Gen. McChrystal

[lazypadawan.livejournal.com]

For those of you who haven't heard...General Stanley McChrystal, the guy in charge of our efforts in Afghanistan, various aides, and some soldiers blabbed in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine about how much the Obama administration's management of the Afghan war sucks. The RS mag comes out on Friday. McChrystal issued an apology but has been summoned to Washington to meet with Obama and his Al Capone baseball bat to "explain his statements."

Many soldiers agree with McChrystal as they disagree with the big no-no of talking smack about the CIC publicly. Afghan pols are rallying to McChrystal's side.

CNN is claiming that McChrystal is going to tell Obama, "You can't fire me, I quit."

Here's Jeb Babbin's take:

http://biggovernment.com/jbabbin/2010/06/22/obama-cant-fire-mccrystal/#more-135594

Here's Monica Crowley's take:

http://biggovernment.com/mcrowley/2010/06/22/mcchrystal-goes-rogue-again/

Byron York has a good piece on the Washington Examiner's website but it's doing a number on my browser.

Here's what I think. It's not a good thing for a general to be mouthing off about the CIC's policies, character, etc.. McChrystal and his aides may have gone too far by going to the media with this. It sets a bad precedent.

But I can, even as a civilian, understand his frustration. Obama and his military-hating cronies are not committed to winning. Political considerations have overtaken military strategy. Either McChrystal pulled this stunt as a way to get Obama's attention--and the public's attention--back on Afghanistan or as a way to get off a sinking ship.

We have never learned the lesson of Vietnam...we cannot let politicians, the media, and eggheads run a war. They don't want the soldiers to get their uniforms dirty. You're more free to kick @$$ if you're on a football field than on a battlefield thanks to ROE that read like they were written by a 21-year-old hippie chick. If you commit to a war, you go in all of the way or you stay home. Winning comes from not the hearts and minds crap, but from utterly psychologically crushing the enemy and making them sorry they ever messed with you in the first place. My plan for Afghanistan would have been along the lines of turning the Hindu Kush mountains into a parking lot and wiping out every Taliban mo-fo without mercy. Take nothing off of the table. Once it's all said and done, you can send in the missionaries and start the work of turning the place into the next Japan or Germany.

Comments

[coldblossom.livejournal.com]

I disagree that Gen. McChrystal should've aired these feelings in this way and at this time. There was an excellent article about how, in the end, this boils down to rotten leadership from the CnC. The article is here (http://hotair.com/archives/2010/06/22/did-obama-reap-what-he-sowed-with-mcchrystal/) at HotAir and makes the case that McChrystal isn't the first to go to the media with problems with the war but Obama should never have allowed anyone to do so, but he did and this breakdown in discipline is the result (seems like it was OK when it was an opinion the President liked, but now that someone is making him look foolish its time for heads to roll). Not that excuses anything, but you reap what you sow.

That said, I am very concerned that Obama will dismiss Gen. McChrystal at a critical stage of the war. If he does this, he will have a convenient scapegoat to blame when things go south, which they will, due to the abrupt change in leadership.

It was also implied that Democrats might decide to alter or even withhold funding for the war over this. That would be the most ridiculous political stunt in a long time, to put the success of an entire war in jeopardy over some name-calling.

Edit: love this passage over at Big Government:

Shortly after President Obama assumed the Commander-in-Chief duties, he retired the existing commanding general in Afghanistan and hand-picked his successor: General Stanley McChrystal. McChrystal was always known as a brash and outspoken military man, an expert in counterinsurgency, greatly respected by the troops under his command, and as having little patience for fools.

His requirement to have to answer to Obama, then, was a trainwreck waiting to happen.

[link (http://biggovernment.com/mcrowley/2010/06/22/mcchrystal-goes-rogue-again/)]

[sreya.livejournal.com]

*snickering* Yeah, that Big Government passage is a good one.