 |
| photo by Peter Yang |
Adm. William J. Fallon, the top American commander in the Middle East whose
views on Iran and other issues have seemed to put him at odds with the Bush
administration, is retiring early, the Pentagon said Tuesday afternoon. –
Top
U.S. Commander in Mideast to Retire Early
Another title to this post could have been: Whatever Dick Cheney wants he gets; and Dick wants Iran.
His troubles began with "the
surge."
One of those plans, according to a Centcom officer, involved slashing U.S.
combat forces in Iraq by three-quarters by 2010. In an interview, Fallon disputed
that description but declined to offer details. Nonetheless, his efforts offended
Petraeus’s team, which saw them as unwelcome intrusion on their own long-term
planning. The profoundly different views of the U.S. role in Iraq only exacerbated
the schism between the two men.
One thing the former head of U.S. Central Command wanted to do was
reinforce
Afghanistan.
In the interview on Tuesday, Admiral Fallon also revealed that as American
forces were reduced in Iraq, he hoped to increase deployments to Afghanistan
by adding “a couple of thousand” military trainers to support
Afghan Army and police forces.
However, it looks to me (and others to whom I’ve communiated) that the real
rub was Fallon’s resistance to Bush-Cheney’s ultimate plans having to do with
Iran. An article in Esquire magazine, "The
Man Between War and Peace", evidently didn’t go down so well. The opening
salvo:
If, in the dying light of the Bush administration, we go to war with Iran,
it’ll all come down to one man. If we do not go to war with Iran, it’ll come
down to the same man. He is that rarest of creatures in the Bush universe:
the good cop on Iran, and a man of strategic brilliance. His name is William
Fallon, although all of his friends call him "Fox," which was his
fighter-pilot call sign decades ago. Forty years into a military career that
has seen this admiral rule over America’s two most important combatant commands,
Pacific Command and now United States Central Command, it’s impossible to
make this guy–as he likes to say–"nervous in the service." Past
American governments have used saber rattling as a useful tactic to get some
bad actor on the world stage to fall in line. This government hasn’t mastered
that kind of subtlety. When Dick Cheney has rattled his saber, it has generally
meant that he intends to use it. And in spite of recent war spasms aimed at
Iran from this sclerotic administration, Fallon is in no hurry to
pick up any campaign medals for Iran. And therein lies the rub for the hard-liners
led by Cheney. Army General David Petraeus, commanding America’s
forces in Iraq, may say, "You cannot win in Iraq solely in Iraq,"
but Fox Fallon is Petraeus’s boss, and he is the commander of United States
Central Command, and Fallon doesn’t extend Petraeus’s logic to mean war against
Iran. … ..
Dick Cheney, has any one man screwed up our foreign policy and America’s standing
in the world more than the vice president?
Don’t be confused. This isn’t about "the surge" anymore, or Afghanistan.
Fallon’s resignation is about Iran. Beware.
Comments are closed.