'You're Not Accountable, Jack'

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
Washington Post
September 9, 2008
Pg. 1
The War Within: The Shadow General

How a Retired Officer Gained Influence at the White House and in Baghdad
By Bob Woodward, Washington Post Staff Writer
Retired Army Gen. Jack Keane came to the White House on Thursday, Sept. 13, 2007, to deliver a strong and sober message. The military chain of command, he told Vice President Cheney, wasn't on the same page as the current U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus. The tension threatened to undermine Petraeus's chances of continued success, Keane said.
Keane, a former vice chief of the Army, was 63, 6-foot-3 and 240 pounds, with a boxer's face framed by tightly cropped hair. As far as Cheney was concerned, Keane was outstanding -- an experienced soldier who had maintained great Pentagon contacts, had no ax to grind and had been a mentor to Petraeus. Keane was all meat and potatoes; he didn't inflate expectations or waste Cheney's time.
By the late summer of 2007, Keane had established an unusual back-channel relationship with the president and vice president, a kind of shadow general advising them on the Iraq war. This September visit was the fifth back-channel briefing that Keane had given the vice president that year.
As Keane was laying out his view, President Bush walked in.
"I know you're talking to Dave," Bush said to Keane. "I know that the Joint Chiefs and the Pentagon have some concerns." The JCS had not favored the surge of 30,000 troops that Bush had decided was essential to quell the escalating violence in Iraq; the chiefs were deeply worried that the surge left no strategic reserve for an unexpected crisis elsewhere.
Keane repeated what he had just told Cheney: The JCS and Adm. William J. Fallon, Petraeus's boss at Central Command, were insisting on studies and reports to justify even the smallest request for more resources for Iraq. Their persistent pressure, pushing Petraeus for a faster drawdown, was taking its toll.
"There is very little preparation," Keane said, "for somebody who grows up in a military culture to have an unsupportive chain of command above you and still be succeeding. You normally get fired." The result, he said, is that Petraeus "starts to look for ways to get rid of this pressure, which means some kind of accommodation."
Bush said he wanted Keane to deliver a personal message to Petraeus from his commander-in-chief. After Bush laid out his thoughts, Keane went to the large West Wing lobby, sat among the couches and chairs and wrote out the president's words.
Then he called Petraeus and said they had to meet.
* * *
On Saturday, Sept. 15, Keane went to Quarters 12-A at Fort Myer in Arlington, where Petraeus and his wife, Holly, maintained Army housing while he was stationed in Iraq. Ever since Petraeus had taken over as the Iraq commander, Keane had been making regular visits to Baghdad to see his protégé. Upon his return to Washington, Keane would come to the White House or the vice president's residence, establishing a line of communication -- Petraeus to Keane to Cheney and Bush -- around the official chain of command.
Earlier in the week, Petraeus had testified before Congress. After two days in the national spotlight -- cautiously reporting progress in the war but warning that conditions were "fragile and reversible" -- he was about to head back to Baghdad.
The two men sat alone. Keane took out the piece of paper and read the president's message, verbatim, aloud to Petraeus:
"I respect the chain of command. I know that the Joint Chiefs and the Pentagon have some concerns. One is about the Army and Marine Corps and the impact of the war on them. And the second is about other contingencies and the lack of strategic response to those contingencies.
"I want Dave to know that I want him to win. That's the mission. He will have as much force as he needs for as long as he needs it.
"When he feels he wants to make further reductions, he should only make those reductions based on the conditions in Iraq that he believes justify those reductions. These two concerns that we are discussing back here in Washington -- about contingency operations and the needs of the Army and the Marine Corps -- they are not your concerns. They are my concerns.
"I do not want to change the strategy until the strategy has succeeded. I waited over three years for a successful strategy. And I'm not giving up on it prematurely. I am not reducing further unless you are convinced that we should reduce further."
It was a message of total support. No ground commander could ask for more. That Bush had sent it through this back channel, or even at all, revealed the depth and intensity of disagreements between the president and the military establishment in Washington.
After hearing the president's message, Petraeus told Keane, "I wish he'd tell CentCom and the Pentagon that." These were the people he had to deal with every day, and they had a very different perspective.
National security adviser Steven J. Hadley and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates did not know of the president's back-channel contact with Petraeus. When I asked the president in May 2008 about his message, Bush explained why he had felt a need to send it.
"I just want Dave to know that I want to win," he said. "And whatever he needs, obviously within capabilities, he'll have. I don't want my commander to think that they're dealing with a president who's so overly concerned about the latest Gallup poll or politics that he is worried about making a decision or recommendation that will make me feel uncomfortable."
 
I have been reading this on Washington Post Online. It really is a great series of articles, I want to read the book now. I thought at first that it would just be another Bush bashing, but it really isnt.
 
Seems to me that Bush, Cheney AND Patreus are violating the chain of command. IF the president wants something said to a commander, send it through the chain of command. This back door bullsh*t is the wrong answer. If the president is having trouble with the joint chiefs, then replace them. If Patreus is having trouble with his bosses, there are ways to get your problems heard. Sometimes you are just told to shutup and soldier, Soldier. Chain of Command is one of the first things that the teach you in basic training.
 
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