On May 18th of this year, I went to a talk at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs by General David H. Petraeus. It was entitled AN UPDATE FROM U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND.
And then: an article in Rolling Stone appears all over the internet before the hard copy even hits the stands, there is a MEDIA-PUNDIT-INTERNET uproar (with some justification) followed by the stepping down of one General, a stepping into a different role by another, and a new Commander of U.S. Central Command. The new Commander is General Mattis – another pretty quotable guy.
Life. Unpredictable, eh?
If any of you are still interested, I’ve translated some of my “worse-than-chicken-scratchings” notes of the event below. Have a look, if so inclined (and hey, I’m not a professional journalist so it’s not like my notes are the gospel or anything).