Change In Command In Afghanistan

Gen. David McKiernan, who was less than one year into an 18-24 month command tour, was basically fired by Secretary Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mullen.

The change is aimed at "getting fresh thinking, fresh eyes on the problem," Gates told a Pentagon news conference.

The move comes as more than 21,000 additional U.S. forces begin to arrive in Afghanistan, dispatched by Obama to confront the Taliban more forcefully this spring and summer.

Replacing McKiernan will be Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who has had a top administrative job at the Joint Chiefs of Staff for less than a year. He is a former commander of the Joint Special Operations Command.

McKiernan held the command in Afghanistan for about 11 months.

Gates recommended to Obama that McChrystal be nominated for the top job and that Lt. Gen. David M. Rodriguez be McChrystal's deputy. He urged the Senate to confirm the two quickly.

Possibly the most awesome part of this is that McChrystal headed the the Joint Special Operations Command which crazy Seymour Hersh said was nothing more than the home of Dick Cheney's super secret assassination teams.

Expect lots more shortly on why McKiernan was fired and what Gates and McMullen expect out of McChrystal.

One name I didn't hear mentioned in the press conference (though I missed some of it) was David Petraeus. McKiernan took over in Afghanistan last summer, Petraeus took over CentCom last fall. I'm pretty much of the, "whatever Petraeus wants, Petraeus should get" school, so if this change reflects his thinking, it's likely a good thing.

I should note one possible reason Petraeus wasn't invoked here is because he wanted McKiernan to stay. In which case applying my "whatever Petraeus wants, Petraeus should get" rule, this is bad.

As you can see in the comments, there are a lot of reasons this may have happened. Time will tell.

posted by DrewM. at 01:37 PM

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