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Army 3-star picked for ‘war czar’

An active-duty three-star Army general will become coordinator of the war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Bush said Tuesday.

Lt. Gen. Douglas E. Lute, the director of operations for the Joint Staff at the Pentagon, will be “the full-time manager for the implementation and execution of our strategies for Iraq and Afghanistan,” Bush said in a statement released by the White House.

As such, Lute will serve as a direct link between commanders in the field, ambassadors Ryan Crocker and William Wood and National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, and will work “closely” with members of Bush’s cabinet, Bush said. Lute will also manage the “interagency policy development process” for the two wars.

“General Lute is a tremendously accomplished military leader who understands war and government and knows how to get things done,” Bush said. “While serving at Central Command, General Lute played an integral role in implementing combat operation plans in Iraq and Afghanistan and gained a critical understanding of the challenges we face in the Global War on Terror. He has already earned the respect and trust of the officials with whom he will be working in his new role.”

Lute, who must be confirmed by the Senate, will carry the title of Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan. He will report to Hadley.

Lute will continue to serve on active duty and will be nominated as a three-star general, a senior defense official said Tuesday. As such, he’ll be outranked by the four-star commander of U.S. Central Command, Adm. William J. Fallon, and the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Army Gen. David Petraeus.

By law, Lute must be renominated at his current grade.

The announcement ends an administration recruiting effort that lasted for at least six weeks and seemed initially aimed at hiring someone out of uniform. The White House apparently had no luck in that regard, having offered the job to at least three retired general officers, all of whom turned it down.

They included retired Marine Gen. Jack Sheehan, retired Army Gen. Jack Keane and retired Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston, sources say. Sheehan, a former NATO commander, rejected the job in very public fashion, harshly criticizing the administration’s conduct of the war.

While Lute’s range of responsibilities and power are yet to be precisely detailed, the administration does not want someone to micromanage or “run the war,” Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates told Pentagon reporters during an Apr. 11 press conference. Gates said he was surprised by the level of interest in the concept and said the phrase “war czar,” quickly coined after news of the administration’s search leaked out last month, struck him as “kind of silly.”

“The person is better described as a coordinator and a facilitator, somebody — this is what Steve Hadley would do if Steve Hadley had the time, but he doesn’t have the time to do it full-time,” Gates said.

“One of the arguments that we hear frequently — and frankly are very sympathetic with — is that we and the State Department are about the only parts of the government that are at war,” Gates said. “This kind of position is intended to ensure that where other parts of the government can play a contributing role, that in fact they understand what the president’s priorities are and make sure that the commanders in the field, the ambassador in the field gets what he needs.”

If confirmed, Lute will fall into a special wartime category of general officers — there currently more than 20 — who serve in special positions at the pleasure of the president, the defense official said. As such, they are not counted against the congressional limit on how many generals the Army can have on active duty at any given time.

Lute is a 30-year veteran and armor officer who served much of his early career in Germany during the Cold War. He took part in the 1991 Gulf War as the operations officer for the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment. He later commanded the 1st Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment and the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, and was assistant division commander (support) for the 1st Infantry Division in Kosovo.

Lute will bring a wide range of joint planning and senior staff experience to the White House. His jobs have included two years as the politico-military planner — and later, the chief of the Central and Eastern European Branch — on the Joint Staff. He later served as deputy director of operations for U.S. European Command. From June 2004 to September 2006, Lute was the director of operations for U.S. Central Command, which oversees the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.