WASHINGTON (AFP) — US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who has steered US forces toward the exit in Iraq, now looks set to oversee a strategic pivot toward Afghanistan under president-elect Barack Obama.
Obama's decision to ask Gates, 65, to stay on the job for at least another year leaked late Tuesday, ending weeks of speculation that the president-elect would opt for continuity in the first wartime transition in 40 years.
A Pentagon spokesman would not confirm the decision, but Democratic operatives told US media that Gates would be named when Obama unveils his national security team next week.
Gates, who is scheduled to visit an air base in North Dakota on Monday, would not require Senate confirmation. He has already polled his senior staff to see who would be able to stay on into the transition, officials have said.
"My hunch is people are not just comfortable that he would stay around, but are comforted by it," said a US military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
"In fact, I would argue that he's been viewed (within the military) as an excellent secretary of defense who has led calmly and with great wisdom," the official said.
It would be the first time the defense secretary of one administration was kept on by a new president from another party, in this case one who campaigned against his predecessor's war policy.
The pace of the US withdrawal from Iraq is likely to be the biggest bone of contention, with Obama calling during the White House campaign for a rapid 16-month withdrawal of all US forces.
However, that position may soften with an agreement now before the Iraqi parliament calling for the withdrawal of all US troops by the end of 2011, a timetable US military leaders say will be difficult but doable.
"I will call in the Joint Chiefs of Staff, my national security apparatus, and we will start executing a plan that draws down our troops" from Iraq, Obama said in a CBS interview September 16.
"Particularly in light of the problems that we're having in Afghanistan, which has continued to worsen. We've got to shore up those efforts," he said.
Afghanistan is where Gates and the Obama team appear to be most in synch.
Both have advocated an increase in US force levels, an acclerated program to expand the Afghan security forces, and a broader strategic plan that encompasses Pakistan, a hideout for al-Qaeda and a staging ground for Taliban attacks in Afghanistan.
Both also have publicly advocated closing the US detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a symbol to many of the excesses of the US "war on terror."
Gates, who has advised six US presidents, also brings deep experience and excellent relations with the Congress where he disarmed Democratic critics of the war with candor and a dry, self-deprecating sense of humor.
In the two years since succeeding Donald Rumsfeld as defense secretary, the former spymaster has overseen a 30,000-troop surge that rescued a dramatically failing US mission in Iraq.
Violence and US casualties have fallen to the lowest levels since the US invasion in March 2003, opening the way for a steady drawdown of forces.
"As we proceed deeper into the end game, I would urge our leaders to implement strategies that while steadily reducing our presence in Iraq also take into account the advice of our commanders," he told lawmakers recently.
Some observers believe that Gates will bow out once an Obama team has had time to settle in and get their bearings.
Historical studies by the Joint Staff have shown that major events often have occurred within a year of a new president's taking office.
Lapses in attention to terrorism during the early months of the Bush administration helped set the stage for the September 11, 2001 attacks.
On other flashpoint problems, like Iran, Gates has warned against military action except as a last resort, and pushed "soft power," arguing for more money and a greater role for diplomacy and other non-military instruments of power.
"Not every outrage, every act of aggression, every crisis can or should elicit an American military response, and we should acknowledge such," he told an audience of military officers at the National Defense University earlier this year.
"Be modest about what military force can accomplish, and what technology can accomplish," he said.
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