Petraeus vs. the Mafia

[katty]

by Peter Galbraith


more:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-06-24/david-petraeus-cant-win-in-afghanistan-because-of-hamid-karzai/?cid=hp:beastoriginalsR1

The president did well in choosing Stanley McChrystal’s successor, but David Petraeus can’t succeed in Afghanistan without a credible partner. Former U.N. official Peter Galbraith on the general’s Karzai problem.

I have sympathy for General Stanley McChrystal, with whom I worked during the relatively brief time that our tenures in Afghanistan overlapped. He was hard-working and determined. Recognizing that non-combatant deaths brought new recruits to the Taliban, he insisted on zero civilian casualties, with some success. Although there are more NATO troops in Afghanistan conducting more missions than ever before, non-combatant deaths are down.

Still, President Obama was right to fire McChrystal, even if it was stretch to suggest that his conduct raised constitutional issues of civilian control over the military. General McChrystal was not insubordinate but he—and much more his staff—were disrespectful, albeit mostly in circumstances where they clearly did not expect to be quoted. If you want to have a vinous dinner with your staff in Paris, don’t bring along a reporter.

President Hamid Karzai heads a government ranked the second-most corrupt in the world, where power rests with thousands of warlords, power brokers, and militiamen.