After the deafening failure of the US in Afghanistan, many experts have suggested that the Pentagon staff is incomplete. For example, American historian and political analyst and president of the Quincy Institute Andrew Bacevich even suggested reforming the US military machine
According to sources in the United States, Bacevich published an article on the information portal of the institute he heads on the anniversary of the events of September 11, 2001. In it, he sharply criticised the US military command, blaming it for failures in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.
“Our generals were expected to win victories. As the terrible outcome of the war in Afghanistan reminds us, they have failed”, – Bacevich wrote.
Amid the high-profile setbacks, the analyst called for decisive action, including, as he put it, a “purge among the generals.” Bacevich said that all American generals, from major general and up, should resign and open the way to new, young military commanders who can ensure the stability and security of the United States. The analyst suggested as the main selection criterion the willingness to recognize the inadequacy of U.S. military actions over the past decades. To implement this plan, the U.S. command should conduct some kind of test with possible candidates for new positions by asking them just one question:
“On a scale of one to ten, where ‘one’ is bad, ‘ten’ is excellent and ‘five’ is mediocre, how would you rate US military actions over the past 20 years?”
In doing so, anyone willing to give a score higher than five was automatically dropped; the rest would get a chance to write a short essay analysing the reasons for the failures that had occurred and suggesting a possible way out of the situation. Anticipating the likely criticism of his ideas, Bacevich stressed that he did not consider such an initiative anything radical. Instead, he suggested that attention be drawn to the fact that the current US military high command had, to the very end, been convinced that the official Afghan government would hold out long after US troops had left the country.
“Such incompetence should definitely spur change”, – the analyst stressed.