Federal Judiciary

The Larger Problems -- By: Jim Talent

General McChrystal had to go. Whatever his virtues as a strategist and commander, the Rolling Stone interview fatally compromised his ability to represent the United States in dealing with allies and to act within the circle of people who must make decisions in Afghanistan. If he had been a subordinate commander, it might have been different, but he wasn?t. It was as simple as that.

Yet there are, as always, broader issues. The whole episode shows a lack of coherence and even civility within the administration. It is certainly not uncommon for factions to form around a president as strong-minded people vie for influence over policy. But the extent of the infighting -- the vicious and personal nature of it -- reflects very badly on President Obama?s leadership. After all, this is supposed to be a team, and the members of a team should know that if they can not be friends, they must at least be responsible adults.

The president has let the situation get out of control, and he now must take effective steps to stop the infighting, not just for the sake of the war in Afghanistan, but to show his whole administration that he will not tolerate the kind of maneuvering that has occurred. Replacing General McChrystal with David Petraeus was a good first step, but more will be needed. General Petraeus is not a miracle worker. He can not be successful unless the president creates greater confidence within his own team about the decisions which the president has himself made.

It?s another test, not of the president?s policy, but of his competence as a leader. Given Mr. Obama?s lack of experience as an executive, and his past performance in crises such as the oil spill, it is reasonable for those of us who support the effort in Afghanistan to worry that he will not be up to the job.

And finally, there is one even broader issue that no one is talking about. Volumes have been written, and appropriately so, about the difficulty of counterinsurgency wars such as the one America is prosecuting in Afghanistan. Some in Washington believe that we should abandon the war -- though they don?t explain how to withdraw, how to deal with the fallout from defeat, or what to do if, as is likely, the terrorists reconstitute their safe havens in Afghanistan once the United States leaves. Many others believe that adjustments in tactics, or better communications, or changes in diplomacy, will increase the likelihood of success. But what everyone agrees on is that the war is straining the resources of the military, and that the whole effort would be much easier if America had a bigger Army.

That would permit the president to put more troops into Afghanistan. The first requirement for success in counterinsurgency is security throughout the entire contested area, and that requires well-trained troops whose sustained presence assures civilians that they can cooperate with coalition forces without fear of reprisal.

Yes, as everyone is writing now, it would help to have an Afghan government that the people trust and respect. But even if President Karzai were a better man, it?s asking a lot of local Afghan leaders to expect them to support their government when their villages are undefended against terrorists. How many Americans would testify against organized-crime figures if the FBI could not protect them?

When America fought Desert Storm, the active-duty Army had 18 divisions, or about 800,000 soldiers. Then, in the early 1990s, that figure was reduced to ten undermanned divisions, with an end strength of fewer than 500,000 men, in order to save money. The thinking then was that for the foreseeable future, the United States would not need to put large numbers of ?boots on the ground? for sustained periods. That was two years before the Bosnian conflict and less than ten years before the Iraqi and Afghanistan operations, both of which -- everyone now agrees -- require, first and foremost, the presence of ?boots on the ground? in large numbers for a long time.

Military planning is about giving presidents options. A larger Army would have given President Bush the option of continuing to prosecute the Afghan operation vigorously even while the mission in Iraq was at its peak. A bigger Army now would give President Obama the option of spreading the blanket of American security much more broadly across Afghanistan. Either option might plausibly have shortened both the Iraqi and Afghan wars. At minimum, a bigger Army would ensure that the United States could sustain its other obligations in places like Korea, and would provide a larger rotational base so that the same units didn?t have to go to Iraq and Afghanistan for numerous tours of duty.

How many lives would have been spared if the wars had been shorter because the Army was bigger? How many hundreds of billions of dollars are being spent each year because in the past our planners wanted to save a fraction of that sum? How much global risk is America running because so much of its strength is committed in one place?

There is a lesson here. Decisions being made now will dictate the kind of military America has ten years from now. The administration wants to save money on the military; that is one area where they don?t support large spending increases. Budgetary concerns are tending to drive planning. The Pentagon is underrating the likely need for naval and air power in the future, at the same time as -- to take one example -- China is rearming far ahead of predictions. The Navy is smaller than it has been since 1916. The Air Force inventory is, on average, 25 years old. The Army is bracing for budget cuts once the operations in Afghanistan end.

In short, everyone in authority is focused on short-term budgetary and political concerns rather than strategic reality. The cost of that shortsightedness will eventually be paid -- but not by the political officials who now have the authority. It will be paid by the men and women of America?s military, by their families, and by an American public that increasingly, and rightly, suspects that the government is failing to defend their country.

-- Jim Talent represented Missouri in the U.S. House of Representatives (1993-2001) and the U.S. Senate (2002-2007).  He is a distinguished fellow at the Heritage Foundation and serves as the honorary chair of the American Freedom and Enterprise Foundation.

Full post as published by Bench Memos - National Review Online on June 25, 2010 (boomark / email).