Petraeus, Odierno, Iraq and Iran

Secretary of Defense Gates announced yesterday that General David Petraeus, currently the Commander of all Multi-National Forces in Iraq, has been nominated for the position of Centcom Commander with authority over our military in Iraq, Afghanistan and the larger Middle East. LTG Odierno has been nominated to take over the MNF-I Command Petraeus is vacating. These nominations have important political implications and may signal a willingness to begin to take on Iran and its proxy war.

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This from the Washington Post:

Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq and the public face of the war effort there, became President Bush's nominee yesterday to supervise U.S. military operations in the Middle East and Central Asia as head of Central Command, putting him in position to oversee American strategy in Iraq for years to come.

Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, who worked closely with Petraeus as the No. 2 commander in Iraq until two months ago, was nominated to receive a fourth star and to take Petraeus's current job as the leader of Multi-National Force-Iraq. . . .

Read the article. Clearly Petraeus and Odierno are both emininently qualified duo for promotion to these positions based on their proven track record of success in Iraq.

This also means that new round of Congressional committee hearings will be scheduled in May or June to approve these nominations. This will put the issues of Iraq, Iran, al Qaeda and Afghanistan back squarely in the public consciousness to compete with the marathon Democratic nomination battle.

Lastly, and most importantly, it may well signal a hardening of our position against Iran. Both Petraeus and Odierno are vocal about Iran's proxy war. I wrote earlier that our next move should be a limited attack against Iran's Qods force and related assets on Iranian soil both as a necessary step for self defense and to put the threat of force clearly back on the table as to Iran's sprint towards a nuclear arsenal.