This is a very bad idea:
The Army has summoned the top U.S. commander in Iraq back to Washington to preside over a board that will pick some of the next generation of Army leaders, an unusual decision that officials say represents a vote of confidence in Gen. David H. Petraeus's conduct of the war, as well as the Army counterinsurgency doctrine he helped rewrite.
The Army has long been criticized for rewarding conventional military thinking and experience in traditional combat operations, and current and former defense officials have pointed to Petraeus's involvement in the promotion board process this month as a sign of the Army's commitment to encouraging innovation and rewarding skills beyond the battlefield. -- WashingtonPost.com
I will agree that the selection process for Generals is broken, in fact, it sucks. The military loses a lot of good people because they don't want to even try.
But all this is going to do is allow Petraeus to select either A. Overly political self serving people like himself. Or B. Pick weak willed boot-lickers who support Dave Petraeus.
Lets not pretend this guy is skilled at either being a general or picking them. He abandoned Tel Afar to the tribes long before they were ready, it lead to a small scale civil war fueled by weapons he handed out to anyone who wanted one. Speaking of weapons, it was on his watch that almost 200,000 weapons went missing, including large amounts of ammunition. Don't contribute the current reduction in violence to the surge, besides the fact that it wasn't his strategy anyway it came out of the Whitehouse. Which is probably where the idea to have Generalissimo Petraeus decide all matters military came from too. No, the surge is not responsible for the current reduction in KIA (more on that later.) And we have gone over the unnecessary COIN manual rewrite. Putting this guy in charge is just more bad news for the officer corp.
This is an unprecedented and unusual move from the pentagon and, quite possibly, a disaster for military. Imagine a Pentagon packed with Petraeus loving generals when he runs for President, which he is rumored to be exploring.
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