Yoni Applebaum explains:
Keeping Bob Gates as Secretary of Defense was the most dramatic signal
Barack Obama could have sent that he intends to implement major changes
in defense policy. That may sound counterintuitive, but it has the
virtue of being true.
As Josh noted this morning, 'cabinet appointees execute policy. They
work for the president.' So if Gates is tasked to take us out of Iraq
and to redouble our efforts in Afghanistan, we can expect him to carry
out both tasks with the same degree of competence he's exhibited thus
far in his tenure. In a properly functioning administration, the
Secretary of Defense is one of several key voices advising the
president on where and how to exercise military force. But he possesses
primary responsibility for deciding how that force should be
structured, staffed, equipped, and supplied. Those are decisions the
president largely delegates, and thus where the secretary exercises his
greatest degree of autonomy. And it is in those realms of defense
policy that Gates has most distinguished himself. In retaining Gates,
Obama is sending a clear signal to the Pentagon bureaucracy that their
usual strategy of stalling and out-lasting civilian appointees is going
to fail; that he intends to pursue Gates' key reforms. And that's a
decision which should make us all stand and cheer.'
