Petraeus Comments More in Line with Obama

During the last two presidential debates, McCain spent considerable time pointing out his belief that Obama's stance on pursuing diplomatic talks with America's foreign enemies is dangerous. In support of his belief, he points to his own war experience and comments supposedly made by General Petraeus, who is respected and admired for his success in overseeing the military surge in Iraq.

Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent reports that recent comments by Petraeus, however, actually better support Obama's policy stances than McCain's.

Regarding the effectiveness of another surge in Afghanistan, Ackerman reported the following,

Unbidden, Petraeus discussed whether his strategy in Iraq — protecting the population while cleaving apart the insurgency through reconciliation efforts to crush the remaining hard-core enemies — could also work in Afghanistan. The question has particular salience as Petraeus takes over U.S. Central Command, which will put him at the helm of all U.S. troops in the Middle East and South Asia, thereby giving him a large role in the Afghanistan war.

“Some of the concepts used in Iraq are transplantable [to Afghanistan] while others perhaps are not,” he said. “Every situation is unique.”

Petraeus pointed to efforts by Hamid Karzai’s government to negotiate a deal with the Taliban that would potentially bring some Taliban members back to power, saying that if they are “willing to reconcile,” it would be “a positive step.”

In saying that, Petraeus implicitly allied with U.S. Army Gen. David McKiernan, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan. Last week, McKiernan rejected the idea of replicating the blend of counterinsurgency strategy employed in Iraq. “The word that I don’t use in Afghanistan is the word ’surge,’” McKiernan said, opting against recruiting Pashtun tribal fighters to supplement Afghan security forces against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. “There are countless other differences between Iraq and Afghanistan,” he added.

McCain, however, has argued that the Afghanistan war is ripe for a direct replication of Petraeus’ Iraq strategy of population-centric counterinsurgency. “Sen. Obama calls for more troops,” McCain said in the Sept. 26 debate, “but what he doesn’t understand, it’s got to be a new strategy, the same strategy that he condemned in Iraq. It’s going to have to be employed in Afghanistan.”

McCain qualified that statement in Tuesday’s debate, but clung to it while discussing Afghanistan and Pakistan. “Gen. Petraeus had a strategy,” McCain said, “the same strategy — very, very different, because of the conditions and the situation — but the same fundamental strategy that succeeded in Iraq. And that is to get the support of the people.”

Regarding the effectiveness of diplomatic talks favored by Obama and derided by McCain, Ackerman reports the following,

Petraeus also came out unambiguously in his talk at Heritage for opening communications with America’s adversaries, a position McCain is attacking Obama for endorsing. Citing his Iraq experience, Petraeus said, “You have to talk to enemies.” He added that it was necessary to have a particular goal for discussion and to perform advance work to understand the motivations of his interlocutors.

All that was the subject of one of the most contentious tussles between McCain and Obama in the first presidential debate, with Obama contending that his intent to negotiate with foreign adversaries without “precondition” did not mean that he would neglect diplomatic “preparation.”

McCain, apparently perceiving an opportunity for attack, Tuesday again used Obama’s comments to attack his judgment. “Sen. Obama, without precondition, wants to sit down and negotiate with them, without preconditions,” McCain said, referring to Iran.

Yet Petraeus emphasized throughout his lecture that reaching out to insurgent groups — some “with our blood on their hands,” he said — was necessary to the ultimate goal of turning them against irreconcilable enemies like Al Qaeda in Iraq.

Ilan Goldenberg of Democracy Arsenal summarizes the implications of the Petraeus comments succinctly when he stated, "...General Petraeus completely contradicted many of John McCain's arguments about Iraq and Afghanistan. This wouldn't be so important if McCain didn't consistently cite Petraeus agreeing with him as a justification or his policies. To a lesser extent McCain is using the same tactic that President Bush used in 2007 trying to take his own foreign policy philosophy and ascribe to a General who is seen as more credible on these issues. So when Petraeus contradicts him on Afghanistan, Pakistan and how we should deal with our enemies it's a big deal."