America’s
major wars of the last half century—Vietnam, the Gulf War, and the
Iraq-Afghanistan conflicts—had a common element: the nation’s war leadership in
each, at least for a time, appeared principally to be in the hands of three
individuals, or to borrow a term of Russian origin, a troika. For Vietnam, the
troika was President Lyndon Johnson, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, and General
William Westmoreland. For the Gulf War, the troika was President George H.W.
Bush, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Colin Powell, and Central
Command Commander-in-Chief General Stormin’ Norman Schwarzkopf. For the Iraq
and Afghanistan conflicts, the troika was President George W. Bush, Vice
President Richard Cheney, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
To summarize: Troika One—Johnson,
McNamara, Westmoreland; Troika Two—Bush1, Powell, Schwarzkopf; Troika Three—Bush2,
Cheney, Rumsfeld.
The identification of the Troikas is
not to say that all decision-making was in the hands of just the three members
of each Troika. Many others in the bureaucracies had roles of importance. But
the big three in each instance became the collective face of the endeavor. For
Troika One, the Vietnam War had a “light at the end of the tunnel.” For Troika
Two, Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait would “not stand.” For Troika Three, Americans
would be “greeted as liberators” in Iraq.
So how did the three Troikas do?
Well, One and Three did not fare well. The light at the end of the Vietnam
tunnel turned out to be no light at all. The tunnel just ended in murkiness.
Greeted as liberators in Iraq? Maybe by some residents for a few months, but
then the locals returned to their millennia-old disputes and grievances, with the
added fun of turning on the latest group of outsiders who dared to intrude on
their paradise.
And Troika Two? Wonder of wonders,
it got the job done. Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait did not stand. Period.
The quality of the Troikas’
memberships might explain much of the uneven results. Troika One had a superior
politician, a tactically adequate but strategically challenged soldier, and a
brilliant but tragically flawed manager. Troika Three had an average, at best,
politician, an ideologue with significant comprehension limitations, and a
brilliant but tragically flawed manager. And Troika Two? Simply, it had three
individuals who understood the relationship between objectives and resources.
Perhaps the most interesting
components of Troikas One and Three were the brilliant but tragically flawed
managers. McNamara and, to a lesser extent, Rumsfeld were certainly brilliant.
All one had to do was ask them. But the brilliance was part of the flaws. They
appeared too sure of themselves. Staff dissent appears to have been
discouraged. This is not to say that there was much in the way of staff
dissent. Maybe group think in the Pentagons of the 1960s and the 2000s was a
contributor to the situation. The SecDefs had no reason to question their own
brilliance because no one seriously disagreed with their pronouncements.
In any case, as smart as they were,
neither McNamara nor Rumsfeld understood, at the level of international affairs
and in the field of military operations, the relationship between objectives
and resources. Each pursued the objective of winning a war with, one,
inadequate resources, and two, little understanding of the nature and strength
of the enemy. Each was given extraordinary leeway by a President who was beyond
his natural element, which was domestic politics.
On one occasion, Donald Rumsfeld famously said, in response to a critical question from a low-ranking soldier, “you go to war with the Army you have.” The same can be said about a nation’s leaders: “you go to war with the leaders you have.” In Troika Two, the leaders were up to the challenge. In Troikas One and Three, not so much.
