Petraeus at the Super Bowl

General David Petraeus made an appearance at the Super Bowl. The contradiction between the increase in specialization in the NFL and Petraeus' job is striking. Some NFL teams have a punter, a kicker for field goals, and a kicker for kickoffs while Petraeus is the head of U.S. Central Command, which puts him in charge of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The conditions, cultures, peoples, histories, and circumstances are profoundly different in Iraq and Afghanistan. The battle to be fought is different. The way the United States needs to relate to the people in the two countries is different. Afghanistan hasn't been occupied by a foreign force for a few thousand years. The country has fallen victim to an invasion, a civil war, and now another invasion in the last thirty years. The country's infrastructure is practically nil. The U.S. overthrew a religiously Sunni fundamentalist regime. After overcoming British colonialism, Iraq eventually saw a secular strongman take over the well-developed nation. Iraq featured a burgeoning middle class and a predominately Shiite population. Afghanistan has many different ethnic groups, but the largest are the Pashtuns. Iraqis are mostly Arab. The differences are overwhelmingly endless.

If there was ever a time for specialization it should be in dealing with the situations in Iraq and Afghanistan. And let's let one guy do all a team's kicking in the NFL.