Now that President Obama has opted for a renewed commitment to a massive COIN effort in Aghanistan, it becomes imperative to replace the present ambassador with someone who believes in and who supported the Surge thinking of the Kagans, retired General Jack Keane, etc.
General McChrystal deserves the opportunity to form his own team made up of like minded true believers. He triumphed over the arguments of the present ambassador, and to keep the two of them there together would only lead to dissonance in the message of success that is bound to radiate from Kabul between now and July, 2011.
With Fred Kagan and Kimberly there at his side Stanley McChrystal would continue to receive the kind of advice that he appreciates. Some job can be created for Keane as well.
With the team in place, they should all be kept there until the "end state" that they are seeking is reached. pl
Works for me -- maybe he can getaa bunch of Israeli mercs to provide cover -- they certainly own him & his at least that much. Masada, anyone?
Posted by: PirateLaddie | 03 December 2009 at 11:42 AM
Colonel,
With the Kagan's yearning for their 'end state' in the artificial Afghanistan, that would equate to them eventually dying and being buried as one more Kabul monument. Such would rob our U.S. prison system of eventually garnering a catch, much like the Nazi propagandists of WWII that were convicted at Nuremberg. The Kagans and those of their same ilk, richly deserve a Nuremberg II proceedings.
Posted by: J | 03 December 2009 at 12:16 PM
Our new course of action reminds me of something I heard a street kid in San Francisco say once:
"If you're going to smoke crack, smoke ALL the crack, man!"
I'm no sniveling anti-war progressive. Don't get me wrong. But this is a stupid course of action - I have read the story of Dr. William Brydon, and the tales of the Soviet Army and the forces of Alexander the Great. No one has conquered Afghanistan, for any purpose (and we don't even have a stated purpose for being there, I might point out) and it is quite likely that no one every will.
I can still defend my vote for Obama by pointing to the alternative; but that's all I've got left. A damned shame.
Smoke all the crack, indeed.
Posted by: The Moar You Know | 03 December 2009 at 12:24 PM
As added help to McChrystal most of the WP warmonger columnist should be packaged with Kagan et al
Posted by: N. M. Salamon | 03 December 2009 at 12:29 PM
I'd be all for sending them to some nice outpost, Wanat seems a nice place to try out thier ideas. Maybe Karzai could give them some 'elite' units of his army to work with. But they've already been responsible for too many Americans getting killed needlessly to give them any more damned influence.
Posted by: Fred | 03 December 2009 at 12:48 PM
Colonel,
When thinking of the Kagan Family, my feelings range from dislike to barfing. They are wordsmiths who promote war but ignore the blood and pain that they cause. But, even worse are the Stakeholders who control federal government for their own personal gain at the expense of the nation’s citizens.
According the Jane Hamsher, firedoglake.com, “The bankers came to the White House and said, 'We want you to ratchet down the rhetoric and that's what happened. The word went out at those meetings, 'Don't criticize the bankers, don't criticize Geithner and Summers,’"
No different than the Industrial Military Complex spending trillions of dollars, now and in the future, to kill hundreds of religious fanatics on the other side of the world.
Posted by: VietnamVet | 03 December 2009 at 02:26 PM
Why should they abandon a postion of influence for one with NO influence? They are not stupid just wrong and totally ignorant of anything that does not support their egos and ignorance.
Posted by: William R. Cumming | 03 December 2009 at 02:36 PM
Col.,
Your sense of humor is in fine tune today. If that is a picture of Fred Kagan, he could use some time with McChrystal. McC would get him in shape in no time.
P.S. Congrats on the 4 million hits. You are a must read for me.
Posted by: Jackie | 03 December 2009 at 02:46 PM
Agreed with Jackie- Kagan might benefit from having to 'sweat to get paid,' literally.
Agreed as well regarding the hits. Some blogs are on-ramps to ideas, others are express lanes where you have to get on-board or miss the point. With issues of gravity (like those often discussed here) it's a rare blessing to find one that has a nice mix.
Posted by: Brett J | 03 December 2009 at 04:47 PM
So he can "embarrass" Afghan politicians and "cajole" Karzai ? Maybe while he's there, he can decide how best we can employ "conditionality."
Posted by: dennis nolan | 03 December 2009 at 05:34 PM
Back in the day, in the run up to the Iraq invasion, I saw Kristol at the Out of Town News stand in Harvard Sq. I just shook my head. Now I wonder what I might do if I met Kristol or the Kagans or their like on the street... Is popping them in the chops worth it? You might get away with the a&b charge if judged by a jury of your peers....
Pitch
Posted by: PitchPole | 03 December 2009 at 05:47 PM
Back during the Vietnam War the JUSPAO people could not disseminate their materials back home, only to not so friendly press corps in Saigon. That material rarely was reported as issued. Petraues has his own "peanut gallery" of "military experts (Kagans, Biddle, O'Hanlon, etc) who are pro-any-war "think-tank" hacks as his transmitters of propaganda. Even Cordesman does the some of that. In essence, presenting themselves as PRIMARY SOURCES, they really are only slave loud-speakers for the Petraeus shop scripts. Of course, and since he's rather clumsy, you can see McChrystal's hand in what they produce, as can be noted from his rather non-analytic, non-substantial "declassified" report to Obama that hits hot-button words as if he were writing it for "leak" rather than for policy. Read McChrystal's report:
http://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/Assessment_Redacted_092109.pdf
Worthy of comparison are the following two reports by noted European Afghanistan experts:
Gilles Derronsoro:
http://www.carnegieendowment.org/files/fixing_failed_strategy.pdf
and Antonio Giustozzi:
http://www.crisisstates.com/download/seminars/GiustozziDec05.pdf
Per a report by Andre Mitchell on MSNBC the troops requirements goes way beyond 80,000:
“The numbers are really pretty horrifying. What they say, embedded in this report by McChrystal, is they would need 500,000 troops - boots on the ground - and five years to do the job. No one expects that the Afghan Army could step up to that. Are we gonna put even half that of U.S. troops there, and NATO forces? No way. [Morning Joe, September 23, 2009]”
So these pear-shaped chickenhawks are on loan from neocons to the Pentagon as emplifiers of the “good news” myths by the myth-maker who brought us the Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman frauds as cover-up of casualties from firndly fire snafus. Recall how catastrophic was McChrystal’s “winning” (sic) strategy in Helman Province using 20,000 Marines that he asked for. A very good sum up of how Obama got screwed into uping the troops commitment was broadcast on NPR tonight. If anyone is interested I’ll post the transcript when available. It’s a keeper. I would also be very grateful for Col. Lang’s opinion on the Dorronsoro and Guistozzi papers. By the way, here’s a graet transcript pitting Derronsoro against Biddle and Bergen:
http://www.carnegieendowment.org/files/1110carnegie-afghanistan_big_questions.pdf
Again, Col. Lang, your opinion would be greatly valued.
Posted by: deteodoru | 03 December 2009 at 08:24 PM
If, and it's a big if, the administration can use the next year to shut down the ISI in Pakistan, and if the Pakistani army can neutralize the Taliban nest in the northwest terrorties, then I would say there's a very good chance the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan can be shut down during the following year. Then, it would become possible to send people in to rebuild Afghanistan, but not until then.
Posted by: rbe1 | 04 December 2009 at 07:34 AM
Interesting Adm. Mullen interview:
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2009/12/200912424926404830.html
Enjoy
Posted by: N. M. Salamon | 04 December 2009 at 10:53 AM
Excuse me, rbe1, "shut down the ISI"? Is that like Pakistan shutting down the CIA? Pakistan is a sovereign state and the US saw to that way back when "free" India was deemed a Soviet friend. We have used the ISI for as long as it existed. The Pakistani Army is shutting down only the Pakistani Taliban that rebels against the nation, not that Afghan one which draws on 4.5 million Afghan refugees and all sorts of Pashtun tribal assets for “raisons d’etat,” a sovereign right! During the Cold War the US was seen as the defender of national sovereignty of small helpless nations in the Third World struggling against declared World Communist aggression emanating from Moscow. For better or worse, we then recognized international law. Are we now residual Bushies who dream of ourselves in togas and bejeweled, rearranging "the colonies" afar? Please recall that 9/11 was not an initiative but a reaction because we protected the NEAR ENEMY in Muslim lands in return for cheap oil against their own people. That made us the FAR ENEMY, hence 9/11. And so great was our hubris that the airlines made it possible by violating the very laws established in the 1970s during a spade of skyjackings. THE PILOT'S CABIN DOOR WAS KEPT OPEN, hence four airliners were seized in about ten minutes each. We imposed ourselves on others and in stupor of hubris, Bush hiding the criminal negligence of the airlines and making of alQaeda as if extraterrestrial. We could not believe that they would react to our self-serving impositions in the Middle East. Would you STILL think America so omnipotent now? Are we like the declining Rome, similarly deceived by our commanders, like the Roman generals losing legions in the Germanic Forests because they couldn't adapt to the topography. We are indeed a "publis" oh so wiling to believe that we can kill 'em all and still live the good life back home.
Posted by: DE Teodoru | 04 December 2009 at 06:20 PM
I don't understand how war enthusiasts can be kept OUT of AfPak. Don't they realize how critical the next 18 mos are to confirming their wisdom? and how much $$$ can be had?
Posted by: ked | 04 December 2009 at 06:35 PM
In 16 months the generals will be saying they need more time to get this baby democracy safely off life-support.
This Atlantic online article from May gives the economic reasons for breaking the oligarchy, though I can think of more:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200905/imf-advice
Posted by: optimax | 05 December 2009 at 12:22 AM
1. Let's not overlook Fred's brother Bob's new Neocon paper mill, the "Foreign Policy Initiative"
http://www.foreignpolicyi.org/about/staff
2. Kagan clan advised McCain during his campaign.
3. Daddy Kagan, a Leo Strauss type:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Kagan
Posted by: Clifford Kiracofe | 05 December 2009 at 07:59 AM
The issue is not Kagans but the neocons calling for "World War IV" against Islam. The Kagans are just blah blah pawns, part of the agitprop peanut gallery of Petraeus/McChrystal. Eisenhower warned of the danger of the military-industrial complex and the neocons have been enriching themselves propagandizing through hate and fear-- per Lenin, their ancient teacher's motto: POLARIZE TO MOBILIZE-- getting paid, now on the right instead of left, to promote Pentagon expenditures as in the high-days of the Cold War.
Posted by: DE Teodoru | 06 December 2009 at 07:40 PM