Extracts from new book coming out with extensive material regarding bad treatment of Richard Holbrooke, SHS '58

Describes how Obama White House and its military advisors used every means available to undercut/marginalize Holbrooke's (SHS '58) mission in Afghanistan; only Hillary Clinton prevented his removal as special ambassador; not a pretty picture.

‘Little America’: Infighting on Obama team squandered chance for peace in Afghanistan  - By Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Published: June 24

Excerpted from “Little America: The War Within the War for Afghanistan.”


In late March 2010, President Obama’s national security adviser, James L. Jones, summoned Richard C. Holbrooke to the White House for a late-afternoon conversation. The two men rarely had one-on-one meetings, even though Holbrooke, the State Department’s point man for Afghanistan, was a key member of Obama’s war cabinet.

As Holbrooke entered Jones’s West Wing office, he sensed that the discussion was not going to be about policy, but about him. Holbrooke believed his principal mission was to accomplish what he thought Obama wanted: a peace deal with the Taliban. The challenge energized Holbrooke, who had more experience with ending wars than anyone in the administration. In 1968, he served on the U.S. delegation to the Paris peace talks with North Vietnam. And in 1995, he forged a deal in the former Yugoslavia to end three years of bloody sectarian fighting.

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Thanks to David A Ross SHS' 56 for sharing this article.----