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| McChrystal’s ‘victory’ dance |
| Dana Milbank |
| “Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be.” -- Winston Churchill, 1940
“It could be similar to politics, where you defeat the other party in an election but you don’t wipe them out.”
-- Gen. Stanley McChrystal on Tuesday, explaining what it means to “defeat” the Taliban
Before arriving in Afghanistan on Tuesday. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he would tell U.S. soldiers there that “we are in this thing to win.”
That formulation (in addition to echoing Hillary Rodham Clinton’s “I’m in to win” presidential campaign theme) was striking because it was very different from what Gates’s top general in the Afghanistan war, Stanley McChrystal, was saying on the very same day. Where Gates was Churchillian, McChrystal, testifying before a pair of congressional committees, was a one-man army of qualifiers.
“If it’s a war of necessity, then I would think, by definition, we have to win it,” supposed Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.).
“I believe it’s important that we be successful,” McChrystal clarified.
Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.) was still not clear. “We do intend to defeat the Taliban?”
“Sir, the military term, in fact, without parsing that too tightly, we -- we intend to prevent them from doing what they want to do,” McChrystal replied.
Rep. John Kline (R-Minn.) asked for further clarification of the war aim: “Is that to win?”
“I believe it’s to let the Afghan people win,” the general hedged.
Clearly McChrystal was in a no-win situation. He managed to get through three hours of testimony before the House Armed Services Committee on Tuesday morning and four hours more before the Senate Armed Services Committee in the afternoon without once uttering the word “victory.”
This careful linguistic dance was typical of McChrystal’s long-awaited testimony before Congress. He proved himself to be a capable technocrat, if not necessarily an inspiring war leader. When Gen. David Petraeus came before Congress under similar circumstances two years ago to defend the “surge” in Iraq, he became an instant hero on Capitol Hill. But McChrystal, with his too-big reading glasses and his talk of risk mitigation, came across as more careful and less charismatic.
We shall fight on the beaches? No. “We will remain partnered with the Afghan security forces in a supporting role to consolidate and solidify their gains.” We shall fight on the landing grounds? Not exactly. “We may demonstrate progress towards measurable objectives,” McChrystal said.
It’s appropriate that McChrystal’s performance was more Bill Kristol than Billy Crystal. Still, the general’s testimony on Capitol Hill was a letdown. Lawmakers have for months demanded his appearance as he showed up instead on “60 Minutes” and at a London think tank, where he disagreed publicly with Vice President Biden. His leaked request for as many as 80,000 troops helped to build pressure on President Obama to escalate the war in Afghanistan.
But in the flesh, McChrystal was loyal to his civilian masters, departing from the policy only when he said of Obama’s July 2011 date to begin a pullout: “I don’t believe that is a deadline at all.”
Describing his hopes for victory, the general was a study in circumspection. Defeating al-Qaeda is a “core goal,” he said, but when it comes to the Taliban, he said, the aim is merely to “disrupt and degrade.”
In arriving at that modest goal, the general said, the brass had a lengthy debate over what “defeat” means. “In military terms, defeat actually means render an enemy incapable of accomplishing his mission,” he explained. It “does not mean that you eradicate that enemy down to the last individual.” The goal, he added, is to “lower their capacity.”
Kline was puzzled. “Are we asking them to go over and win?” he asked of the 30,000 additional troops.
“We are asking them to go over and be on the winning team,” McChrystal parried, “and the reason I parse this is because the Afghans are the ultimate winners here.”
“I don’t understand why we’re parsing these words ‘success’ and ‘victory’ and ‘win,’ Kline protested. “Is there some guidance from somewhere to all of you that says we can’t use the words ‘win’ or ‘victory’?”
McChrystal must have taken this complaint to heart. After lunch, when he reprised his testimony for the Senate Armed Services Committee, he finally found his winning attitude.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) cited Gates’s “in this thing to win” comment and asked McChrystal: “Do you agree with this statement?”
“I agree with the secretary’s statement. We are in it to win,” McChrystal replied. The dam was broken, and the “w” word poured out. “The most important thing we will have done by the summer of 2011 is convince the majority of the Afghan people that in fact, we are going to win. We and the Afghan government are going to win. . . . I believe this force wants to win.”
It was a small victory -- for declarative sentences.
Washinton Post |
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