Posted on 06/27/2010 9:10:14 PM PDT by stolinsky
After a 34-year military career, General Stanley McChrystal was relieved from command in Afghanistan because of reports in Rolling Stone that he and his staff made critical remarks about the administration. Islamic websites cited his removal by President Obama as proof that we are losing the war.
General McChrystal was “taken out” as surely as if he had been hit by a bullet from an enemy sniper. He might even have preferred that. Opinions vary, but most describe him as a superb officer, one close to his troops.
A key commander was removed at a critical time, because of remarks he and his staff allegedly made − in private − to a reporter from a liberal, counter-cultural magazine. That is, an officer who demonstrates abundant honor was fired by a president who has less, as a result of an article by a reporter who has none at all. How could this happen?
(Excerpt) Read more at stolinsky.com ...
That means that sub Zero owns this war. That sub Zero will lose it. That this will be his Waterloo.
WHo WEE.. if Barry Half-White could read my mind.. he would blush..
“to a reporter from a liberal, counter-cultural magazine”
He supported & voted for Obama - what does that make him?
If I got four hours sleep a night and ate one meal daily, I might have voted for Obama myself.
I had exactly that thought.
It was a head shot by Rolling Stone carefully calculated to inflame the rage of the most thin-skinned president in our lifetime.
The title, calling McChrystal a “runaway,” clearly trumpeted dishonorable cowardice and smeared a patriot just like the General Betrayus title smeared Petraeus.
There wasn't the slightest evidence of “runaway” in the character of McChrystal if you don't count an aversion to fancy formal French dinners.
Right below the title Obama would, of course, been enraged by the reference to “wimps in the White House” falsely attributed to McChrystal. I couldn't find any use of the word “wimp” by McChrystal or his staff, only by the reporter who wrote story, or the editor who wrote that line under the story title.
Here is a quote from a UK Telegraph article showing an assessment more grounded in reality, unlike the fawning US media who proclaimed Obama brilliant for demoting Petraeus to replace McChrystal:
“How wrong the conventional wisdom can be. Obama’s actions in dragging McChrystal back to Washington and personally sacking him in as dramatic a fashion as possible in fact displayed weakness. They also avoided the real problem - his confused Afghanistan policy and dysfunctional civilian team.
“No one would pretend that the profane, juvenile banter of McChrystal and his aides was clever or appropriate, never mind in the presence of an iconoclastic Rolling Stone reporter. The general, a legendary combat leader who engaged in fire fights in Iraq alongside SAS troopers while in his 50s, deserved to be reprimanded.
“Inartful and ill-advised as the words were, however, they also spoke to a justifiable deep frustration within the US military in Afghanistan and contained a degree of truth about Obama’s civilian officials that made the famously thin-skinned President decidedly uncomfortable.”
It was clearly a setup and hit job from beginning to end!
Exactly why remains to be seen IMHO
He was a lefty that was so politically driven and thin skinned that he had the Fox News channel removed from his TV.
His priorities did not spur him to shoot back at the ragheads who just killed one of our country's defenders. I can't help but wonder what the family of the man who gave his life under those ROE's thought of that (I'm sure AP/Rooters will get right on that)
He had swallowed hook, line and sinker the concept that if we disarm, the most vile people on earth will fall in love with us and suddenly turn on the worst of them, regardless of the fact that as soon as McCrystal leaves, anyone who cooperates with us is marked for death.
He was reckless with his own security, and encouraged his men to be.
I can see why Obama picked him.
Sorry, but I am going to disagree with almost everyone here... He was too much aligned with the progressive left and caused unnecessary deaths of our soldiers with his feel good policies. I can understand that many of those same policies came from Obama, but if you don’t stand up for the troops, you are useless in my mind.
Amen. McChrystal’s first priority was reducing civilian casualties, even if it meant more military would be killed.
Yes, I agree... and that was just WRONG. Another priority from out wonderful president!
An email from a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan:
We can all agree that McChrystal was imprudent to allow a freelancer (for Rolling Stone!) access to himself and his inner circle. He has admitted as much. But the hysteria is seriously overwrought:
1. He didn’t undermine civilian control in Afghanistan. Nothing in the article questions the policy set by the president in December. On the contrary, McChrystal and his aides main complaint is that the president’s civilian advisors are undermining the president’s policy. This is significantly different from Fox Fallon, who was fired as CENTCOM commander after that Esquire profile in March 2008 because he disagreed with and undermined President Bush’s policies in the region.
2. He didn’t speak disrespectfully of his chain of command. That chain, remember, runs from McChrystal to Petraeus to Gates to the President. Jim Jones, Dick Holbrooke, and others are unelected staffers and considerably less accomplished than is McChrystal, for that matter. (The same applies to Biden, even though he’s elected.) Plus, McChrystal himself is quoted directly only about Biden and Holbrooke; neither quote is especially critical. The most surprising tidbit to me is that McChrystal voted for Obama...
3. All these blind quotes are basically true, aren’t they? Does anyone in this town disagree that Jones is out of his depth? Or that Holbrooke is a wounded animal? Or that Eikenberry has a serious ego problem, resents his failure to get a fourth star, or blindsided McChrystal with that cable to protect himself?
4. I wouldn’t even concede the blind quotes are accurate. Is Hastings a reliable reporter? I do know that he writes that the surge began in 2006 and that McChrystal was “regimental” commander of 3rd Ranger “Battalion.” One doesn’t need any military knowledge to know these are wrong. How many other errors did he make?
Anyway, that’s the two cents of a low-level veteran!
-Found at - http://www.hughhewitt.com/blog/
“We shouldn’t be surprised that he took less than 40 hours to sack his hand-picked commander in Afghanistan even after dithering for four months over that commander’s recommendations.” - Hugh
“McChrystal’s first priority was reducing civilian casualties, even if it meant more military would be killed.”
Gen McChrystal’s directive
Which Petraeus himself subscribes to:
The use of air-to-ground munitions and indirect fires against residential compounds is only authorized under very limited and prescribed conditions (specific conditions deleted due to operational security).
(NOTE) This directive does not prevent commanders from protecting the lives of their men and women as a matter of self-defense where it is determined no other options (specific options deleted due to operational security) are available to effectively counter the threat.
Could you provide some examples where McChrystal was directly responsible for deaths of our soldiers? A couple of articles with date - location - of incidents would be fine. Thanks.
Well let’s see...
They came out with an award for withholding fire, just in case civilians were involved...
The deaths have increased in the last month due to ROE’s...
Many soldiers are complaining about the ROE’s - maybe they have something to say... After all, it is their life that the government is playing with...
Of course, if you are progressive in nature, you would not care about the casualties...just soldiers after all...
"Hastings and Parhamovich met in 2005 in New York while he was working at the magazine and she was a publicist for Air America Radio."
figures.
This is the General’s responsibility! If he can’t stand up for the troops, he need to be gone. I give a damn about Obama’s directives, if he disagrees (and in this case he should), he should resign, not put his troops at risk unnecessarily...
Anyone who gives an interview to the druggie, sex,rock and roll, anti-war, anti-military, Rolling Stone is an idiot, and deserved whatever he gets.
The fact that this supposedly “brilliant” military man voted for Obama just confirms that fact.
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