Obama's counterinsurgency gaffe on Meet the Press

Jim Gerahty:

Russert says that NBC News has learned the U.S. has assembled military plans to strike targets in Iran because that country is assisting its agents/insurgents in Iran. He asks Obama, would you support "limited attacks in Iran"?

Obama says he doesn't want to speculate yet. He says that as commander in chief, he doesn't take military options off the table, but that he wants to see the intelligence. After some pro-forma Bush-bashing, he points out that Iran has to change its behavior, but that he will offer "carrots."

(Carrots? Extending this metaphor, the Europeans have offered an entire grocery store for the Iranians to drop their nuclear program, with no results so far.)

"If we cannot get the Iraqis to stand up in seven years, we are not going to get them to stand up in fourteen years or fifty-six years."

I don't like that answer, but I think it will resonate with many Americans.

...

It should not resonate with anyone who knows anything about counterinsurgency warfare. The average counterinsurgency takes 11 years and in 90 percent of the cases the insurgents lose. What Obama is suggesting is topping the operation in the middle. He demonstrates a profound ignorance of counterinsurgency warfare and he very likely has no advisers who do.

At some point he has to be confronted on this ignorance so that the rest of America can be educated on the point too. As a case in point, the counterinsurgency in Colombia has been going on for 40 years and has only recently started showing progress after the Bush administration started making resources available to Colombia to help them fight it. The Democrats apear to want to retreat from that fight too.