This, from the Washington Times:
Gen. David H. Petraeus plans to open an in-house intelligence organization at U.S. Central Command this week that will train military officers, covert agents and analysts who agree to focus on Afghanistan and Pakistan for up to a decade.
The organization, to be called the Center for Afghanistan Pakistan Excellence, will be led by Derek Harvey, a retired colonel in the Defense Intelligence Agency who became one of the Gen. Petraeus’ most trusted analysts during the 2007-08 counterinsurgency campaign in Iraq.
Hmmm. Expertise. Political expedience. Expertise. Political expedience. Say that combo ten times fast, and let me know which one you get tripped up on. The problem isn’t analysts and other dedicated folks staying focused on the subject at hand. Political masters and senior staff are notoriously, monstrously pragmatic, and will think absolutely nothing of assigning, say, the resident West Africa guy to go deep on South West Asia…. with a report back deadline of tomorrow morning. I have no doubt that the management will come up with some wonderful feat of time compression to abbreviate that decade-long commitment, when conditions demand it, and reassign folks whenever there’s a shortage of heavy lifters and thinkers somewhere else.
H/t DR
MICHAEL A. INNES 
Apparently, necessity is the mother of invention, after all. I think this is a good idea, but it’s about 5 years too late.