President Obama, seated at the head of a conference table strewn with papers in the White House Situation Room, stared at charts showing various options for sending additional U.S. troops into Afghanistan. He and his top national security advisers had been debating the way forward for two full months. On this day, Nov. 11, the president scanned the choices with a trace of irritation. At a meeting more than two weeks earlier, he had asked for a plan to deploy and pull out troops quickly -- a "surge" similar to the one that his Republican predecessor had executed in Iraq, but with a fixed date to begin withdrawals.
The One liked W's Surge?
What was in front of Obama - scenarios in which it took too long to get in and too long to get out - was not what he wanted.
After one revelatory discussion about the mission's goals, administration officials changed their chief objective from trying to eliminate the Taliban to making sure insurgents could no longer threaten the Afghan government's survival. The new strategy would include a closer relationship with Pakistan, along with a warning that the United States would step up its action against al-Qaeda camps in that country if the Pakistanis did not do it themselves.
I'm sure that scares the bejeebus out of them.
In 25 hours of meetings that the president led over three months, participants reviewed in detail how complicated the Afghanistan conflict had become. The sessions were fluid, influenced by the ghosts of the
"What was interesting was the metamorphosis," said national security adviser James L. Jones, the only senior official who agreed to discuss the deliberations on the record. "I dare say that none of us ended up where we started." But among a wide range of opinions as the process began, Vice President Biden was known to oppose a major troop buildup, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates was publicly leery, and some of Obama's civilian advisers were privately opposed. When the president polled them on his final decision two days before it was announced, all endorsed it. He wore 'em out.