Defense Secretary Robert Gates has announced he will not renominate Gen. Peter Pace to be chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. When Peter Pace steps down at the end of September, he will become the shortest-serving chair since Gen. Maxwell Taylor in 1964 during the early years of the Vietnam War. Gates predicted a reconfirmation hearing for Pace before Congress would have been contentious.

Robert Gates: “I am no stranger to contentious confirmations, and I do not shrink from them. However, I have decided that at this moment in our history, our men and women in uniform and General Pace himself would not be well served by a divisive ordeal in selecting the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”

Robert Gates has nominated Navy Admiral Michael Mullen to be the next chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Mullen has predicted the war on terror will go on for a generation. He said earlier this year: “The enemy now is basically evil and fundamentally hates everything we are — the democratic principles for which we stand … This war is going to go on for a long time. It’s a generational war.” Mullen’s nomination comes as The Washington Post reports the U.S. military is envisioning keeping a force of over 40,000 troops in Iraq for years, if not decades, to come. In recent weeks, Bush administration officials have said the U.S. might maintain a military presence in Iraq like it has in South Korea, where it has kept troops since the end of the Korean War 54 years ago.