For results to come in from Indiana and North Carolina, check out Spencer Ackerman interviewing David Petraeus.
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While You Wait
06 May 2008 05:46 pm
Comments (10)
Seriously pathetic interview.
Ackerman veers from lauding Petraeus' alleged "accomplishments" to avoiding any serious criticism or event comment on the disingenuousness of many of Petraeus' comments in the interview.
Petraeus' notion that "the big movements" back Maliki is completely wrong by any assessment of Sadr's movement that I've seen, for example. Sadr has literally millions of poor Shia Iraqi supporting him, if not necessarily his militia.
Still less are there any assessments of Petraeus' actual COIN theories, let alone applications in Iraq - such as the use of major air power in urban situations with the concomitant high "collateral damage" (read: war crimes on civilians). Neither is there any comparison of US COIN theory with the theories of Fourth Generation War, which go considerably beyond COIN notions and specifically apply to Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.
All in all, a poor interview. Ackerman is clueless, and I suspect, a hawk, no matter what he pretends.
An hourlong interview and all we got was that article? Lame.
Scrap the article and just give me a transcript of the interview.
The crux, I think is at the close: "But, he concluded . . . , you don't get to pick your wars. Sometimes they are thrust upon you." The whole point is not how to do COIN but whether to get into a situation where it is required. Or more precisely, having blundered into such a situation whether to stay there for the long haul required. Gen. Petraeus has nothing to tell us on that score, except how long and hard and costly making that choice would be. But it is not under our form of government his choice.
Not really an interview with Petraeus, is it? More like "Spencer Ackerman's tedious Iraq punditry sprinkled here and there with a few truncated quotes from Petraeus." Where's the interview transcript--complete and unedited?
Waste. Of. Time.
I gotta agree with Mixner and Al. Would much rather have seen a straight-up interview transcript focusing on questions designed to make Petraeus uncomfortable or maybe even a little defensive. Instead we get something close to a puff piece. Waste of an opportunity, and less than I'd expect from Ackerman.
What you are missing is that Petraeus is a servant in the constitutional process. He is doing his damndest to make chicken salad from chicken shit. That is his job. He doesn't pick the wars. He just tries to win them.
Basically a waste of an interview, as Al and Mixner noted, but hopefully this refutes the lefty meme we've seen in comments on this blog that Petraeus's is necessarily on the right politically because he has granted interviews to journalists on the right.
Yeah, right, Fred, Petraeus is voting Obama...
Nitwit.
Comments closed May 20, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
I thought it was good. I will read the first four to see what else he has to say.
Posted by danceswithgoats | May 6, 2008 6:14 PM