Panetta enjoys bipartisan support, but for how long?

A “home-run choice” is how a leading Republican qualified US President Barack Obama’s pick of Leon Panetta to replace Robert Gates as secretary of defence when Gates steps down Thursday. Indeed, the appointment of Panetta, CIA director since 2009, has made for a rare moment of bipartisan harmony in Washington, as his nomination to the head of the Pentagon was confirmed by all 100 senators last week.

According to John Fortier, a political scientist at the non-profit Bipartisan Policy Center, “the appointment does not in itself signal a big shift in defence policy”.

But the 73-year-old Panetta takes over the job at a crucial moment: he will oversee the remainder of the troop withdrawal from Iraq and Obama’s shifting strategy in Afghanistan; he also inherits the US participation in the operation against Gaddafi in Libya, and is expected to implement the end of the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, paving the way for gay Americans to serve openly in the military. Panetta will face these challenges in the wake of Obama’s call for 400 billion dollars in military spending cuts (through 2023) – and as Obama runs for re-election.

Congressional experience to come in handy

Panetta comes to his new position with little experience in crafting military strategy, but his political background is thought to equip him well for his new job at this particular time. Born in California to Italian immigrants, Panetta began his career as a moderate Republican and served in Richard Nixon’s administration as a civil rights advisor before crossing the lines in 1971.

He then served as a Democratic member of the House of Representatives (representing California from 1977 to 1993). According to Darrell West, a government scholar at the Brookings Institution, Panetta gained “tremendous political skills and policy knowledge” from his Congressional past. This experience is expected to serve him particularly well as defence secretary, as he will have to wrangle with Congress over the defence budget during a time when deficit reduction is a declared bipartisan goal.

After his terms in Congress, Panetta worked as President Bill Clinton’s budget director in 1993 and then his chief of staff from 1994 to 1997.

A look back at Panetta’s political career suggests a cautious approach to military interventions: as a congressman, he voted against authorising President George H.W.’s Persian Gulf War in 1991; in 2006, he served on the Iraq Study Group, a bipartisan commission that published a report recommending a faster end to the Iraq War, rather than the surge that President George W. Bush chose to pursue.

According to government scholar Darrell West, Panetta’s single most difficult task as defence secretary will be “navigating between generals who want slow troop withdrawals and a president who wants a speedier timetable”.

CIA connections and a focus on Pakistan

But it is Panetta’s experience as director of the CIA (a post to which he was appointed in February 2009) that is likely to have the most impact on his work at the Pentagon. Panetta oversaw the raid that resulted in al Qaeda chief Osama Bin Laden’s death in May in Pakistan, and before that, he implemented a dramatic increase in drone strikes in Pakistan targeting senior al Qaeda operatives. His counterterrorism strategy has been described as relatively limited, with its primary aim being to crack down on insurgents.

In the past few weeks before he officially steps into his new role, Panetta has zeroed in on Pakistan as the focus of the most pressing US foreign policy challenges. Speaking to the Senate Armed Services Committee on June 10, Panetta said that US-Pakistan ties amounted to “one of the most critical, and yet one of the most complicated and frustrating relationships that we have”.

Panetta’s work as CIA director is thought to be a major advantage in his future dealings with Pakistan, especially in communicating with the Pakistani espionage agency (Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence), which the US has accused of secretly bolstering the Taliban. Panetta himself has recently spoken out against what he characterised as Pakistan’s turning a blind eye to insurgents in the northwest that have been targeting Americans across the border in Afghanistan. He will likely be relying on the relationship he was able to build -- while working as CIA head – with the Pakistani spy agency’s chief, Lt.General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, in order to press Pakistan further on the matter.

It remains to be seen whether these contacts will get Panetta results that eluded his predecessor, Robert Gates. But for now, at least, he will begin his duties as defence secretary with wide support and confidence in his abilities. “If anyone can do this job, it is him,” West told France24.com.