Barack Obama, General Disaster?
By Larry Johnson on December 9, 2009 at 10:11 PM in Current Affairs
This is mind boggling. This defines a level of incompetence that is genuinely frightening. What is “this?” News from earlier this week that on 8 October, while General McChrystal was briefing Barack Obama, Joe Biden and National Security Advisor Jim Jones on the “CONOPS” (i.e., the Concept of Operations) or CONPLAN for Afghanistan there was this startling exchange (as reported in the Washington Post):
In June, McChrystal noted, he had arrived in Afghanistan and set about fulfilling his assignment. His lean face, hovering on the screen at the end of the table, was replaced by a mission statement on a PowerPoint slide: “Defeat the Taliban. Secure the Population.”
“Is that really what you think your mission is?” one of the participants asked.
In the first place, it was impossible — the Taliban were part of the fabric of the Pashtun belt of southern Afghanistan, culturally if not ideologically supported by a major part of the population. “We don’t need to do that,” Gates said, according to one participant. “That’s an open-ended, forever commitment.”
But that was precisely his mission, McChrystal responded, enshrined in the Strategic Implementation Plan — the execution orders for the March strategy, written by the NSC staff.
“I wouldn’t say there was quite a ‘whoa’ moment,” a senior defense official said of the reaction around the table. “It was just sort of a recognition that, ‘Duh, that’s what in effect the commander understands he’s been told to do.’ Everybody said, ‘He’s right.’”
“It was clear that Stan took a very literal interpretation of the intent” of the NSC document, said Jones, who had signed the orders himself. “I’m not sure that in his position I wouldn’t have done the same thing, as a military commander.” But what he created in his assessment “was obviously something much bigger, and more longer-lasting . . . than we had intended.”
Actually it was not Jim Jones who had signed “the execution (sic) order.” The correct terminology is EXECUTE ORDER. Here is a relevant section from the DOD manual governing how military decisions are made and communicated:
General. Phase VI, Execution, begins with the decision to execute an OPORD, normally transmitted by a CJCS execute order, and continues until the crisis end state is achieved. The execute order establishes a firm C-day and L-hour for deployment and details any significant changes to warning order and alert order guidance. Upon receipt of the CJCS execute order, the supported commander issues an execute order to the subordinate commanders. The JPEC then makes any required adjustments to its OPORDs and updates movement requirements in the TPFDD if required by the latest guidance. Supporting commanders and Service component commanders will execute the deployment of the first increment of scheduled movement. Scheduling and movement of subsequent increments of forces will continue for the duration of the operation. At execution, visibility must be maintained over the deploying force. Proper allocation of TPFDD requirements to carriers and adjudication of planned versus actual lift are necessary to ensure a smooth, controlled deployment in consonance with the supported commander’s concept. To be successful in this task requires a coordinated effort by the entire JPEC.
Stan McChrystal is no fool. He is a professional Army officer on par with George Marshall, Dwight D. Eisenhower and George Patton. When he receives an execute order from the Commander-in-Chief he is responsible for delivering a CONOPS aka Concept of Operations, which explains how he plans to implement the Commander’s order. The assumption is that the order originated with Barack Obama and was communicated to McChrystal by the Execute Order from the Joint Chiefs of Staff (signed out by SecDef Robert Gates).
These morons in the White House are issuing orders and not paying attention to what they are ordering. This is beyond amateurish. This is negligence and incompetence. The Washington Post reports it in such a “mater-of-fact” manner that I am sure the average reader did not appreciate the magnitude of the mistake. I am currently at Fort Bragg, North Carolina and the Army officers I’m talking to are genuinely appalled by this news. They have never seen anything this clueless from the chain of command.
This is not just the fault of Obama. He is being poorly served by his staff, including retired Marine General Jim Jones and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. They write a Strategic Implementation document and then do not remember the content or the directions to their commander in the field. This is inexcusable and should scare the living hell out of every American. The Commander-in-Chief is a shallow clown who apparently forgets the content of the orders he issues on a critical national security matter.
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