Petraeus to the Rescue

After President Obama read the first few paragraphs of Rolling Stone magazine's profile of General Stanley McChrystal, it was less than 48 hours before David Petraeus accepted command of US troops in Afghanistan. Petraeus will be implementing his own strategy, which will smooth his replacement of McChrystal. But "counterinsurgency" hasn't been working the way it's supposed to. The Taliban are tenacious, local officials are unreliable and US troops are frustrated. Petraeus rescued the war in Iraq during the Bush years, but said himself the war in Afghanistan was going to be tougher. Can he unify a dysfunctional team of military and civilian leaders? Can he meet the President's deadline of beginning a troop draw-down by July of next year?