The accounts of Bob Woodward's new book, Obama's Wars, as reported in the Washington Post and The New York Times seem to confirm both the left's and right's worst fears about the process by which the strategy in Afghanistan was chosen.
To the left, the book apparently confirms the suspicion that the president knew better than to escalate a war he knew couldn't be won for political reasons. The book suggests that the president shares their view that the current situation is intractable, that there is no functional local partner -- the book portrays Afghan President Hamid Karzai as suffering from manic depression -- and that the wisest course of action is to withdraw as soon as possible will be confirmed. According to the summaries of the book, Woodward quotes top advisers Lt. Gen. Douglas E. Lute and Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke saying the decision to escalate troops in advance of a 2011 drawdown doesn't "add up" and "can't work." Obama reportedly told Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates that "I'm not doing long-term nation-building. I am not spending a trillion dollars" and that it was in "our national-security interest" to leave as quickly as possible. The ultimate decision is also portrayed as an Obama-esque artificial compromise between Biden's light-footprint strategy and the one the military was offering.
The right will view their impression of Obama as a weak president at odds with the military and uncomfortable with the use of force as vindicated. Obama reportedly "bristled at what he saw as military commanders' attempts to force him into a decision he was not yet comfortable with," namely the addition of more troops. "To ensure that the Pentagon did not reinterpret his decision, Mr. Obama dictated a six-page, single-space “terms sheet” explicitly laying out his troop order and its objectives," according to The New York Times. He became "exasperated" when military officials kept pressing him to alter his ultimate decision.
Then of course, there's this heated conversation with Gen. David Petraeus and Adm. Mike Mullen, and Gates, in which the president reportedly said:
"In 2010, we will not be having a conversation about how to do more. I will not want to hear, 'We're doing fine, Mr. President, but we'd be better if we just do more.' We're not going to be having a conversation about how to change [the mission] . . . unless we're talking about how to draw down faster than anticipated in 2011."
Meanwhile, the news that "Obama has kept in place or expanded 14 intelligence orders, known as findings, issued by his predecessor" that "provide the legal basis for the CIA's worldwide covert operations," sounds ripe for a FOIA request follow-up. I suspect the president's statement about a potential high-casualty terror attack may get the most attention. The president reportedly said, "We can absorb a terrorist attack. We'll do everything we can to prevent it, but even a 9/11, even the biggest attack ever ... we absorbed it and we are stronger." Chances are, rather than being portrayed as a statement of faith in the American people, this will be cast as a sign of complacency.
I'm unsure how this changes the political dynamic on the war, since it mostly confirms what most people skeptical of the war already thought. We're still left with liberals who see the war as no longer worth fighting and a right that, whether it does or not, will sense a political advantage in portraying Obama as too weak to commit to getting the job done. The big difference is that the presidents' critics on both sides will have more ammunition than ever -- we'll see whether it matters that the American people are as ambivalent and exasperated about the war as the president himself.
