In light of the recent morass that involves Petraeus and now Allen, both General Officers of the United States Army who have been shuffled about the game board like bishops in our various theatres of imperialism, I ask: Are there not hundreds of viable and competent candidates for any of the assignments either holds?
A General is just that, general. You should be able to plonk him in any theatre and give him orders and expect he can assemble the appurtenant personnel and get the job done. He or she should be able to quickly assess the mission and the resources necessary and argue for twice what he needs and then be happy with a quarter of the ask. This is the job description.
Likewise I expect there to be an [ex]spook[ish] administrator type with mean political skills that can head the CIA. I hope there are more than a hundred such individuals that fit that slot.
We are a country of 300M plus people. Are you telling me we have to keep pulling from a small pool of less than 20, playing musical chairs to keep these positions of responsibility filled? Really?? We spend billions on DOD and the CIA, but there's only a small club that gets the plum spots? Are we spending that money keeping better and more qualified people from doing a better job than the people we have? Seems like it.
I refuse to believe we don't have deserving and excellent practitioners that can step right in and keep things running. Get some new blood.