Obama's top US general in Afghanistan has been shown the door, but top brass at the Pentagon haven't really explained why
It seems harsh to suggest the Pentagon top brass don't know what they're doing. But those who care to read the transcript of the press conference at which the sacking of the top American general in Afghanistan was announced may find that conclusion hard to resist. "In some ways we're learning as we go here," said Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the joint chiefs. It was not a reassuring admission.
The public defenestration of General David McKiernan, a distinguished career officer who took command in Kabul less than one year ago, was brutal in that cold, callous way peculiar to American officialdom. More to the point, it remains largely unexplained. "We can and must do better ... We have a new policy set by our president, a new strategy, a new mission ... I believe new military leadership is also needed," said Robert Gates, the defence secretary.
But when asked what McKiernan had done wrong, or what his mooted replacement, Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal, might do better, Gates and Mullen grew confused in thought and word. "Nothing went wrong, there was nothing specific," said Gates. "There probably is no more critical ingredient than that "“ than leadership. And again, along with all the other changes, it's time now," said Mullen.
Reading between the crossed lines, there were plenty of clues that might explain the decision. McKiernan repeatedly asked for more troops in Afghanistan. President Barack Obama gave him 21,000; he wanted 10,000 more. But Gates opposed a big conventional build-up. He and others have also been wary of comparisons with the Iraq surge, instead stressing local "Afghanisation" solutions.
Unidentified Pentagon officials and fellow officers were quoted today saying McKiernan was too conventional in his thinking, that he had tried (and failed) to force out the allegedly corrupt Afghan president Hamid Karzai, and that as Nato commander he was too chummy with the mostly flaky European allies. In this latter respect, this week's developments mark another stage in the "re-Americanisation" of the Afghan war.
The problem is, the charges against McKiernan don't stick. In a media briefing last autumn, shortly after taking command, McKiernan set out a clear, thought-through, and politically subtle strategy. More troops were needed, especially in the south, after years of neglect due to Iraq. But reinforcements alone were not the answer.
"We can win all the tactical battles but that doesn't mean we win. To win, we have to win the battle of ideas," he said. "We must define winning in Afghan terms: meaning improved security, reduced civilian casualties, trustworthy government, economic and social progress."
McKiernan spoke of the need to increase Afghan army forces, provide a better-respected police force, root out foreign jihadis and Taliban extremists, and seek regional solutions via a "bottom-up" approach. "Most Afghans don't want the re-emergence of the Taliban. But we need a greater commitment by the international community ... Afghanistan will not ultimately be a military outcome. Isaf will not run out of bad people to kill. It will be a political solution."
These approaches accurately reflect Obama's Afghan policy, except McKiernan was already pursuing it six months before Obama made it his own. So the question remains: why was he fired?
One answer seems to lie with General David Petraeus, the Centcom commander and hero of the Iraq surge. Petraeus was the baleful, missing figure in the room when Gates and Mullen wielded the knife. Subordinate to McKiernan in Iraq, he is now his superior. The two men are not said to be close. McKiernan had allegedly been slow to adopt Petraeus's favoured counter-insurgency tactics, such as co-opting local tribal groups (as in Iraq). McChrystal, in contrast, is a special operations expert with a reputation for hunting down "high value" enemy targets.
But personal and tactical disagreements are not the whole story. The preoccupation of both Gates and Mullen with the urgent need to turn Afghanistan around rapidly reflects the pressure they are under from a White House that inherited a war it does not really want to fight and is not convinced it can win. McKiernan warned last year that a satisfactory outcome would take a decade, perhaps 14 years. For his political bosses, that was way too long.
The changes in command underscore the impression that Obama, abandoning long-term nation-building goals, is looking for quick, minimalist results in Afghanistan, chiefly containing and deflating the insurgency. His aides don't want the war dragging on when he stands for re-election in 2012. And the top brass increasingly believe the real counter-terrorism battle is centred next door, in the tribal areas of Pakistan.
As military expert Max Hastings noted this week, Pakistan matters more. Afghanistan was becoming a sideshow; it was the "wrong" war. Now McKiernan has been fired for the wrong reasons.
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