General Stanley McChrystal’s acerbic comments about his colleagues lifts the lid on the dirty war being fought in Afghanistan among America’s leadership. The conflict may be less bloody than combat with the Taleban but the sniping, back-stabbing and character assassination is every bit as nasty.
At the heart of the struggle is the underlying tension between the men in uniform and the civilians. When General McChrystal was brought in to run the new counter-insurgency campaign he needed a “Ryan Crocker” — the former US ambassador to Baghdad whose partnership with General David Petraeus was key to turning around the campaign in Iraq.
The politics in Kabul proved far more complicated. From the outset he had an uneasy relationship with President Obama, who inherited the war and wanted a way out — in contrast to the Bush Administration which gave the Pentagon carte blanche.
Mr Obama’s delay in agreeing to a troop surge last year led to frustration among the military command in Kabul. The Vice-President Joe Biden’s open challenge to the counter-insurgency strategy — he prefers a lighter force and more reliance on unmanned drones — exposed cracks in the mission.
Karl Eikenberry, the US ambassador to Kabul and the former general commanding US forces, proved an unwilling partner. He also has voiced disagreement with the strategy. “Eikenberry thought he should be running the show,” said one Kabul diplomat. “The relationship between the two men is poisonous”.
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For that reason Mark Sedwill, the former British ambassador was appointed Nato’s civilian chief. He now sits beside General McChrystal in Nato headquarters, eclipsing Mr Eikenberry’s role.
The situation is further complicated by Richard Holbrooke, the US special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, who has succeeded in upsetting Americans and Afghans, civilians and soldiers alike. His British counterpart Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, another former ambassador to Kabul, resigned his post recently after a strained relationship with Mr Holbrooke and Mr Sedwill.
General McChrystal has now been recalled to Washington for a likely dressing down. The White House knows that if he is forced out of his post the entire Afghan strategy could go with him. If he stays, he will be greatly weakened by the crisis. Afghans are past masters at spotting weaknesses in their enemies.
Ultimately war is a zero-sum game. If the current military surge and counter-insurgency strategy works in Afghanistan, this spat will be lost in the footnotes of history and General McChrystal will be remembered as the man who saved the war.
If it fails, General McChrystal will have to take the rap for the losing the war on the battlefield and at home.