In Defense of Petraeus

[zenwalk]

From Foreign Policy mag's Thomas Ricks.

We don't know precisely the relationship between General Dwight D. Eisenhower and his driver, Kay Summersby, during World War II. But it is evident that it was romantic in some ways, and, by her later account, quite intimate. If Ike were judged by today's standard, he would have been sent home in disgrace from Europe, and the war likely would have been worse without his calm, determined and unifying presence. He was not fired. But dozens of other Army officers, including 16 division commanders in combat, were relieved of command during the war -- for professional reasons.

Matthew Ridgway was another great American general, serving in World War II and Korea. Over a few months in 1951, in one of the best but lesser-known episodes of American generalship, Ridgway turned around our fortunes in the Korean War. Like Ike, Ridgway was fond of female companionship. He almost seemed to get a new wife for every war. In his personal papers on file at the U.S. Army archives in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, interspersed with discussions of how to improve combat leadership in the Korean War, there are some terse notes from his first wife's lawyer.

This change may have occurred in part because we as a nation no longer have much military experience and no longer prize military effectiveness, nor even are capable of judging it. In past wars, soldiers eager to survive would forgive their leaders a multitude of lapses if they believed those leaders knew their business.

http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts...asked_i_answer

[dsummoner]

The change occurred secondary to a broader societal change regarding availability of information.

[zenwalk]

Ricks has a running peeve against civilian authority bowing and scraping to the military. This whole Bush era logic that you give the Generals what they want because they are doing the fighting. If we'd followed that reasoning we'd still be fighting the Civil War with the great great great grandson of McClellan.

There's a Darwinian process that happens in time of war. One steps up to the plate or they don't. The way the system is supposed to work is if you don't step up to the plate, you are replaced. It is the duty of the president to replace commanders when they don't pan out. The goal is not to get troops killed or wounded out of some general's personal need to clock active duty. Petraeus happens to have done a pretty good job under extraordinary circumstances and that needs to be recognized in all this. He shouldn't've resigned.

[dsummoner]

My suspicion is that the resignation had little to do with the cover story.

[zenwalk]

I think Byng is close to it when he talks about it being a set up at the safe house. Chit happens and this was bad. No doubt P has taken it to heart. Find it hard to believe that we are up against any challenging opponents in Libya though.

[Jeebus]

If we'd followed that reasoning we'd still be fighting the Civil War with the great great great grandson of McClellan.

Not likely, McCellan was a general who didn't even want to get into the battle, he'd have sat out the entire war if Lincoln didn't berate him to fight.

There is a famous Lincoln quote (paraphrased) "General, if you are not using the Army you would mind if I borrowed it for a while."

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
October 13, 1862.

MY DEAR SIR--You remember my speaking to you of what I called your over-cautiousness. Are you not over-cautious when you assume that you cannot do what the enemy is constantly doing? Should you not claim to be at least his equal in prowess, and act upon the claim?...

Exclusive of the water line, you are now nearer to Richmond than the enemy is, by the route that you can and he must take. Why can you not reach there before him, unless you admit that he is more than your equal on a march? His route is the arc of a circle, while yours is the chord. The roads are as good on yours as on his...

For a great part of the way you would be practically between the enemy and both WASHINGTON and Richmond, enabling us to spare you the greatest number of troops from here. When at length running for Richmond ahead of him enables him to move this way, if he does so, turn and attack him in rear. But I think he should be engaged long before such a point is reached. It is all easy if our troops march as well as the enemy, and it is unmanly to say they cannot do it. This letter is in no sense an order...

A. Lincoln

http://www.familytales.org/dbDisplay.php?id=ltr_abl410

[Hexexis]

In Defense of Petraeus

Out-freekin'-standing! Same sorta D-fense the generals give the country: lame, limp-wristed, adversarial.

Ricks became the sr. civ. spox for "COIN"; vastly oversold, historically unsound "strategy" that basically encouraged enemy to kill Americans.

Ricks, Petraeus et al.: they've been conning the nation for nigh onta a dozen years, but as long as (per Ricks) the story remains @the level of salacious gossip & intrigue, we can expect decades more of "war" in far away places; necessary, apparently, for our "freedoms."

[Hexexis]

Not likely, McCellan was a general who didn't even want to get into the battle, he'd have sat out the entire war if Lincoln didn't berate him to fight. ...

Amazingly, Bush, Rumsfeld had the same troubles w/ Franks, Wallace, McKiernan (by inference, Petraeus) in Iraq. End of March, 2003, they were threatened w/ being relieved unless they got their butts (well, troops' butts, anyway) into Baghdad. & The "war" was all downhill from there.

[Hexexis]

Ricks has a running peeve against civilian authority bowing and scraping to the military. This whole Bush era logic that you give the Generals what they want ...

Don't know from whence you acquired notion of "Bush era logic," but things were quite the opposite in the early days of OIF: notta peep outta the generals when Cambone, on behalf of Bremer, delivered the ultimatum that the Iraq army was to be disbanded; this despite generals (McKiernan) anticipating aid from Iraqis right then (not 3 yr hence after training). (Find an article about unintended consequences of Goldwater-Nichols, 1986.)

Ricks became the sr. civ. spox for Petraeus's "COIN"; & if you refuse to entertain the notion that something more than scandal, gossip is long rotten in the higher echelons of the Pentagon, maybe you think that altho our generals, admirals, & their troops & Allied forces once beat back TWO imperialist powers bent on world domination in less than 4 yr, playing assorted warlords & angry terrorist types to something less than a draw after 11 yr is a resounding military success.

[Terry K]

The administration had to know about the indiscretion of Petraeus with Broadwater, well in advance of his appointment as CIA Director. In fact, Petratus was subjected to a greater vetting and background check than Obama. To obtain the top secret clearance required to be CIA Director, one has to submit to a grueling polygraph exam where all sorts of questions are asked. It appears Petraeus was appointed by the WH, knowing full well he could be controlled. I find it interesting that his initial testimony supported the theory that the Benghazi attack was connected to the video and then, just after the election, he is outed by charges of adultery.

[overtaxed]

Adultery didn't seem to matter when a former president did it.

[bullmikey]

We've – we being the civilian oversight of the military -been having "troubles" with our generals ever since the Continental Congress found itself becoming exasperated by the demands, complaints, and overall conduct of the Revolutionary War by George Washington. So what? That’s the way the system is supposed to work, with interlocking and oppositional tensions; these serve as a mutual apparatus of checks and balances, usually ensuring that military oversight doesn’t overstep its boundaries and that civilian oversight doesn’t blunder us into actually losing a war.

As for this latest “scandal”…I don’t know. You kind of need a program to follow along and figure out who was doing what to and with whom. The sex part is being played up beyond its importance. There’s something really smelly here that’s being totally ignored by the MSM. I’m going to trust Senator John McCain’s instincts – he’s hardly a right-wing demagogue or card-carrying member of the flaky birther faction of his party – and if his instincts tell him something smells to high heaven then you’d best get yourself fitted up for a gas mask.

[Byng]

The change occurred secondary to a broader societal change regarding availability of information.

Byngo! The problem here is not the fact that Petraeus was having an affair but the fact that two Generals were very obviously acting like a couple of horny teenage kids on Facebook by basically Internet stalking the same woman who at best was given more access to one of our most important military bases than she should have been.

The same goes for the Petraeus mistress/biographer, one minute the FBI states that the case is closed and a few days later they turn up in numbers at this woman's home and spend five hours searching her home and removing boxes containing the Generals personal Archives. This case is far from closed, they are obviously looking for a security breach and any threat to National Security there may have been.

The woman in Florida has had her access to the base revoked and all connections to the military suspended while the investigations are taking place. This all comes down to "availability of information" today when said electronic information was not available in the past.

So I don't think there was any way that Petraeus could have kept his job without it having some negative affect on the CIA and I don't see Allen being appointed Supreme Allied Commander of NATO in a month of Sunday's.

[Byng]

.................I just heard that Petraeus mistress has been stripped (no pun intended) of her Security Clearances! So the plot thickens.