Rep. Joe Sestak (D-Pa.), a retired three-star Navy admiral who’s trying to win the Democratic nomination for Senate from Pennsylvania, has issued a statement checking McCain:

“As the senior ranking military Veteran in Congress, I am compelled to respond to Sen. McCain’s opposition to President Obama’s commitment to allowing all American troops to serve their country openly and honestly. How can a policy that has dismissed more than 13,000 trained, able, and honorable American servicemembers — including upwards of 800 troops with “mission critical” skills, like Arab linguists — be viewed as successful?

“Especially in a time of war, when our military is overstretched and our troops and their families are under unprecedented strain, we cannot afford to lose any more troops that the American people depend on for our national security. I agree with Sen. McCain that our military is the best in the world and the best in our nation’s history. That’s precisely why I have faith in the leadership capabilities of our officer corps and non-commissioned officers, as well as the dedication, professionalism, and integrity of our troops, to handle this transition without detriment to readiness or capability.

“The men and women who wear the cloth of this nation should be entitled to the rights they so heroically defend.”

“Let me say this about about General McChrystal, with all due respect,” Pelosi said, according to a transcript sent my way by a Pelosi aide. “His recommendations to the president should go up the line of command. They shouldn’t be in press conferences.”

I’m guessing she meant London speeches, but whatever. For the record, the general’s people told me he agrees; he’s got no more public appearances planned; the message is received; and the secretaries of state and defense both said last night that they support McChrystal.

Despite the need to move men and material by air into theaters like Afghanistan, the Obama Administration sought to end production of our C-17s, the work horse of our ability to project long range power. Despite the Air Force saying it would increase future risk, the Obama Administration successfully sought to end F-22 production – at a time when both Russia and China are acquiring large numbers of next generation fighter aircraft. It strikes me as odd that Defense Secretary Gates is the only member of the Cabinet to be tasked with tightening his belt.

The canceling of the F-22 was a minority position within the GOP, but it was supported by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), and it’s tough to find actual defense experts who disagree.

It’s difficult to understand how the Kagans think there are 40,000 – 45,000 U.S. troops available for deployment — the Pentagon doesn’t think the Army can deploy a single additional combat brigade to Afghanistan in the next six months — and the report is silent on whether to increase the pace of withdrawal from Iraq (formerly a Kagan no-no); whether to decrease the time in between deployments, which the Army and the Secretary of Defense will resist after having to do it to sustain the 2007 Iraq troop surge; or whether to … I don’t know. They just want the politically treacherous 40,000-45,000 troop increase, and now the GOP will have a troop figure to say Afghanistan requires if Obama doesn’t provide such a ginormous increase. (They also back the consensus call for speeding up the development and deployment of Afghan security forces.)

The Obama administration is not reacting kindly to the leak’s attempted trap. “The impact may be the opposite of the leakers’ intent,” said an official in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. “This will increase the determination of the civilian leadership not to be rushed or pressured.”

In any event, the Kagans actually provide an arguably more realistic political strategy than either the McChrystal review or the Obama administration. From the PDF’s strategic framework:

Governance
– Remediate damage that corruption and abuse of power have done to the legitimacy of the Afghan Government
Help and cajole GIRoA [the Afghan government] to emplace systems and procedures to improve
– Help and cajole GIRoA to emplace systems and procedures to improve legitimacy over the next few years
– Improve the capacity of GIRoA at all levels to provide essential services to the  Afghan people, especially security, justice, dispute resolution, and basic  agricultural and transportation infrastructure agricultural and transportation infrastructure

That gets the United States out of the business of nation-building and back into state-building — supporting institutions rather than replacing them — and they call in for setting up elections in provinces and districts to supercede the ability of the president to appoint them. The strategy is clearly designed to limit the damage from the disputed election. Somewhat surprisingly, the Kagans call for getting admirably ruthless with the Karzai government by suggesting that

The presence of large numbers of American and international forces and the irreplaceable role they currently play in providing security for the Afghan
government and its officials also offer enormous leverage

That’s leverage blunted by the Obama administration’s suggestion (and, to be fair, the Bush administration’s legacy) that the U.S. provide an unconditional commitment to Afghanistan. There is, however, this questionable assertion:

If the US declares that it will not send additional forces because of those
flaws, it is de facto declaring that it regards the election as illegitimate, the
Karzai government as illegitimate, and the Afghan enterprise as unworthy
of additional effort, all of which will seriously exacerbate damage to the
legitimacy of the government within Afghanistan as well as to the will of
the international community to continue the struggle

That’s a series of propositions that just don’t follow from each other. They provide to say that a lack of a second troop increase within a year would undermine Afghan troop morale; and there’s no reason to fear an Afghan sense of occupation or clientism, which are prime concerns of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. And the only people who would make these claims would be the Kagans and the readers of this paper, so it calls into question whether the Kagans have provided a good-faith effort or a set of GOP talking points.

The 2,500 to 3,000 troops include explosive ordnance disposal teams, route clearance teams, medevac units and intelligence specialists needed to combat the growing threat of improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, which are the leading cause of death among U.S. forces in the country.

There’s a broad consensus within the administration that such a counter-IED capability is necessary, regardless of troop numbers, and the raised death toll from IEDs underscores the urgency. But Gates’ move underscores to McChrystal who’s in charge here, as does Gates’ comment that the decision on whether McChrystal’s strategic assessment matches administration goals is “outside of General McChrystal’s area of authority.”

That’s a telling indicator of how Gates operates: in the course of giving McChrystal what he wants, the defense secretary indicates that the surest way not to get what he wants in the future is to box the administration in. Notice there haven’t been many “we need more troops” quotes leaked in the last couple days from McChrystal’s command.

Iran is placing extraordinary emphasis on its ballistic missile and WMD development programs. The ballistic missile infrastructure in Iran is now more sophisticated than that of North Korea, and has benefited from broad, essential, long-term assistance from Russia and important assistance from China as well. Iran is making very rapid progress in developing the Shahab-3 MRBM, which like the North Korean No Dong has a range of 1300 km. This missile may be flight tested at any time and deployed soon thereafter.

We judge that Iran now has the technical capability and resources to demonstrate an ICBM-range ballistic missile, similar to the TD-2 (based on scaled-up Scud technology) within five years of a decision to proceed-whether that decision has already been made or is yet to be made.

– Donald Rumsfeld, chairman, Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat, July 15, 1998

The intelligence community now assesses that the threat from Iran’s short- and medium-range ballistic missiles, such as the Shahab-3, is developing more rapidly than previously projected. This poses an increased and more immediate threat to our forces on the European continent, as well as to our allies.

On the other hand, our intelligence assessment also now assesses that the threat of potential Iranian intercontinental ballistic missile capabilities has been slower to develop than was estimated in 2006.

– Robert Gates, this morning. The only way to vindicate Rumsfeld is to believe that Iran hasn’t made a decision to proceed with an ICBM, in which case there’s little reason to fear the Iranian regime.

President Obama has made a sound choice that will improve our security. The President’s decision focuses on fielding effective capabilities to defend our forward deployed force and allies in Europe against the real and existing missile threat from Iran, which consists of short- and medium-range missiles, rather than only against a potential future long-range threat. Iran already has many hundreds of short- and medium-range missiles, and has been adding more, but will not have long-range missiles for years to come.

President Obama’s decision supports NATO’s policy to address missile threats “in a prioritized manner that includes consideration of the level of imminence of the threat and the level of acceptable risk.” It also supports the security needs of our European allies, some of whom are within range of Iranian missiles today. This decision reinforces our security commitment to our European allies; it does not weaken it.

Secretary Gates has assured us that both Poland and the Czech Republic are positive about this approach and that they are being offered the opportunity to participate in this phased, adaptive missile defense architecture. We understand, specifically, that Poland is being offered a Patriot battery (their first priority) and Standard missiles for deployment on their soil.

We cannot proceed, in any event, with deployment of the previously-proposed missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic because the conditions required in our law have not been met, including ratification by Poland and the Czech Republic of agreements relating to such deployments. Moreover, that proposed system would not defend against the threat to them and other countries in Europe of short- and medium-range missiles from Iran.

The President’s decision also opens the door to missile defense cooperation with Russia, which would send a powerful signal to Iran. It could also help increase our regional missile defense capability if Russia shares missile flight data from its Armavir radar. NATO has repeatedly supported U.S.-Russian cooperation on missile defense. President Obama’s decision will not threaten Russia, and it offers an opportunity for missile defense to serve as a uniting issue, rather than a dividing one.

Now imagine that. A U.S.-Russia collaboration on missile defenses, something that hearkens back to the Reykjavik summit between Reagan and Gorbachev. Administration officials, on and off the record, have been saying all day that there isn’t any quid pro quo for scrapping a ballistic missile shield that provokes Russia for one that doesn’t. Indeed, there wouldn’t need to be any. It’s cost-free to get rid of a bone in another person’s throat, and it favorably inclines him toward what you’d like to do.

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Among their baseline judgments is precisely what former undersecretary of defense Eric Edelman cautioned — that the “threat from Iran’s short- and medium-range ballistic missiles is developing more rapidly than previously projected.” But Iran’s intercontinental ballistic missile capabilities are still immature, and are proceeding slower than previously projected. Meanwhile, “U.S. missile defense capabilities and technologies have advanced significantly,” a trend expected to continue, and so the administration plans a four-phased for theater missile defense between now and 2020 based around those advances. Gates noted that those emergent technologies don’t rely on a “single, large, fixed European radar” that was supposed to be built in the Czech Republic; nor do they require the technology underlying the planned interceptor field in Poland. So out it goes.

It’s some good jujitsu: accepting the technological premises of missile defense advocates to argue that the planned Poland/Czech Republic-based system is a relic before it’s built.

Here’s full fact sheet.

President Obama has approved the recommendation of Secretary of Defense Gates and the Joint Chiefs of Staff for a phased, adaptive approach for missile defense in Europe. This approach is based on an assessment of the Iranian missile threat, and a commitment to deploy technology that is proven, cost-effective, and adaptable to an evolving security environment.

Starting around 2011, this missile defense architecture will feature deployments of increasingly-capable sea- and land-based missile interceptors, primarily upgraded versions of the Standard Missile-3 (SM-3), and a range of sensors in Europe to defend against the growing ballistic missile threat from Iran. This phased approach develops the capability to augment our current protection of the U.S. homeland against long-range ballistic missile threats, and to offer more effective defenses against more near-term ballistic missile threats. The plan provides for the defense of U.S. deployed forces, their families, and our Allies in Europe sooner and more comprehensively than the previous program, and involves more flexible and survivable systems.

The Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended to the President that he revise the previous Administration’s 2007 plan for missile defense in Europe as part of an ongoing comprehensive review of our missile defenses mandated by Congress. Two major developments led to this unanimous recommended change:

* New Threat Assessment: The intelligence community now assesses that the threat from Iran’s short- and medium-range ballistic missiles is developing more rapidly than previously projected, while the threat of potential Iranian intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capabilities has been slower to develop than previously estimated. In the near-term, the greatest missile threats from Iran will be to U.S. Allies and partners, as well as to U.S. deployed personnel – military and civilian –and their accompanying families in the Middle East and in Europe.

* Advances in Capabilities and Technologies: Over the past several years, U.S. missile defense capabilities and technologies have advanced significantly. We expect this trend to continue. Improved interceptor capabilities, such as advanced versions of the SM-3, offer a more flexible, capable, and cost-effective architecture. Improved sensor technologies offer a variety of options to detect and track enemy missiles.

These changes in the threat as well as our capabilities and technologies underscore the need for an adaptable architecture. This architecture is responsive to the current threat, but could also incorporate relevant technologies quickly and cost-effectively to respond to evolving threats. Accordingly, the Department of Defense has developed a four-phased, adaptive approach for missile defense in Europe. While further advances of technology or future changes in the threat could modify the details or timing of later phases, current plans call for the following:

* Phase One (in the 2011 timeframe) – Deploy current and proven missile defense systems available in the next two years, including the sea-based Aegis Weapon System, the SM-3 interceptor (Block IA), and sensors such as the forward-based Army Navy/Transportable Radar Surveillance system (AN/TPY-2), to address regional ballistic missile threats to Europe and our deployed personnel and their families;

* Phase Two (in the 2015 timeframe) – After appropriate testing, deploy a more capable version of the SM-3 interceptor (Block IB) in both sea- and land-based configurations, and more advanced sensors, to expand the defended area against short- and medium-range missile threats;

* Phase Three (in the 2018 timeframe) – After development and testing are complete, deploy the more advanced SM-3 Block IIA variant currently under development, to counter short-, medium-, and intermediate-range missile threats; and

* Phase Four (in the 2020 timeframe) – After development and testing are complete, deploy the SM-3 Block IIB to help better cope with medium- and intermediate-range missiles and the potential future ICBM threat to the United States.

Throughout all four phases, the United States also will be testing and updating a range of approaches for improving our sensors for missile defense. The new distributed interceptor and sensor architecture also does not require a single, large, fixed European radar that was to be located in the Czech Republic; this approach also uses different interceptor technology than the previous program, removing the need for a single field of 10 ground-based interceptors in Poland. Therefore, the Secretary of Defense recommended that the United States no longer plan to move forward with that architecture.

The Czech Republic and Poland, as close, strategic and steadfast Allies of the United States, will be central to our continued consultations with NATO Allies on our defense against the growing ballistic missile threat.

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1. Russia, a much more important country than either Poland or the Czech Republic, viewed it as needlessly provocative.

2. The thing was never actually built, so getting rid of the plans to build it is fairly cost-free.

3. The thing was more about Eastern European political fears of a resurgent Russia, which are better dealt with through diplomatic means.

4. Iran isn’t dreaming of raining missiles down on Prague or Gdansk.

5. Moving Patriot batteries into Poland is an adequate political substitute for Polish anxieties.

[UPDATE: 6: Oh, and there are alternative missile-defense systems like Aegis that would be used as a substitute in a couple of years; plus closer-to-Iran interceptors as well

In favor of continuation:

1. Iran might someday at some point acquire this missile capability and then decide what it wants to do is blackmail European countries into giving it all their gold coins.

2. Russia isn’t an important country and even if it were, the United States ought to cherish the memory of when it was cool to provoke it.

Eric Edelman, the second Bush-administration undersecretary of defense for policy, tells The Wall Street Journal’s Peter Spiegel that he saw intelligence reports on the pace at which Iran is making technological progress on long-range missiles. But you know who sees more intelligence reports on those missiles? Edelman’s former boss, Defense Secretary Bob Gates. If Gates, the model of a pragmatic defense secretary who often discusses the need to reset defense policy around “real” and not “hypothetical” threats, doesn’t see an actual cost to U.S. or allied security, then none exists.

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Here’s the funny bit. bin Laden says that Obama is “powerless” to win the Afghanistan war. Well, perhaps. But this is his 9/11 anniversary message, the one everyone expects at this time every year, and it drops days after the actual anniversary. And al-Qaeda is reportedly having difficulty convincing anyone of its relevance outside Waziristan, after snatching defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq and showing itself unable to recruit new fanatics. Its last several major attack attempts have been foiled and it doesn’t look like it has another mastermind like Khalid Shaikh Mohammed still in its ranks.

In short, bin Laden is like the music industry. His major successes are now on the mixtape circuit, but he can’t figure out, in this new environment, how to translate that into wider success. No one’s interested in buying it anymore.

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