WASHINGTON, Feb. 6 (UPI) -- Did Admiral William Fallon fumble the ball at his confirmation hearing as the next Central Command chief last week? Or were concerned U.S. senators simply asking the wrong questions?
There was certainly a widespread buzz around Capitol Hill on Jan. 30 that Fallon's performance in his testimony was one of the least impressive of any senior serving officer in living memory.
As The Washington Times' Rowan Scarborough and Charles Hurt reported Jan. 31, Fallon admitted that even after being picked to run the most strategically important U.S. command that oversees the war in Iraq, "he does not know much about the plan that the administration says will determine whether the U.S. wins the war."
Fallon admitted to stunned senators, "I have not gotten into the detail of these plans." He admitted ignorance of how future Iraqi theater ground forces commander, Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, would use his forces to deal with the escalating Sunni insurgency in the California-sized country of 28 million people.
"I do not know the details" of how Gen. Petraeus plans to use the additional forces President Bush has approved as part of his new "surge" strategy, Fallon admitted. "I'm sure he's going to have to consult with his generals on the ground once he gets into position and then figure it out."
"The admiral's lack of knowledge startled some senators," Scarborough and Hurt wrote.
"I'm surprised that you don't have that understanding going in, frankly," Sen. Carl. Levin, D.-Mich., the hard-charging new chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, bluntly told the admiral according to the Washington Times report.
Defenders of the admiral have argued that it is perfectly reasonable for him not to know much, or even anything, about the conduct of ground operations in his theater, or that he could be a quick study and master the relevant expertise rapidly. His critics claim that his lack of specificity means he is likely to be wash-out as CENTCOM commander-in-chief.
Neither the pro nor anti-Fallon arguments have much merit to them. Good and experienced four star general officers keep themselves well briefed privately on major military operations in their commands down to tactical levels. Partly for this reason, it is usual for U.S. government and Department of Defense policy to pick four star general officers for theaters that have vast operational knowledge relevant to the wars and security challenges in the parts of the world that their commands cover.
Adm. Fallon was a perfect choice, therefore, for his years running PACCOM or Pacific Command, where he enjoyed wide respect and success because his expertise as a Navy aviator and director of air operations from carriers, which gave him a mastery of the relevant forms of U.S. power projection in the Western Pacific region.
For the same reason, no previous CENTCOM four-star general officer had come out of the U.S. Navy because the main security challenges in the region usually required expertise in ground force operations.
Nor can such expertise be acquired overnight. Gen. Petraeus was a natural choice for the post of Iraq ground forces commander because he had served as a senior general in the conquest of Iraq in March-April 2003 at the head of the 101st Airborne Division, because of his tour as a senior general in northern Iraq, and because he had co-authored the U.S. Army's manual on counter-insurgency warfare.
Adm. Fallon has some four decades of experience in carrier-launched air operations and is one of the world's most experienced commanders in that field.
It is therefore also wrong to dismiss Adm. Fallon as any kind of fool or sycophant because he acknowledged honestly to the Senate Armed Services Committee what he knew and did not know about the details of ground forces operations and future plans in Iraq. Fools do not become four star general officers in the armed Forces of the United States
Both sets of arguments therefore miss the mark. The key lesson to learn from Adm. Fallon's testimony and the debate surrounding it and from his frank acknowledgement of his lack of expertise about key issues dealing with the conduct of military operations in Iraq is that, as we have noted in previous columns, he was chosen for the CENTCOM post for other reasons.
Adm. Fallon has little recent experience in the Middle East and none in commanding ground forces in land battles. He is an expert in the projection of maritime-based air power. Therefore, if the Bush administration either plans to launch air strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities in the foreseeable future, or if it expects any significant Iranian offensive operations against U.S. forces in Iraq or against U.S allies in the Gulf, then Adm. Fallon's appointment and his vast experience in directing carrier-borne air strikes makes far more sense.
There was one other revealing aspect of Adm. Fallon's testimony: It confirmed the prediction we made in these columns that Gen. Petraeus would be given a free hand to run military operations in Iraq without the customary oversight that a four star command general usually gives to the commander theater operations within a single country. In a war as complex and fast-evolving as the one in Iraq, that deprives the U.S. command structure of a valuable level of balance and oversight, however experienced and even brilliant the theater-level ground forces commander is.
As we have noted before, Adm. Fallon's selection as the next CENTCOM chief only makes sense if his vast experience as a director of carrier-based operations is regarded as being essential to major tasks within the CENTCOM region. And that would mean major air strikes against Iran are being at least contemplated by U.S. policymakers. No other explanation cuts any ice.
