That's Not The Surge I Knew

Having taken on the intelligence services for failing to connect the dots over Detroit, does the White House want to take on more trouble by antagonizing the military?  Or is the NY Times just stirring the pot, and if so, where is the love?

WASHINGTON — Senior White House advisers are frustrated by what they say is the Pentagon’s slow pace in deploying 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan and its inability to live up to an initial promise to have all of the forces in the country by next summer, senior administration officials said Friday.

Tensions over the deployment schedule have been growing in recent weeks between senior White House officials — among them Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., Gen. James L. Jones, the national security adviser, and Rahm Emanuel, the White House chief of staff — and top commanders, including Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the senior commander in Afghanistan.

A rapid deployment is central to President Obama’s strategy, to have a jolt of American forces pound the Taliban enough for Afghan security forces to take over the fight. Administration officials said that part of the White House frustration stemmed from the view that the longer the American military presence in Afghanistan continued, the more of a political liability it would become for Mr. Obama. But beyond the politics, the speeded up deployment — which Mr. Obama paired with a promise to begin troop withdrawals by July 2011 — is part of Mr. Obama’s so-called “bell curve” Afghanistan strategy, whereby American troops would increase their force in Afghanistan and step up attacks meant to quickly take out insurgents.

One administration official said that the White House believed that top Pentagon and military officials misled them by promising to deploy the 30,000 additional troops by the summer. General McChrystal and some of his top aides have privately expressed anger at that accusation, saying that they are being held responsible for a pace of deployments they never thought was realistic, the official said.

Great - maybe next week the Administration can pick a fight with the Fed.

McQ points out that Obama's three months of dithering didn't help speed things along:

Remember the “let me be clear, this decision has delayed nothing” rhetoric”? Well, let me be clear – his inexperience apparently has left him with the false impression that troop deployments are an overnight thing. And now the usual finger pointing from the White House has begun.

From the left flank, Prairie Weather complains about the lack of Gingko Bilboa in his life:

General Stanley McChrystal knows how to promise but not how to keep it.  Evidently part of the Afghanistan deal -- built as a swift and short-term surge -- was easy to promise but not to produce.

...I don't remember seeing complaints from the Pentagon when they were urging the White House to back a surge.  But now a promised quick surge of 30,000 additional troops is being delayed by "bad weather, limited capacity to send supplies by air and attacks on ground convoys carrying equipment for troops from Pakistan and other countries presented substantial hurdles,"  according to the deputy commander in Kabul.  Wait!  Winter weather, attacks on convoys are something they've never experienced in eight years in Afghanistan?

He doesn't remember?  My goodness, does Prairie W remember anything from last December?  Does he remember that McChrystal asked for additional troops over a period of eighteen months, not six?  That it was Obama who insisted on replaying the Iraqi "surge", which has now been privately acknowledged as a success?  Let's cut to the Times:

The deployment time in the case of Iraq was six months; when the Pentagon first came to President Obama two months ago with a plan that stretched over 18 months, he offered up some withering questions. He turned to Gen. David H. Petraeus, now the head of Central Command and the commander in Iraq during the Bush surge, and asked: “What takes so long? What’s so hard about this?”

White House officials say it was Mr. Obama himself who pressed the idea of a surge of his own, openly acknowledging in a meeting that he had criticized it harshly during the campaign.

I guess PW forgot this classic generalship from Obama as well:

The plan [to add 30,000 troops], called Option 2A, was presented to the president on Nov. 11. Mr. Obama complained that the bell curve would take 18 months to get all the troops in place.

He turned to General Petraeus and asked him how long it took to get the so-called surge troops he commanded in Iraq in 2007. That was six months.

“What I’m looking for is a surge,” Mr. Obama said. “This has to be a surge.”

I will guess that the Pentagon agreed to a deployment schedule that was somewhere between optimistic and unrealistic, after offering a cascade of caveats that the White House chose to ignore. 

I don't imagine I am alone in expecting Obama to blame the military if his plans don't work (it would be Kennedyesque!)  but I am surprised that the second guessing has begun so soon.

Comments

[Thomas Collins]

Obama running health care and Obama formulating military strategy. The perfect formula for illness and insecurity.

[bio mom]

They are just setting the table to have someone to blame if things don't work out.

[Soylent Red]

I do not get a warm and fuzzy about a guy who has never so much as run a den of Cub Scouts second-guessing people who have been career military men for decades.

Give the troop your desired outcome, in detail. Then let them formulate a plan within your parameters and execute it. Your only job is to point them in the right direction and see to it they have more than what they need to accomplish the mission.

It ain't rocket surgery Barry.

[RichatUF]

They are setting the stage to pull the rug from under Gen. McChrystal.

[Danube of Thought]

I'm amazed at this development. All during the dithering phase I read extensively about how it was going to take a long, long time to get the troops in place when and if the decision was finally made to send them. Among the stated reasons I recall was the difficulty of transporting materiel in extremely difficult, roadless terrain.

[pagar]

IMO, it won't just be Gen McChrystal, it'll be the entire military. The leftists have been
trying for years to pull down the US military. The Obama administration will claim that they had the right plan and could have won, except the US military balked at implementation.

[Clarice]

Could be worse..they could have taken Murtha's advice and re-deployed to Guam first.

[Buford Gooch]

Some of you prefer to attribute to perfidy that which is much more likely naivete.

[Rick Ballard]

If naivete = ignorance backed by slightly less than mediocre intelligence, then I can buy it. Between ears and brains I do believe he should just be called Dumbo.

[boris]

They're not naive, they're FUBAR. They are opposed to doing what has worked. They mean to establish new methods. They would rather fail and have somebody else to blame than succeed by accepting conventional national defense policies they think are the cause of the world's problems.

Close enough to perfidy IMO.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Gingko Bilboa

I saw her dance in the 70's.

[boris]

Naivete or FUBAR: you decide ...

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

TERRY MORAN: The surge of U.S. troops, combined with ordinary Iraqis' rejection of both al Qaeda and Shiite extremists have transformed the country. Attacks are down more than 80% nationwide. U.S. combat casualties have plummeted, five this month so far, compared with 78 last July, and Baghdad has a pulse again. If you had to do it over again, knowing what you know now, would you — would you support the surge?

OBAMA: No, because — keep in mind that —

MORAN: You wouldn't?

OBAMA: Well, no, keep — these kinds of hypotheticals are very difficult. Hindsight is 20/20. I think what I am absolutely convinced of is that at that time, we had to change the political debate, because the view of the Bush administration at that time was one that I just disagreed with…"

YouTube

The question: knowing the surge worked and given a do-over would you support the only thing that saved Iraq from failure?

By answering "No" in that fashion he chooses failure over success. A fair interpretation of his answer: Obama's choice would be to fail in Iraq rather than support a certain remedy because he disagreed with the Iraq policy.

[MikeS]

People who have never done anything are always surprised by how long it takes!

[Terry Gain]

Obama's choice would be to fail in Iraq rather than support a certain remedy because he disagreed with the Iraq policy.

Well said Boris. It's surprising that Obama would be stupid enough to admit that he wanted the mission in Iraq to fail rather than be proven wrong.

So is he merely naive or evil? Does it matter?. The Obama administration is an unfortunate melding of the naivety and incompetence of Carter, the paranoia and corruption of Nixon and Agnew and Obama's unparalleled ignorance and narcissism.

[Joseph Brown]

As a former Air Force NCO I spend alot of time on Air Force web sites. Got any idea how much this so-called surge is being talked about? None, nada, zilch. Nobody is talking up how his/her squadron/base/wing is ramping up. It ain't something that's gonna happen like yesterday, much less tomorrow.
Mr Nope'nChange is gonna find out how long it takes to do a movement like that. It's not like ordering up Marine-1 and AF-1 to hop up to NY or Chicago or his hometown of Honolulu.
Nor Copenhagen nor the myriad other places he visited to do his shuck and jive apology act.

[MarkO]

Obama has only one real skill and it to blame others.

And, that, too, is Bush's fault.

[DebinNC]

NYT: Administration officials said...

It's incredible that the WH's "frustration" with the military and worries over Obama's "political viability" were purposely expressed to the NYT by the WH itself, not some unattributed Pentagon leak or a Gibbs briefing gaffe. Obama hasn't had a press conference since he gave us "acted stupidly", six months ago. I bet he's so angry he's semi-unhinged, and his handlers are terrified at what he might say sans TOTUS.

[matt]

I blogged this this morning. LUN. Once again, Emmanuel and the other vipers are playing the blame game. More to the point, they are getting good men likked with their shenanigans.

[Danube of Thought]

I think you're onto something, Deb.

This guy is mind-numbingly stubborn--"invincibly ignorant" is the phrase that comes to mind. Does he continue to believe that closing Gitmo will reduce Al Qaeda recruitment? Does he believe that the benefits of closing it outweigh the costs?

Does he believe that trying KSM and pantybomber in the criminal justice system will bring a net benefit to national security by demonstrating our "values' to the world? If so, which values does he have in mind?

He seems to learn nothing at all from experience.

[Old Lurker]

Good call, Deb.

[E. Nigma]

Amateurs talk about strategy. The professionals talk about logistics.

Afghanistan is a landlocked country. Iraq has a major seaport in Basra, and also seaborn traffic came ashore in Kuwait to be staged to march up into Iraq.
It's not just men. It's tents, baracks, fuel, equipment, ammo, etc., etc.
It either gets flown in or has to be trucked in over the Khyber pass through Pakistan or some other unsavory land route. It becomes increasingly more obvious why the Bush Administration was not eager to devote large amounts of resources to Afghanistan. It is at the end of a very long logistical line, and is deucedly difficult to support.

Yes indeed, the military is being set up to fail, no matter how this shakes out. Come 2011 or 2012, McChrystal and Petraeus will be dragged in front of Congress to be humiliated over this.

[MayBee]

Apparently, one of the withering questions was not, "Can you do this?"

[Soylent Red]

Afghanistan is a landlocked country. Iraq has a major seaport in Basra, and also seaborn traffic came ashore in Kuwait to be staged to march up into Iraq.

And with that...is anyone still confused why we might want to draw our enemies into a fight in Iraq, rather than try to root them out of Afghanistan?

[Rick Ballard]

Maybe someone could show the Kendonesian commie a map? I still believe that the "nobody could be this dumb" folks are way too hopeful. He's definitely not naive but that does not exclude "butt ignorant and proud of it".

[Jane]

is anyone still confused why we might want to draw our enemies into a fight in Iraq, rather than try to root them out of Afghanistan?

To this day, every single lefty does not understand that strategy. And most think Al Qaeda is justified because we had some troops near Mecca. Obama is going to get us all killed.

[DerHahn]

To go along with E Nigma's post, it's clear that Obama has no clue what the key point of the Surge in Iraq really was. It wasn't just additional troops, it's the mission that the additional troops completed.

[narciso]

Well his tutor on the subject was Biden, how could he have gotten it right

[Danube of Thought]

From PPP:

"The Massachusetts Senate race is now a toss up.

"Buoyed by a huge advantage with independents and relative disinterest from Democratic voters in the state, Republican Scott Brown leads Martha Coakley 48-47."

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vjnjagvet]

Come 2011 or 2012, McChrystal and Petraeus will be dragged in front of Congress to be humiliated over this.

We can only hope.

[JorgXMcKie]

Obama thinks he is royalty. Like the Bourbons, he "has learned nothing and forgets nothing."

I suspect he's watched too much Star Trek [with ears he might be Ferengi, and he's way sneaky] and thinks all he needs to do is have Scotty beam the troops and equipment to Afghanistan.

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vjnjagvet]

Here's what I should have posted:

Come 2011 or 2012, McChrystal and Petraeus will be dragged in front of Congress...

We can only hope. Petraeus will triumph in such a forum.

[Ann]

This was linked on twitter today and I love it:

It says:

Allies Or Enemies, You Make The Call

I come in peace. I didn't bring artillery. But I'm pleading with you, with tears in my eyes: If you f**k with me, I'll kill you all.
-Marine General James Mattis, to Iraqi tribal leaders

P.S. Does anyone really believe that the buck will stop with Obama if there are any casualties on American soil? Or is it just really convenient to say that after no one got hurt?

[narciso]

Actually that would be Miles O'Brien, but the point still applies. The Europeans knew this, that's why they wanted Mattis for NATO, but
he picked Stavridis instead.

So, NSA knew of the Nigerian in August, Leiter, was warning the Congress back in September, that Yemen was a hot spot, but that would have interfered with the recess
they had set up for Gitmo detainees, then
October, the Nayif debrief, November, the
Mutallab Sr, warning in November, and the December 22nd principals meeting. How do they dare face us with that kind of a record

[cathyf]

DoT, I think you got that backwards. "Vincibly ignorant" is the phrase you were looking for.

Vincible ignorance
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Vincible ignorance is, in Catholic ethics, a moral or doctrinal matter that could have been removed by diligence reasonable to the circumstances. It contrasts with invincible ignorance, which can not be removed at all, or only by supererogatory efforts (eg. exceptionally remote location).

While invincible ignorance prevents a sinful action from being a sin, vincible ignorance at most mitigates it. It may even aggravate guilt. The guilt of an act performed or omitted in vincible ignorance is not to be measured by the intrinsic malice of the thing done or omitted so much as by the degree of negligence discernible in the act.

Ignorance stemming from making little or no effort is termed crass or supine; it removes little or no guilt. Deliberately fostered ignorance is affected or studied; it can increase guilt.

Ignorance may be

* Of law, when one is unaware of the existence of the law itself, or at least that a particular case is comprised under its provisions.
* Of fact, when not the relation of something to the law but the thing itself or some circumstance is unknown.
* Of penalty, when a person is not cognizant that a sanction has been attached to a particular crime. This is especially to be considered when there is question of more serious punishment.

Vincible ignorance can also refer to the intentional refusal to understand or consider a particular point of doctrine. (eg. "The doctrine of Invincible Ignorance is just wrong, no matter what you say.")

[E. Nigma]

Cathy

How about "stuck on stupid"? :)

Obama is probably not "stupid", but his ignorance in many matters (Hirohito surrendered to MacArthur?) is compounded by his non-existent management skills, poor staffing choices and his basic arrogance in not being willing to learn from someone who knows more in a particular subject (is that vincible ignorance?).

[bgates]

Gee, I'm going to need to apologize to my parents - I used to ask "withering questions" all the time.

"Why is this drive taking so long? Why can't we go to Pizza Hut tonight?"

[J. Peden]

First a "surge" can't possibly work and didn't, then all you have to do is push a button and out comes a bell-shaped victorious surge exactly integrated into the many other things you have also dialed up according to the very latest adjustments of the "Marxisant" Fantasy World Game, of course as derived from your having again succeeded in channelling the Ideal, as only you can.

Well, at least I know I can't do that and get away with it, but that realization came so far back that I can't possibly remember it, probably because I hadn't learned to talk yet.

[J. Peden]

He seems to learn nothing at all from experience.

Posted by: Danube of Thought

Let me be perfectly clear: in the Marxisant Fantasy World there is no such thing as "experience", nor obviously any "History". And that goes for what I just said, too.

[J. Peden]

I'd girded my loins to an extent comparable to the maximal setting on Barbara Boxer's cinchable thongs, when all of a sudden I realized that what i really needed to do was to either take some LSD or get a lobotomy, or both.

[AllenS]

If you check Prairie Weather's comments, you'll find me commenting. She changed the original post after I ripped her a new one.

My comments:

You may "think McChrystal has a little history of privately expressing dissent."

Nowhere in that article was there any mention of "McChrystal deliberately undermining his commander."

Those were quotes from her original article. She scrubbed them.

[PW]

Allen -- I think you're behaving like a nut! The post was posted once; no change was made to it; no little gremlins came in and edited. I don't have a "new one." I'm just chafing at your rudeness.

Above all, we can't know and won't know for years about whether Obama's policy choices were good ones.

We do know McChrystal's less that perfect reputation. We have seen him being a grumbler. We have experienced serious problems with the Pentagon. We have the past eight years of lies, coverups, and godawful policy choices to deal with. You can dislike Obama and I can find your basis for that dislike kind of childish or uninformed. But none of that has any relevance to the situation at hand. If you're really interested in what's happening in Afghanistan, I'd highly recommend a short trip to CSpan and a recently broadcast discussion at the Middle East Policy Institute now available on video.

[AllenS]

Those were quotes from you that I cited.

[Rob Crawford]

Does anyone really believe that the buck will stop with Obama if there are any casualties on American soil? Or is it just really convenient to say that after no one got hurt?

Uh... Fort Hood?

[Rob Crawford]

We have the past eight years of lies, coverups, and godawful policy choices to deal with.

That you say this makes it clear you're not operating with a clear head.

Unless you're talking about the lies, coverups, and "godawful policy choices" of the Democrats. Which I doubt you are.

[Soylent Red]

If you're really interested in what's happening in Afghanistan, I'd highly recommend a short trip to CSpan and a recently broadcast discussion at the Middle East Policy Institute now available on video actually being there as a highly competent and decorated 34-year career Soldier, with five years of command time at Joint Special Operations Command (where you were responsible for finding and killing Zarqawi).

FIFY.

As opposed to, say, a feckless professional complainer who has done nothing in his miserable existence except be a parasite on society, blame others for his failures and act cool.

Aren't there waffles you should be eating somewhere?

[pagar]

IMO, Any surge died Here

SEALs Tired of Watching Their Back says source

We saw the same thing in Vietnam. A military not supported by the Administration loses it's best and most highly trained troops.

[Stewart]

What, our military misled the White House, and the public? How can that be? This is unheard of! Get real. All you bumper sticker patriots need to open your eyes and see that the career military is a huge bureaucracy with the central purpose of every huge bureaucracy -- larger budget and more power. Who suffers? The low level enlisted! You want to help them, it's simple! Advocate a war tax and the draft. That means enough money (right, out of your pocket!) and enough boots on the ground (that's right, your kids!) Otherwise you're all just a bunch of whiners that want someone else to do the dirty work for your mouthing off.

[PD]

Obama seems to think it should take less time to plan and execute a surge involving thousands of troops, than to choose a church to attend, which he still hasn't done.

[daddy]

"Amateurs talk about strategy. The professionals talk about logistics."

This is exactly the same as the logistics situation facing Shell Oil in trying to get permission to drill in the Chuckchi Sea this summer season.

The Administration via Secretary Salazar holds a news conference to announce that approval is given, but it's not really given because it's always tentative approval (simply dithering and delaying through the EPA and Govt Bureacracies, etc.) And because it's tentative, not actual permission, Shell can't afford to spend millions to move all the super-expensive men and equipment up to the Chuckchi without an ironclad guaranty that they have been cleared to drill. Lacking that guaranty, Shell won't waste the cash to accomplish the logistics, and until the Government and EPA finally get off their butts and give actual approval the hardcore work of spending and mobilizing and logistics won't start. And when and if the Government, after months of dragging the process out, does finally give permission, its too late, because of our short drill season, for Shell to accomplish the logistics required to drill in 2010.

So it gets pushed into the future and delayed, and allows clueless jackasses in the press and the comments section to grandstand about the fault lying anywhere but where it deservedly belongs ---squarely in the lap of the Government.

[LTC John]

"Advocate a war tax and the draft. That means enough money (right, out of your pocket!) and enough boots on the ground (that's right, your kids!) Otherwise you're all just a bunch of whiners that want someone else to do the dirty work for your mouthing off."

Another armchair SecDef, and flinging the old "chickenhawk" in a oblique manner too!
Boots on the ground (wow, I marvel at the lingo!) need to be trained, equipped, supported and had best be folks that want to be doing what they are doing. You may want unhappy conscripts with no desire to be somewhere, but I'll stick with the men and women we have now, thanks very much.

Would you advocate an "Entitlement Tax" or a "Stimulus Tax", perhaps a "Subsidy Tax" as well? I guess some expenditures are more important than others, eh?