President-elect Trump\u2019s promise to \u201cdrain the swamp\u201d of Washington seems forgotten \u2014 like so many political promises \u2014 as he meets with swamp creatures, such as disgraced Gen. David Petraeus, says ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern.<\/p>\n
By Ray McGovern<\/p>\n
The news that President-elect Donald Trump called in disgraced retired Gen. David Petraeus for a job interview as possible Secretary of State tests whether Trump\u2019s experience in hosting \u201cThe Celebrity Apprentice\u201d honed his skills for spotting an incompetent phony or not.<\/p>\n
Does Trump need more data than the continuing bedlam in Iraq and Afghanistan to understand that one can earn a Princeton PhD by writing erudite-sounding drivel about \u201ccounterinsurgency\u201d and still flunk war?\u00a0Granted, the shambles in which Petraeus left Iraq and Afghanistan were probably more a result of his overweening careerism and political ambition than his misapplication of military strategy. But does that make it any more\u00a0excusable?<\/p>\n
In 2007, Adm. William Fallon, commander of CENTCOM with four decades of active-duty experience behind him, quickly took the measure of Petraeus, who was one of his subordinates while implementing a \u201csurge\u201d of over 30,000 U.S. troops into Iraq.<\/p>\n
Several sources reported that Fallon was sickened by Petraeus\u2019s unctuous pandering to ingratiate himself.\u00a0Fallon is said to have been so turned off by all the accolades in the flowery introduction given him by Petraeus that he called him to his face \u201can ass-kissing little chickenshit,\u201d adding, \u201cI hate people like that.\u201d\u00a0Sadly, Petraeus\u2019s sycophancy is not uncommon among general officers.\u00a0Uncommon was Fallon\u2019s outspoken candor.<\/p>\n
The past decade has shown that obsequiousness to those above him and callousness toward others are two of Petraeus\u2019s most notable character traits.\u00a0They go along with his lack of military acumen and his dishonesty as revealed in his lying to the FBI about handing over top-secret notebooks to his biographer\/lover, an \u201cindiscretion\u201d that would have landed a less well-connected person in jail but instead got him only a mild slap on the wrist (via a misdemeanor guilty plea).<\/p>\n
Indeed, Petraeus, the epitome of a \u201cpolitical general,\u201d represents some of the slimiest depths of the Washington \u201cswamp\u201d that President-elect Trump has vowed to drain. Petraeus cares desperately about the feelings of his fellow elites but shows shocking disdain for the suffering of other human beings who are not so important.<\/p>\n
In early 2011 in Afghanistan, Petraeus shocked aides to then-President Hamid Karzai after many children were burned to death in a \u201ccoalition\u201d attack in northeastern Afghanistan by suggesting that Afghan parents may have burned their own children to exaggerate their claims of civilian casualties and discredit the U.S., reported<\/a> The Washington Post, citing two participants at the meeting.<\/p>\n