Mistaken

We’ve accused Obama of dithering. His fans claim we confuse dithering with prudence. They are mistaken. Obama does not demonstrate prudence but a lack of judgement.

Obama’s delay has protracted and complicated the campaign; it has reduced McChrystal’s ability to prepare for and conduct an effective operation next year.

Obama listed his goals regarding this conflict in a Mar/09 speech. McChrystal took command in June. Obama expected McChrystal to adhere to those goals and make progress by the summer of 2010. That is exactly what McChrystal set out to do. It is Obama who has not done his part. He won’t allow McChrystal to meet his, Obama’s, own deadline!

Where would we be today if BO had acted on McChrystal’s recommendations? From Fred Kagan, director of the Critical Threats Project at AEI, the following: "We would already have begun...
* Expanding the Afghan National Security Forces as rapidly as possible toward the goal of 400,000 total, a figure agreed-upon by the Afghan Ministers of Defense and Interior and by the U.S. military's own reviews;
* Preparing infrastructure within Afghanistan and the region to accommodate a large and rapid surge of U.S. forces;
* Sending more forces immediately to support ongoing operations in Helmand;
* Issuing orders to deploy all of the forces McChrystal requested as rapidly as possible.

Ordering the most rapid possible expansion of the ANSF should have required no discussion. Expanding Afghan forces has been a core principle of almost every plan the president has considered seriously. Indeed, it was one of the primary recommendations of the policy review conducted this spring. And it is also...something that could have been turned off with little harm if a few months of review changed the president's mind."

Get it?

Folks! All of this would have been underway, and key - all could have been begun and the WH would still have the luxury of a thoughtful review. It takes months to prepare and deploy a large combat unit. But they can’t get ready without orders. The prepare-to-deploy order, on the other hand, can be reversed - units can cancel movement plans, or return home more readily than they can start deploying without warning. There is no downside. The lag effect. Simple. To all but BO.

The failure of this adm then is that it has refused to buy time for its commander. Anyone of us would have known better. Hmmmm.

Is there something more than just lack of judgement, something in the very makeup of the man that is not quite right? We wonder. Obama’s background is narrow, confined to the grievance industry. There’s nothing robust about the guy. Where are the great enthusiasms for his country? Actually, he doesn’t seem very American to us. We feel he doesn’t understand Americans, nor, as it has become abundantly clear, American history. Ah, but we wander... this all remains the stuff of another blog.

Robert Craven