A reader living in Kabul sent me a long, very thoughtful email about the changeover between General McKiernan and General McChrystal. He’s quite deeply worried that this portends the creation of an MNC-A, an Afghan version of the Multi-National Corps, Iraq, in both command structure and intent (several people have speculated this is why a new general has been sent to Afghanistan, and why McChrystal has been promoted).
Indeed, the big concern he raised is whether or not the war is being “Americanized.” It is certainly a growing theme, as an American takes over command in Kandahar and RC-South is flooded with U.S. troops (Rajiv Chandrasekaran, for example, has filed multiple reports to this effect). The reader said that McKiernan was adamant about limiting the American footprint in ISAF so that it’s not seen as a U.S. puppet—and that, rather than being “too conventional” as everyone from Andrew Exum to Ralph Peters has alleged, he was deeply focused on the non-kinetic side of the fight, and thought improving peoples’ lives was the key to winning the war, not just killing bad guys.
His take tracks closely with my experience in Afghanistan earlier this year, though I never set foot in Kabul or talked to a General Officer. And this is where the concern comes into play: none of this is necessarily a reflection on McChrystal, but the way in which this change of command has taken place: it kills the career of a man who has made no screw ups and has served with distinction, and inserts a new level of American administration outside the normal ISAF channels. As the reader put it, “the mission of ISAF is broader than just to exact revenge on terrorists and their supporters for September 11 or even to remove Afghanistan’s capability of supporting terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda.”
The way McChrystal’s promotion has been handled is sparking worry in NATO countries that they are going to be pushed aside, or even worse, stepped on by SOF units going after bad guys. Justified or not, it is a legitimate worry, since the impression is that we are simply replicating the command structure and style our leaders feel worked in Iraq…whether that is appropriate for Afghanistan is unclear.
The flip side of this, of course, is that the ISAF chain of command is a hot mess. Coordination is extremely difficult, and the national caveats have posed problems for years. It is possible that imposing a stronger command will improve things… but it is just as possible that our NATO partners, who, lest we believe Fox News actually do contribute substantially to the fight, will get frustrated at the seizure of power and simply go home.
Patience is already wearing thin in Germany, Canada, Britain, the Netherlands, and even France. For better or for worse, that must be a concern if the U.S. wants to avoid being painted as just another USSR replacement operating in the area. General McChrystal may very well be the single greatest contribution to this war since the invention of the daisy cutter, but everyone from President Obama through General Petraeus and Adm. Mullen have handled his promotion in an absolutely terrible, humiliating way.
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The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the blog post From the Front: 06/05/2009 News and Personal dispatches from the front and the home front.
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