<<The consensus of the JCS and the generals on the sciene was that a surge was needed and they reccomended a number.>>
The problem was that there was some informed military opinion that the recommended number was short by hundreds of thousands from what it needed to be. In September 2009, in a classified report, Gen. McChrystal stated that the war needed a commitment of 500,000 troops for five years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Afghanistan_%282001%E2%80%93present%29<<After mulling it over more than two months the President takes decisive action , and gives the generals two thirds of the manpower they had asked for.>>
Mulled it over? WTF would
YOU do if one general who seems to know what he's talking about gives an estimate of half a million and others say 90,000?? Either McChrystal and his staff are right or the other guys (the JCS) are right. If the right number is half a million, what's the difference if the JCS gets 60,000 or 90,000? Either way they're fucked If McChrystal is correct, there is no fucking way. The country can't afford half a million troops in Afghanistan for five years, so they might as well pull the plug on the whole fucking enterprise right now - - only Obama can't afford the political consequences of doing so. So he's more or less stuck on going ahead with the JCS estimates, only in reality they're fucked at 90,000 and they're fucked at 60,000. Either way they're fucked. Obama had no choice (politically) but to go with the JCS and hope to hell they were right and not McChrystal. But at the same time, figuring correctly that they had buffed up their estimate to give him some fat he could cut, he gambled on the 2/3 figure.
<<Bush also had this problem , but between the two Obama has it worse.>>
How you figure that?
<<Can you imagine Rosevelt and Chirchill responding to the needs of the campains with such a lack of dispatch?>>
You tell me. I have no idea when they were presented with troop estimates and how long they took to respond. I don't see the comparison anyway between WWII, a very mobile and fluid war of large armies moving at
blitzkrieg speed with the fate of the world hanging in the balance and a counterinsurgency campaign in Afghanistan with virtually nothing at stake that anyone gives a shit about.