By Emelie Rutherford
Defense Secretary Robert Gates recommended to the White House that Marine Gen. James Mattis command U.S. Central Command and oversee the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
If President Barack Obama heeds Gates’ recommendation to nominate Mattis, and the Senate confirms the nomination, Mattis will replace Army Gen. David Petraeus. Petraeus stepped down and took over as commander of U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan last week after Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal resigned after he was quoted in Rolling Stone magazine making controversial comments about the Obama administration.
Mattis now heads Joint Forces Command and previously commanded the requirements-setting Marine Corps Combat Development Command.
“Gen. Mattis has proven to be one of the military’s most innovative and iconoclastic thinkers,” Gates said yesterday at a Pentagon press conference. “His insights into the nature of warfare in the 21st century have influenced my own views about how the armed forces must be shaped and postured for the future.”
Gates tapped Mattis to lead the Pentagon’s so-called “red team” for the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review, an assignment the defense secretary attributed to the general’s “strategic insight and independent thinking.”