WSJ for Gates
Friday, October 31, 2008 at 2:34AM ARTICLE: Boots on the Ground or Weapons in the Sky?, By AUGUST COLE and YOCHI J. DREAZEN, Wall Street Journal, OCTOBER 30, 2008
Excellent little piece from Cole and Dreazen, who, with Jaffe's book-related absence, are clearly the duo-cream of the crop on defense at WSJ (Jaffe makes it a trio), so having them together in a single piece is a real treat.
The kicker is their end-of-article analysis that says, You give Gates one more year in position and this Leviathan-v-SysAdmin fight could well be settled in the favor of the SysAdmin.
To me, that's the #1 reason to argue and argue vehemently that Obama keep Gates on as a transitional legacy figure during two wars.
It's sort of a gutsy argument for two industry journalists to make openly, and I was surprised to see it out there in the open. I've made arguments just short of that (I don't think I've ever said "keep him" for explicitly that reason, although I've been open in the reason for my praise of Gates), so I really tip my hat to both of them for making that argument openly in print.
Pretty damn cool, actually.
(Thanks: Dean Wakeham)
Reader Comments (1)
I am currently reading The Devil We Know by Robert Baer, which I find to be avery interesting look at Iran, and how they are planning on using their successful experience in guerilla warfare in Lebanon, to take over Iraq, and other countries in the Middle East. Has anyone else read this book? I am half way through, and have not gotten to the perscription yet, and am wondering what the perscription for Iran will be, because understanding their strategic goals doesn't appear to be as easy as make them a regional hegemon in the Middle East and hold them accountable, because it appears more that should tehy control the Middle East, they control a lot of oil, which gives them soft power to wield on the global scale.