Gates likely to sustain terror war

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Defense Secretary-designate Robert M. Gates is not expected to rein in the aggressive global war on al Qaeda started by predecessor Donald H. Rumsfeld or reverse the transformation of the Army, but instead focus on how to win in Iraq and get American troops home, current and former Pentagon officials say.

"He definitely is not seen as someone wimping out on the global war," said a Pentagon adviser. "How he does it, and what tools, and who he entrusts with them, that's a whole different issue."

Mr. Gates, once confirmed by what Republicans hope will be a December floor vote, will arrive at the Pentagon needing to replace a number of senior aides to Mr. Rumsfeld who set policy on intelligence, special operations and the war itself.

Some other officials Mr. Rumsfeld eyed for senior posts may be discarded because they would not get through a Democrat-controlled Senate, Pentagon officials said.

President Bush introduced his new defense secretary Wednesday and said Saturday that Mr. Gates was an "agent of change" in a sign of the growing momentum for a new direction in Iraq policy after election defeat for Republicans.

"He has experience leading large and complex organizations, and he has shown that he is an agent of change," Mr. Bush said in his weekly radio address. "He will provide a fresh outlook on our strategy in Iraq, and what we need to do to prevail."

That task will be Mr. Gates' overriding focus in the administration's last two years. The quiet government staff man and former college president will be the Pentagon leader the president hopes will ensure that Iraq is not as damaging in the 2008 election to Republicans as it was in 2006.

Mr. Gates resigned Friday from the Iraq Study Group, a blue-ribbon panel established by Congress to find new solutions for Iraq. The bipartisan group is headed by former Secretary of State James A. Baker III and former Rep. Lee Hamilton, Indiana Democrat.

It is Mr. Gates' ties to Mr. Baker and Brent Scowcroft, former President Bush's national security adviser, that has Republican hawks worried. Mr. Gates worked with both in the first Bush administration as CIA director and deputy to Mr. Scowcroft.

Mr. Scowcroft opposed the war and is said to be cool to Mr. Rumsfeld's aggressive style of using the full force of the military to confront al Qaeda. He was among the team of aides who advised the first President Bush to end the fighting against Iraq in 1991 in the first Gulf war.