Stan McChrystal’s Bold Vision
By Larry Johnson on October 7, 2009 at 11:24 PM in Current Affairs
Looks like Barack Obama and his allies on the Hill who are attacking the integrity of General Stanley McChrystal are illiterate. How else to explain their ignorant statements that are so at odds with what General Mcchrystal actually wrote and recommended.
So here’s your homework. Read the General’s assessment of Afghanistan and his recommendations.
Once you do that (I’m giving you 24 hours) then we will have a discussion.
Read it here.
The jackasses trying to pin the label of “MacArtheresque” on General McChrystal are ignorant asses who are displaying their complete failure to read or comprehend the history of the interaction between Douglas MacArthur and Harry Truman. MacArthur deliberately and repeatedly challenged Truman. McChrystal has done nothing of the sort. His actions have had the approval of the chain of command all along.
And one more thing. How dare Jim Webb impugn General McChrystal’s integrity by his snide remark that McChrystal should have attended a White House briefing rather than give a speech in London. Hey Jim. Yeah, you asshole. If your buddy Obamba had requested such a meeting do you really believe that General McChrystal would have told the President to “fuck off” and stayed in London. Hell no!!! You owe the General an apology. How dare you play such a chickenshit game.
(Release: November 13)
on sale for only $16.95.
has a spatula.)
8% Off at $11.95, with a rare five-star ranking by 294 customers: 
And check out these: 
("This crazy redhead is on to something. Her pink Rambler story alone is worth the price of the book," writes 
- “Richard Sale’s reportage on Washington, the CIA, the American armed forces, and foreign intrigue has created a perfect background for this account of the steady growth of President Clinton as a master of the game of nations.”--W. Patrick Lang, former head of Middle East Operations, DIA
"Anne C. Heller's stunning biography of Ayn Rand" uses a "plethora of newly unearthed research and fresh insight."
Glad you’re posting on this, Larry. Here is a WSJ article that echoes your views. He is their scapegoat.
Obama and the General
The White House finds a four-star scapegoat for its Afghan jitters.
Yes, pm317. How sad that the civilian administration is trotting out the sycophants with former military credentials who are willing to attack General McChrystal. Headline on Drudge this morning: “TROOP MORALE FALLING.” Understandable, and disgusting.
Viet Nam was a winnable war…….with the right strategy. LBJ was too busy scamming people stateside to come up with one though.
It has recently been revealed that LBJ and his advisers were fully aware that Medicare was going to cost far more—nine times more as we now know— than they were letting on. They knew that Medicare would never get passed if people understood the actual costs, so he and his advisers lied about it. Imagine that, our President neglecting his principle duties as Commander in Chief while pursuing personal glory, and historical immortality, by ramming through deceptive landmark legislation that would end up causing terrible damage to the private health care industry (whether you understand it or not, Medicare and Medicaid are the predominant reasons for the explosion of medical costs). I’m either experiencing Deja vu, or just a bad episode of SSDD (same shit, different decade)
Webb posed himself as independent,
now he is just an Obama robot.
Caveat…I have not read the entire memo and I will but at first glance this is all COIN again the surge. Now we know COIN was not the total success that is was portrayed as in Iraq. There were a number of other factors that gave us the final edge, namely AQ screwed itself by taking on the local tribal chiefs and we finally learned how to barter with the tribal factions after listening to the real experts (Iraq Tribal Study – Al-Anbar Governorate, as an example) rather than attempt to run them over with the surge.
Of course the question that remains is really what is the relationship between AQ and the Taliban today in Afghanistan? Even General Jones says that AQ is not as dependent on Afghanistan as it once was. So where should our focus really be? Afghanistan or Pakistan? And/or is after eight years Afghanistan a really threat to us? If it is 49,000 troops ain’t crap. Remember the support ot combat ratio… Marine’s 3 to 1 Army 5 to 1? So is 40,000 troops enough?
Here we go again I see…..
As far as ““MacArtheresque” goes, leaking this out to the press PRIOR to any formal approvals whether by the General or by who ever was not so smart and politically motivated. But unlike Bush who fired or forced retirement on General Officers who disagreed with him, so far that faith has not fallen on McChrystal…
Bold plan? Or audacious one?
Again this is all COIN…and I am not so sure that both the ANA and the ANP are capable of achieving the goals within the time frame the General wishes for….
My second problem is the political situation one which after eight years is still not anywhere near stable.
Additionally many of these villages and tribes especially in the south switch sides as they see fit for their own personal gain or should I say for the gain of their patron. This alone can be very dangerous to our forces and we still do not have that situation under control.
Finally, the Narco trade.. we need to deal once and for all with this issue. Its nice to attack the shoot the bad guys which currently is a target rich environment….but more importantly attacking the funding would do even greater damage….
PS: 40K ain’t going to be enough….
Thank you.
I have a comment
trapped in the spam filter
Please f r e e m e !!!
It’s a reply to my previous comment after reading the assesment.
Thanks LJ.
…where peceptions derived from actions…
We must never confuse the situation as it stands with the one we desire, lest we risk our credibility”.
I am very concerned about Obama’s demoralizing methods even if he ends up making a right decision. Like he’d want it to be a Pyrrhic victory. I’m not sure how to represent the “VRWC” in this issue but I remain convinced of the correctness of the “Let Larry be Larry” view. Why does the President let so many options twist in the wind?
Wow, that post from Larry from last August brought back memories (and anger). To answer your question, quite simply, he does not know which option to pick.
Larry, you win. Up to this point, I have been defending General Jones and Jim Webb for reasons that no longer seem to matter. I now believe that support was misplaced. They are more interested in covering for Obama, who has been MIA on this issue, than in supporting the McChrystal could have resigned but instead he told the truth, the memo was leaked by third parties, and according to my information he had approval from above to say what he did in London for the benefit of NATO as a whole, since this is a NATO operation. I will say it again because I know it to be true, here as with the pirates, the military was facing mission failure because of no decision from the White House. Jim Webb is a personal disappointment to me for taking this cheap shot at a man who spoke truth to power. I always believed Jim was that way but evidently not. I have been a supporter of his throughout his career, and although I do not know him personally, we have a common link to Annapolis, the Marine Corps, and at one time to the Republican Party. Old soldiers never die, but it is disappointing when they simply fade away.
Yeah, McChrystal oversees 100,000 NATO troops as well.
Lets face facts..this is really not about the General playing politics with the President. This is about politics in general.
There is no evidence of the General playing politics. If anything the opposite. Read the WSJ article I linked in my comment up thread or the WaPO article elizabeth linked below.
Ouch!
The President’s very public waver is already doing strategic harm. The Taliban are getting a morale boost and claiming victory, while our allies in Europe have one more reason to rethink their own deployments. Such a victory, as the head of the British army Sir David Richards warned on Sunday, would have an “intoxicating effect” on extremist Islam around the world.
Ouch!
Commanders in Chief can change their minds. George W. Bush waited too long to embrace the “surge.” He had private doubts when the casualties also surged in 2007, but he gave the new approach a chance to succeed. Mr. Obama is blinking even before all the additional troops he ordered to Afghanistan have had time to deploy to the theater.
Ouch!
McChrystal has become a political target merely for taking at face value Mr. Obama’s order to fight the war properly.
Ouch!
No commander in uniform should ask his soldiers to die for a strategy he doesn’t think is winnable—or for a President who lets his advisers and party blame a general for their own lack of political nerve.
Ouch, Messiah Obama
Hey wbboei, for a minute I wondered where you got the quotes from — it is from the WSJ article I link in my comment up thread.
Speaking of the General…
Pakistanis Balk at U.S. Aid Package
Criticism Threatens To Snarl Obama’s Efforts in Region
Yep, we need to understand the terrorist sympathizers’ sensitivities better. I read a news account that said they were trying to send the captured Taliban about 60 of them to the Indian border for the jihadi operations.
Hey Pm317, that caught my eye too. It was the first time I’ve heard someone couch terrorists as having a multi-cultural component.
Ya think if the Pakistani generals say nyet to the strings attached funding they’ll go back to selling technology?
The news account you mention, I take it that ‘they’ are the Pakistanis? People are looking the other way on other “stuff” when that crap happens. Not good.
Yep, ‘they’ are the Pakistanis. You know they just have get and move all Taliban from Afghanistan and the NW frontier to their eastern border with India. That is it. It will become India’s problem. Obama can wash his hands off.
Haven’t I watched this movie before?
Oh yea that’s right. I have. Charlie Wilson’s war. If I recall correctly (in the movie, I’m assuming it’s more or less based on true facts) Charlie was questioning why the US was prepared to spend billions to supply munitions so they could fight off the russians, but not millions so they could build schools.
If I’m not wrong, the 1st afghan war was where Osama was trained by CIA to fight the russians. So where did we go wrong?
Main problem with politicians has always been their concern with their own ass rather than doing what’s right. Short term view to life doesn’t solve problems.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/07/AR2009100704088_pf.html
They have screwed it up so badly they are back to square one:
…senior officials involved in Afghanistan strategy discussions now and earlier this year said the lack of agreement in March about counterinsurgency will make these deliberations more protracted and disputatious.
“We’re going back to key assumptions,” one of the officials said.
“Putting a bunch of kids in the White House and Congress at this time in history really wasn’t a very good idea.”
Kids (the emotionally immature) voting for kids. Americans have become seriously stupid. Unlike a video game, the stakes here are quite real. You can’t always fix things with the next election. You don’t always get a second chance.
I’ve always felt that he won because kids, who hadn’t experienced life as an adult, voted for their American Idol.
Is this from the article? It is not there now.
.
That kind of deep backround I thought went out of style with hopey and changey transparency.
“Kids (the emotionally immature) voting for kids.”
Kids killing kids. American kids.
Larry. I found it very telling that the Russians may be providing logistics in the northern region.
Telling? They have been doing so with Afghan’s Northern neighbors for years now and NATO has been asking the Russians to get involved. Whether that is good or bad depends upon your likes or dislike for the Russians. Apparently the General is sending a message….
Yes, but Obama and Medeved are “Buds”, so this should not be a problem now…….snark off.
Seems like your opposed even if a possible favorable relationship could help the matter which in the north it very well could. Or is it no matter what Obamma does he’s damned? And I thought we only held these feeling for Bush?
The only “side” I`m on are the men and women over there waiting for a clear strategy from someone who is only concerned about how it will affect his polls and hoping he can stall until the health care is passed.
You are smarter than this and you know that Obama and even Bush were not running the wars by polls. Stupidity? Perhaps…. polls no…
Moreover I do agree that we needed to revisit our strategy in Afghanistan and I am not a big supporter of the COIN strategy as the savior.
I just want to make sure that we do the job that is necessary and then get out. I will also remind you that we “should” see a decrease in the ops-tempo in the south and along the Paki boarder, winter there is brutal. Hopefully that decrease will not mean an increase in the north during winter. Meaning we have some time before we need to really make a decision and use the winter for mobilization and prep for the spring…..
Obama is an idiot. He has no concept of war or how to win. 3 months ago he said…(I’m always worried about using the word “victory” because, you know, it invokes this notion of Emperor Hirohito coming down and signing a surrender to MacArthur”)
Most people with a brain would know Hirohito did not take part in the surrender ceremony on the USS Missouri anchored in Tokyo Bay on Sept. 2, 1945, though MacArthur did. Signing the instrument of surrender for Japan were its foreign minister and the head of its army.
Not only that, Hirohito was allowed by the United States and its allies to remain on the throne, albeit with less power than he held in the militarist Japan that brutally sought to dominate Asia.
.
Hey Smart-azz-just-you… This ain’t about BUSH!!! Why can’t fools like you live in the present??? Comparing obassole to Bush this and Bush that…. is just plain juvenile…
Yeah… juvenile… That says it all!
Juvenile? This coming from the brother of the town idiot…. HA!
Bush and BO are brothers?
.
That flies in the face of the commanders that in fhe all of 08 where asking for the same things for Afghanistan. BO is to little to late and cant make up his mind about southern fried food. Smart Jazz, you think he can make up his mind about life and death?
Yeah we got it….you don’t like COIN….suggest another strategy then.
However, it isn’t like the Taliban are lining up like the Redcoats…lol.
And the Gen already made the point in his report that negates your view. He stated that it is a ‘year-round struggle’ and not one with an ‘insurgent “fighting season”‘.
Time is important…and this winter shouldn’t be wasted prepping for spring.
Thanks Larry for writing what many must be thinking after actually reading the assessment/document./H
Yes thank you Larry, anyone reading General McChrystals recommendations can see they are clear cut to the point and analyze the ground from every position.
Was this not the idea when the Whitehouse put him into this position? Instead there mulling over if all this information is the right way to go forward.
When its stated in black and white more troops are needed asap on the ground so the Taliban are unable to take control.
If the powers that be need to pussy foot around it’s time they put on a flat jacket and went to Afghanistan to assess the situation rather than throw blame in the Generals direction.
Plus this is not April 11, 1951 this is October 2009 times have changed wars are different I see nothing in the Generals recommendations that he threatening to go it alone in Afghanistan.
The two scenarios/incidents are completely different.
http://www.historywiz.com/primarysources/trumanmacarthur.html
In 1951 President Truman announced that General Douglas MacArthur was relieved of his duties as Allied Commander of United Nations forces in the Far East during the Korean War. MacArthur openly challenged U.S. civilian leadership by threatening to attack China in defiance of the President and the United Nations.
Larry….what can we expect from a controlled puppet? Who is precieved as lazy, vain and naive. With so many rumors regarding his background, world players are not afraid of him!
The corporate controlled media needs to be regulated, reformed. They have become fat, lazy and
biased! Collecting their fat corporate paychecks! This issue needs to be addressed, maybe they can become nonprofit entities?
Obama hires the man and says that this is not war of choice.
Then he pushes the buck, ignores McChrystal, flies to Copenhagen, while morale with the troops are plummeting in Afghanistan:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/Afghanistan/article6865359.ece
What part of Commander-in-Chief does Obama not understand? Of course his retort will be the now tired mantra of blame-it-on-Bush. That’s getting tired and it won’t work now.
Pelosi astounds me. She says “… Without a strategy, we shouldn’t resource the mission.” Well, we’re 8 yrs into this fricken war, one would think coming up with a strategy would be rather urgent at this point. How is that health care in the US is such an emergency we can’t even take the time to study the problem and come up with a good plan, but when it comes to a war we have all the time in the world to pussyfoot around and really take our time?
Dang I had a good long rant going then forgot my name (doh) again!
Anyway, NANCY you have (all by yourself) made Democratic women forever look like weak & cowardly liars, enablers & frauds! Like useless Pieces O’Shiate made only to perk some coffee and make a few standing ovations to the GREAT ONE!
DAmn WAshington stinks soooo bad I bet you can see the fumes rising from 100 miles away! HILLARY get OUT of there while you still can. And take a bath in Hydrogen Peroxide while you are at it! Putrid filth flowing from within!
And Larry it’s nice seeing you defend the military. I don’t remember the civilians that worked for the Government being so decent EVER to the military. Were you X military at one point? As well as X CIA?
“Meanwhile, NATO is pressuring Russia to supply more equipment and
training to Afghanistan army troops. That is one of those ironic,
science-fictional sentences that non-fiction authors seldom get to pen.”
-Informed Comment
That’s right, we’re asking Russia to be the good guys there. We’re almost through the looking glass on this one.
Meanwhile, the Western imposed puppet Karzai is about to have his ballots recounted and face a runoff vs. the second largest vote getter, that may be troublesome for him since the divided vote was to his favor re: threat from other candidates.
Now if no2 is just another stooge we lined up, let’s send more 80,000 more troops into the pidgeon shoot! Right?
A recount in Florida in 2000 and all this shit would never have gotten to this point. Are we going to abide by the recouint results there in Afghanistan, or export our version of Democracy everywhere? Enron may be dead and buried, its pipeline dream(GH Venture Partners) lives on….
This is Obama’s 3a.m. phone call moment (that he said he was more than ready for), and what does he do? He hangs up on the guy.
Leadership demands bold, decisive, and swift actions in a situation like this and he’s lacks the skills in all categories. Meanwhile American and allied soldiers are getting killed while this Nero of ours fiddles. God, I hope this can turn into an impeachable crisis for him.
I love General Mcchrystal. I’m glad the the General’s report got to the press so the American people knows where the general and the troops stand on the war.
Seriously folks, think about it. If the report did not get out, the WH would have said they were still waiting for the general report … bal… bal.. bal…. reviewing the war strategy is a bunch of whoee, if you ask me. The troops are getting killed and the Commander in Chief is still reviewing the strategy… Give me a break.
How else could you explain Obama’s actions. His Defense czar gets the report and guess where’s the Commander- in-Chief, playing a vain show for the Olympics. Then out of the sudden he wants the General to meet him on Air force One? Come on. What’s wrong with is picture?
Who do you think is doing his job the General, or the guy pretending to be president? I’ll put my money on General Mcchrystal any day.
[...] of the events from March leading up to McChrystal today. Follow Larry Johnson’s post here to see how the White House and others are trying to make General McChrystal the scapegoat now. [...]
Having never attended a military academy or War College, I cannot comment on the General’s strategy, much less wade through the jargon of the 66 page assessment. But I will say that if I were a US Congressperson, I would have to give the General a vote of no confidence. His report is hard to ingest and would probably be impossible to digest without extreme effort. It shouldn’t be that way. All those words to me just communicate mass confusion. Furthermore, his signature does not instill confidence in his character. Yes, I have to resort to handwriting analysis on this one. Mumbo jumbo. Hocus pocus. I did listen to the Lawrence Eagleburger video from one of the NQ blogs the other day and he made sense to me. Afghanistan will be this generation’s Viet Nam if we follow General McChrystal advice.
And you clearly did not read the damn report. Get off your lazy ass and read. The assessment is not “filled” with jargon. Are you really this stupid?
Oh my goodness. I couldn’t read it. It hurt my head. I did skim it and went down to the recommendation section. He wants more troops. It is not clear to me why he wants more troops. The report says something about connecting with the Afghan population and for some reason, he thinks this requires more troops. That’s what I got out of my skimming. I know it wasn’t written for plebes. But if it’s going to have any legitimacy, it should communicate to plebes of which I am one. Someone should be able to condense his rationale into a paragraph or two in plain English. I spent my life in one bureacracy or another, including the military, and I know how they operate. I am surprised this report got past the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff….although I am not surprised it was leaked by one patriotic militarist or another. I stand by what I wrote and I am not lazy, by the way, or that stupid. Please. I consider this a very serious matter and am behind Obama on this one for the first time.
It wasn’t written FOR plebes because it was never meant to be read BY plebes.
If you can’t understand the jargon, how can you have an honest, clear opinion one way or the other?
You can’t skim something, then expect to understand it. No one is going to the Cliff Notes for us plebes.
When I connected to the link provided, I was quite ready to be enlightened. My mind was open. I started reading and got bogged down. What are these people talking about? What is their point? I don’t get it. It’s like healthcare. Will someone please explain to me what they are talking about. I expect that from the Democrats on healthcare and I expect that from the Republicans or whoever is behind this push to commit more troops to Afghanistan. It’s absurd to think the average person can make an intensive effort to investigate and understand every significant issue that arises. The proponents of an issue have the responsibility to present it in a way that can be understood by the average person. I don’t believe in automatically bowing to authority on anything.
Vietnamization (sic) will be to add a little more troops keep up with what the ISI is doing, but not so many troops to change the actual dynamic. That is the easy decision for Obama, because he can justify that to the left while appearing somewhat proactive to the right. To sell this he needs to marginalize the general. Also, easy for Barack to do evidently. “Easy Way” Barack will do what he does.
“I did listen to the Lawrence Eagleburger video”
No, you didn’t. Eagleburger said Obama had no choice but to send the 40,000 troops — but be wary if they come back asking for more.
Gen. McChrystal’s stature is unlikely to be affected by petty, political insults.
He would not have risen among the ranks if he were a “shrinking violet”!
Can we afford to win in Afghanistan?
Can we afford to lose in Afghanistan?
Not being omnipotent, I can’t answer either question, but that leads me to another question.
Would this country have been better served by no other response than burials of our dead following the attacks on Pearl Harbor, New York, and Washington?
I think not!
This is from “Conservatives, Time to Adopt Alinsky Tactics” from April 2008. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2126371/posts
The current maddness in Washington and the media explains this ongoing lunacy. It will most likely continue.