If you know anything about the military then you know that Petraeus knows the chain of command or he wouldn’t have all those stars on his shoulders today.

Petraeus said the following during his last briefing:

a mission focus on either population security or transition alone will not be adequate to achieve our objectives;

the security and local political situations will enable us to draw down the surge forces.

long-term US ground force viability will benefit from force reductions as the surge runs its course;