General Petraeus' Thirty Years War

The Asia Times Online ^ | 02 May 2010 | Spengler

[Palter]

Memo to heads of state: beware the clever general who turns up at a tough moment, and says "Leave it to me: I can fix it for you." Two examples come to mind. The great field marshal of the Thirty Years War of 1618-1648, Albrecht von Wallenstein, taught armies to live off the land, and succeeded so well that nearly half the people of Central Europe starved to death during the conflict.

General David Petraeus, who heads America's Central Command (CENTCOM), taught the land to live off him. Petraeus' putative success in the Iraq "surge" of 2007-2008 is one of the weirder cases of Karl Marx's quip of history repeating itself first as tragedy second as farce. The consequences will be similar, that is, hideous.

Wallenstein put 100,000 men into the field, an army of terrifying size for the times, by turning the imperial army into a parasite that consumed the livelihood of the empire's home provinces. The Austrian Empire fired him in 1629 after five years of depredation, but pressed him back into service in 1631. Those who were left alive joined the army, in a self-feeding spiral of destruction on a scale not seen in Europe since the 8th century. Wallenstein's power grew with the implosion of civil society, and the Austrian emperor had him murdered in 1634.

Petraeus accomplished the same thing with (literally) bags of money. Starting with Iraq, the American military has militarized large parts of the Middle East and Central Asia in the name of pacification. And now America is engaged in a grand strategic withdrawal from responsibility in the region, leaving behind men with weapons and excellent reason to use them.

[verity]

"If one is not aware that the bashing is being administered by a "just war" theorist, or a faithful Catholic defender of that doctrine..."

And one can still vehemently disagree with them.;-)

[Incorrigible]

Bump!

[Spengler]

First, I am not Catholic but Jewish. First Things is not Catholic (although its founder was Catholic) but ecumenical.
Second, I support Just War doctrine. I supported the invasion of Iraq but thought it stupid to take responsibility for nation-building in Iraq. We should have put in our own strongman and withdrawn most of our forces.
Third, Petraeus solved Bush’s problem in Iraq brilliantly, but at the cost of creating an effective Sunni armed force, which will create trouble in the future.

[Billthedrill]

That's actually a little hard on Wallenstein, don't you think? He wasn't the first one to come up with armies living off the land, after all - his innovation was making the cities on whose behalf the army was fighting pay for the deal. And he wasn't assassinated for that reason, he was assassinated because his boss thought he was going to turn coat. Which he might have.

The whole nation-building thing was a very risky process, but if you do pull it off the dividends can be very long-lasting. Kenya and India come to mind. Whether Iraq will turn out that way we cannot know yet. But I'd submit the historical record suggests that if you do pull it off, it's longer-lasting than any strongman and quite a bit better for the population of the country it's done with. Personally I admire Bush for sticking to that after the staff who came up with it started to peel off. YMMV.

[Ben Ficklin]

Dang, Petraeus is starting to sound like a Realist. He must have his eye on Gate's job.

No doubt he received the AEI invite prior to his statement to the committee.

[rmlew]

You need to work on your reading comprehension skills. David Goldman, aka Spengler, is anything by anti-Israel.

[driftdiver]

Sure sport, I’ll get right on that.