[Doom1]

"U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has named the top U.S. commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, to lead the U.S. Central Command, which oversees the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as U.S. military operations and security cooperation throughout the Middle East and in Central Asia and East Africa. VOA's Al Pessin reports from the Pentagon.
The move was not a surprise, but it confirmed Secretary Gates' desire for continuity in Iraq strategy, and the expansion to Afghanistan of the kind of success the administration says General Petraeus has had in Iraq.
"The kind of conflicts that we're dealing with not just in Iraq, but in Afghanistan, and some of the challenges that we face elsewhere in the region, in the Central Command area, are very much characterized by asymmetric [guerilla] warfare," said Secretary Gates. "And I don't know anybody in the United States military better qualified to lead that effort."
Secretary Gates also announced that General Petraeus' former deputy in Iraq, Lieutenant General Raymond Odierno, will replace him, even though Odierno has only been home from Iraq for two months, much shorter than the minimum one year.
Gates was asked whether that reflects a 'stay the course' strategy, an approach that hurt President Bush's Republican Party in the 2006 election. The secretary indicated things have changed since General Petraeus was put in place early last year, including a surge of U.S. forces and a new counterinsurgency strategy."


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