The Long War Against Extremism in Afghanistan

Posted: August 20th, 2018

By General David Petraeus

General David Petraeus (US Army, Ret) served more than 37 years in the U.S. military, culminating his career with six consecutive commands, five of which were combat, including command of the Multi-National Force-Iraq during the Surge, U.S. Central Command, and Coalition and U.S. Forces in Afghanistan. He also served as Director of the CIA and is now a partner in the KKR global investment firm and chairs the firm’s global institute.

Nearly two and a half years ago, General David Petraeus (US Army, Ret.) wrote an opinion piece published in The Washington Post, titled, ‘5 ‘big ideas’ to guide us in the Long War against Islamic extremism’.

His fundamental point was that the U.S. had to get the ‘big ideas’ right in order to establish a framework for the comprehensive civil-military effort required to make progress against the Islamist extremists the US has fought in unending war since late 2001. The Surge in Iraq, which Petraeus commanded from February 2007 to September 2008, had impressed upon him that determining the right big ideas was the most important task of a strategic leader. In fact, he has frequently observed since then that the surge of ideas mattered much more than the surge of forces.

“The Cipher Brief has become the most popular outlet for former intelligence officers; no media outlet is even a close second to The Cipher Brief in terms of the number of articles published by formers.” —Sept. 2018, Studies in Intelligence, Vol. 62

Access all of The Cipher Brief’s national security-focused expert insight by becoming a Cipher Brief Subscriber+ Member.

Subscriber+