I’m unaccustomed to thinking of Eliot Cohen as a hack, but this op-ed is pure hackwork. Any number of valid critiques of the Obama administration’s decisionmaking on Afghanistan/Pakistan are available for the making, particularly after reading Obama’s Wars. But it’s cheap to simply imagine how Karzai, Ahmadinejad, Netanyahu, the father of a Marine, Mullah Omar and a one-star staff officer could respond. Worse, a casual reader would be forgiven for thinking Cohen, a connected guy, collected these quotes for real.

Perhaps this is a writing exercise gone wrong. I’ve been impressed with Cohen’s work, especially Supreme Command, so it’s all the more surprising that he’d produce something so lazy. I’d genuinely like to read a real Cohen review of Obama’s Wars.