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Authors: Nathan Hodge
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Washington.
John Hillen, the head of the State Departmentâs Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, got the phone call from Petraeus in early 2006. The general was just back from Iraq, and he needed a favor. Hillen knew Petraeus from Army circlesânot especially well, but they had a mutual friend in Lieutenant Colonel John Nagl, the influential armor officer who had made waves with Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam , the newly popular book on counterinsurgency. Hillen and Nagl had been friends for two decades: They shared the same supervisor at Oxford University, where Nagl was a Rhodes Scholar and where both men earned doctorates. They had known each other as young lieutenants in the Army and had both served in the first Gulf War.
During Operation Desert Storm, Hillen was the senior scout platoon leader for then Captain H. R. McMaster, who commanded Eagle Troop of the Second Armored Cavalry Regiment in the Battle of 73 Easting, a tank duel with the Iraqi Republican Guard in late February 1991. 8 McMasterâs Abrams tank and Hillenâs Bradley fighting vehicle were within fifty meters of each other during the fight, which led to the destruction of over one hundred Iraqi armored vehicles and the decimation of a Republican Guard brigade. As their careers advanced, Hillen and McMaster stayed in touch: They were all part of a relatively small circle of Army officers with Ph.D.s who all knew one another, at least by reputation, and who tracked one anotherâs professional rise.
Petraeus was part of that circle as well: He had completed a Ph.D. at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. âIâm sitting here writing this field manual, and itâs great, I got Nagl, I got all the right people,â Petraeus said. âAnd we have reaffirmed the age-old counterinsurgency tenet: Eighty percent is political, twenty percent is military.â
âGreat,â Hillen laughed. âYou reinvented the wheel.â
The two men were sharing an insiderâs joke: That 80 percent political, 20 percent military formula was, at least within progressive military circles, a piece of accepted wisdom, a formula borrowed from David Galula. The irony was not lost on Petraeus.
âIâm sitting around here, Ranger Hillen, and Iâm looking at all uniforms,â he said. âAnd Iâm writing a book that says eighty percent is a nonuniformed task. Whatâs wrong with this picture? Whereâs the rest of the government?â
Petraeus was slowly coming around to a larger point. The new counterinsurgency manual was intended for the Army and the Marine Corps; the general wanted someone to evangelize the concept throughout the rest of the government. The military desperately needed civilian support, and Petraeus needed a point person in Washington to help organize a governmentwide conference that would introduce the gospel of counterinsurgency to a wider government audience.
âThatâs a good point,â Hillen said. The reason for Petraeusâs phone call was starting to dawn on him. âDo you have anybody in mind?â
âYouâre the point person for the rest of the government,â Petraeus said. Petraeus and his team were planning to roll out the new counterinsurgency manual early in the fall, and they wanted to capture the maximum attention of the Beltway policymaking elite. The governmentwide counterinsurgency conferenceâadvertised as âjointly sponsoredâ by the State Department and the Pentagon, although the Defense Department would provide most of the funds for the eventâwould be their coming-out party.
Hillenâs first thought was, Shit, well thatâs not what my bureau does. (The National Security Council, part of the Executive Office of the President, is supposed to be the main forum for coordinating national security issues at the senior level.)
John Hillen, the head of the State Departmentâs Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, got the phone call from Petraeus in early 2006. The general was just back from Iraq, and he needed a favor. Hillen knew Petraeus from Army circlesânot especially well, but they had a mutual friend in Lieutenant Colonel John Nagl, the influential armor officer who had made waves with Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam , the newly popular book on counterinsurgency. Hillen and Nagl had been friends for two decades: They shared the same supervisor at Oxford University, where Nagl was a Rhodes Scholar and where both men earned doctorates. They had known each other as young lieutenants in the Army and had both served in the first Gulf War.
During Operation Desert Storm, Hillen was the senior scout platoon leader for then Captain H. R. McMaster, who commanded Eagle Troop of the Second Armored Cavalry Regiment in the Battle of 73 Easting, a tank duel with the Iraqi Republican Guard in late February 1991. 8 McMasterâs Abrams tank and Hillenâs Bradley fighting vehicle were within fifty meters of each other during the fight, which led to the destruction of over one hundred Iraqi armored vehicles and the decimation of a Republican Guard brigade. As their careers advanced, Hillen and McMaster stayed in touch: They were all part of a relatively small circle of Army officers with Ph.D.s who all knew one another, at least by reputation, and who tracked one anotherâs professional rise.
Petraeus was part of that circle as well: He had completed a Ph.D. at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. âIâm sitting here writing this field manual, and itâs great, I got Nagl, I got all the right people,â Petraeus said. âAnd we have reaffirmed the age-old counterinsurgency tenet: Eighty percent is political, twenty percent is military.â
âGreat,â Hillen laughed. âYou reinvented the wheel.â
The two men were sharing an insiderâs joke: That 80 percent political, 20 percent military formula was, at least within progressive military circles, a piece of accepted wisdom, a formula borrowed from David Galula. The irony was not lost on Petraeus.
âIâm sitting around here, Ranger Hillen, and Iâm looking at all uniforms,â he said. âAnd Iâm writing a book that says eighty percent is a nonuniformed task. Whatâs wrong with this picture? Whereâs the rest of the government?â
Petraeus was slowly coming around to a larger point. The new counterinsurgency manual was intended for the Army and the Marine Corps; the general wanted someone to evangelize the concept throughout the rest of the government. The military desperately needed civilian support, and Petraeus needed a point person in Washington to help organize a governmentwide conference that would introduce the gospel of counterinsurgency to a wider government audience.
âThatâs a good point,â Hillen said. The reason for Petraeusâs phone call was starting to dawn on him. âDo you have anybody in mind?â
âYouâre the point person for the rest of the government,â Petraeus said. Petraeus and his team were planning to roll out the new counterinsurgency manual early in the fall, and they wanted to capture the maximum attention of the Beltway policymaking elite. The governmentwide counterinsurgency conferenceâadvertised as âjointly sponsoredâ by the State Department and the Pentagon, although the Defense Department would provide most of the funds for the eventâwould be their coming-out party.
Hillenâs first thought was, Shit, well thatâs not what my bureau does. (The National Security Council, part of the Executive Office of the President, is supposed to be the main forum for coordinating national security issues at the senior level.)
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