General David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said on Thursday he had recommended a slower drawdown than President Barack Obama had decided upon, but backed the decision and said no military commander in history gets “all the forces he would like to have, for all the time.”
“The ultimate decision was a more aggressive formulation, if you will, in terms of the timeline than what we had recommended,” Petraeus told a Senate hearing on his nomination to become CIA director.
“Again, that is understandable in the sense that there are broader considerations beyond just those of a military commander.”
