Two wars pose challenge for Obama: US official

MILPLEX

Pentagon well-prepared for transition to Obama team: official
Preparations to hand over the Pentagon to president-elect Barack Obama are well under way at the Pentagon and much farther along than in some previous transitions, a US official said on Thursday. Defense Secretary Robert Gates began efforts to prepare for a handover to a new administration as early as last year, when he asked a bipartisan policy board of senior figures to offer advice on the transfer, said Eric Edelman, undersecretary of defense for policy. Mindful that a new president would be taking over with US troops in combat in both Iraq and Afghanistan -- the first wartime presidential transition in 40 years -- Gates in August issued orders for the Defense Department to start thorough preparations for the handover, he said. "The secretary is very committed to making this a smooth and useful transition," Edelman told reporters on Thursday. Having been involved in several transitions since the 1980s, Edelman said the effort was much more advanced than when George Bush's administration handed over to Bill Clinton's team after the 1992 election. "Compared to when I was here for the 1992-93 transition, I think we're light years ahead of where we were then," Edelman said. "A lot of materials have been prepared," he said. Staff members were trying to avoid an overload of information, what he sarcastically referred to as "death by power point." "We've tried to sketch out a timeline ... of the key decision points that the new administration will face in the first 90 days of its term." Often an outgoing administration argues for keeping its policies in place, but Edelman said the Pentagon wanted to avoid that. Obama's aides have already sidestepped a flurry of speculation that he would ask the defense secretary to stay on. Transition co-chair John Podesta said this week Obama had "great respect" for Gates, but would wait to hear the findings of experts he is sending to review Defense Department operations. Podesta promised on Tuesday that Obama would publish the names of aides due to begin transition efforts at agencies including the State Department, Treasury and the Pentagon as early as Monday.

by Staff Writers
Washington (AFP) Nov 13, 2008
President-elect Barack Obama will face a difficult challenge in balancing the competing needs of the US military as it wages war in both Iraq and Afghanistan, a Pentagon official said on Thursday.

Obama has vowed to withdraw most combat troops from Iraq within 16 months of taking office in January and to deploy additional US forces in Afghanistan to step up the fight against Taliban insurgents.

But US commanders in Iraq will likely be cautious about the pace of any withdrawal of forces after having managed to quell violence in the country in the past year and a half, according to Eric Edelman, undersecretary of defense for policy.

"There will be a tension between trying to get more US forces to Afghanistan quickly and ... the requirements that commanders in Iraq feel they have in order to get through an important year in Iraq," with planned local and general elections, Edelman told reporters.

"There will be some bias towards conservatism in trying to preserve the security gains made in the last 18 months," said Edelman.

"There'll be a tension, for sure, between those two objectives."

He also said that the United States would face a long-term "engagement" in Afghanistan and that military tactics that proved successful in Iraq could not necessarily be employed in Afghanistan.

"It's very complicated and I don't think one size fits all," Edelman said of tactics used in the US "surge" in Iraq.

He said basic principles of counter-insurgency warfare were still relevant but would have to be worked out to fit the particular circumstances of Afghanistan.

"It's going to have to be very much an Afghan solution."

In contrast to Iraq, Afghanistan had no lucrative natural resource such as oil, no experience of centralized government, overwhelming poverty, dislocation from years of civil war, and a rural insurgency operating in rugged terrain along an insecure international border, he said.

Although the United States and its allies doubled the international force in Afghanistan since 2006 and reviewed military strategy against the insurgents, the Taliban has stayed one step ahead, Edelman said.

"The scale of the insurgency ... began to outpace the steps we had taken," he said.

Even when violence was raging in Iraq, it was always clear "Afghanistan would require a much longer engagement than Iraq," he said.

Share This Article With Planet Earth

del.icio.us Digg Reddit

YahooMyWeb Google Facebook

Related Links
The Military Industrial Complex at SpaceWar.com
Learn about the Superpowers of the 21st Century at SpaceWar.com

Memory Foam Mattress Review

SPACE MEDIA NETWORK PROMOTIONS
Solar Energy Solutions
Tempur-Pedic Mattress Comparison ...

Newsletters :: SpaceDaily :: SpaceWar :: TerraDaily :: Energy Daily
XML Feeds :: Space News :: Earth News :: War News :: Solar Energy News

MILPLEX

Analysis: NATO-EU military cooperation

Berlin (UPI) Nov 12, 2008
NATO and the European Union need to overcome their political differences and increase cooperation on military matters, according to officials from both organizations.

SUPERPOWERS China's Enemies Are All Around Part Two China's Enemies Are All Around Part One Gates urges Russia not to block integration with West China hits out at Indian Foreign Minister's border comments	NUKEWARS Russia could ditch Kaliningrad missile plan, Medvedev tells paper SKorea to install sensors to monitor for NKorea nuke tests Six powers favour dual track on Iran nuclear issue: France Pyongyang says it never agreed to nuclear sampling
MISSILE NEWS US denounces Iran missile test Vandenberg Officials Launch Minuteman III Missile USAF Awards Raytheon Contract Option For Maverick Missile Upgrades Raytheon Awarded Contract For Standard Missile-2 Production	MISSILE DEFENSE Raytheon Awarded Development Cintract For BMD Multiple Kill Vehicle BMD Watch: Russia may talk to Obama on BMD US missile chief to Obama: anti-missile system 'is workable' US defence secretary blasts Russia's missile threat
AEROSPACE China's air show saw four bln dollars in deals: report China plane-makers take first steps to rival global giants Aviation giants look to China amid global turbulence Boeing sees China buying 3,710 planes over next 20 years	UAV NEWS German Forces Test Stabilized Camera System For Mini-UAV Honeywell Wins First Production Contract For T-Hawk Micro Air Vehicle Aurora Wins USAF Contract On Vision-Based MAV Guidance DCNS Achieves Automatic UAV Landing On Frigate
IRAQ WARS Feature: Baghdad car bomb targets school Iraq studies US-amended military pact as deadline looms Iraq's cabinet expected to meet on US pact as deadline looms Iraq UN Ambassador Expects Little On The Ground Change With Obama	MILTECH LockMart Receives Contract For Paveway II Laser Guided Bomb Kits Outside View: Russian cops pack new heat Kalashnikov turns 89, a 'happy man' for creating AK-47 TenCate Presents New Lightweight Composite Armour Solution

The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2007 - SpaceDaily.AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any Web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy Statement