to the New York Times, whose Peter Baker says that in the new book, Woodward says that some of the critical players in President Obama's national security team doubt his strategy in Afghanistan will succeed and have spent much of the last 20 months quarreling with one another. Not a big surprise.
Baker says some of Obama's top White House advisers on Afghanistan are described in the book as believing the strategy will not work. Also not exactly a shocking revelation.
Woodward also notes in the book, reports Baker, that the President privately told Vice President Joe Biden to push his alternative strategy opposing a big troop buildup in meetings, and while Obama ultimately rejected it, he set a withdrawal timetable because, 'I can't lose the whole Democratic Party.'
According to The New York Times' Baker, Woodward also says that Gen. David Petraeus told a senior aide that he disliked talking with David M. Axelrod, the president's senior adviser, because he was 'a complete spin doctor," and that Petraeus was effectively banned by the administration from the Sunday talk shows. To read the New York Times piece, click here.
