Petraeus allied with McKiernan, the US commander in Afghanistan... in rejecting the idea of replicating the 'surge' in Iraq.."

Spencer Ackerman, here

“Some of the concepts used in Iraq are transplantable [to Afghanistan] while
others perhaps are not,” he said. “Every situation is unique.”

Petraeus pointed to efforts by Hamid Karzai’s government to negotiate a deal
with the Taliban that would potentially bring some Taliban members back to
power, saying that if they are “willing to reconcile,” it would be “a positive
step.”

In saying that, Petraeus implicitly allied with U.S. Army Gen. David
McKiernan, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan. Last week, McKiernan rejected the
idea of replicating the blend of counterinsurgency strategy employed in Iraq.
“The word that I don’t use in Afghanistan is the word ’surge,’” McKiernan said,
opting against recruiting Pashtun tribal fighters to supplement Afghan security
forces against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. “There are countless other differences
between Iraq and Afghanistan,” he added.

McCain, however, has argued that the Afghanistan war is ripe for a direct
replication of Petraeus’ Iraq strategy of population-centric counterinsurgency.
“Sen. Obama calls for more troops,” McCain said in the Sept. 26 debate, “but
what he doesn’t understand, it’s got to be a new strategy, the same strategy
that he condemned in Iraq. It’s going to have to be employed in
Afghanistan.”