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Good to see a New York Times story deal forthrightly with the question of Gen. Petraeus in domestic politics. But I suspect this is the graf that best sums up where he is with the Obama administration, and in particular with the defense secretary whom he has allied with since becoming Iraq commander:
How much General Petraeus’s muted voice will affect Mr. Obama’s decision on the war is unclear, but people close to him say that stifling himself in public could give him greater credibility to influence the debate from within. Others say that his biggest influence may simply be as part of a team of military advisers, including General McChrystal and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Yes, clearly there’s a debilitating breakdown in civilian control of the military. Will the Constitution and the Republic ever recover from such rapacious military intrusion into domestic politics?
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You’re underplaying this stuff all of a sudden. Not sure exactly what you’re looking at (you’re obviously closer to the action) — and I’ll grant people are now being brought into line. But you seem to mock the notion that it appeared some people seemed to be forgetting who was going to be calling this shot, and on what sequence. That’s tantamount to mocking people for having eyes to see and using them. I don’t think there’s a question that there was tension, largely due to McChrystal’s inexperience in the spotlight as a player in policy, as opposed to as a tactician.
I’m commenting here because this seems to be where you started on this angle. You go even harder on the rift-is-a-myth theme in subsequent post on and obviously in the piece — I’ve got more to say about that as well, so I’ll say it there.