The Washington Post’s Michael D. Shear and Ann Scott Tyson tell us that Defense Secretary Robert Gates will remain atop the Pentagon for at least another year. Barack Obama wants him as Sec Def, though the Obama administration is expected to replace other political appointees at the Pentagon. The heart of the national security line-up has now been decided: Gates, Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, and former NATO commander James Jones as National Security Adviser.

The next months and years will determine whether these are good choices. But I don’t quite understand the infatuation so many in Washington have with Gates. I guess the case for Gates is–to paraphrase Obama campaign adviser Richard Danzig– that he did pretty good in the down and out Bush administration so he could do even better in the Obama administration.

To be sure, Gates has done some interesting and important things like slam the Air Force weapons budget. But he has hardly been a courageous dissenting voice on Iraq or Pentagon-authorized torture. Like Obama, though, he wants more troops in Afghanistan. And like Obama, he’s failed to articulate why more troops will remedy that quagmire.-MB

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