the chattering and political classes who demanded a full, public debate of the Iraq "surge" a few years back are now reaming out General McChrystal for doing that both in public and private regarding the Afghan mess.

President Obama should have realized that when he took the advice of Secretary of Defense Gates and others and appointed General McChrystal, he was naming a man renowned for his straight forward way and total intellectual integrity--to say nothing of moral courage. General McChrystal is a rare man. He is a professional man-at-arms, not a careerist ticket puncher with his nose firmly in place--and not on his face.

Just as General McChrystal is not General MacArthur updated, President Obama is not a brand new and improved version of President Truman. Truman made decisions and took personal responsibility for them. He acted quickly and decisively without regrets, without polls, and without looking back.

He consulted to be sure. But he made the decisions. He exercised leadership. He did not follow the winds of either his party (and he was the most yellow dog of yellow dog Democrats) or the American public. As the sign on his desk read, "The buck stops here."

Nor did Truman dither. Hold endless review sessions. Endless meetings with senior staff. He listened. He read. He chose. He acted. He acted in a timely manner. He was, of course, not a lawyer so he understood the real world meaning of that lawyer-loved phrase, "time is of the essence."

Truman would have appreciated McChrystal. He would have listened to McChrystal. Then he would have decided. Quickly. Effectively.

Truman deserved McChrystal. But, he had MacArthur.

McChrystal deserves Truman. He has Obama.

Pity.