Click on the title above for a link to the full Rolling Stone Magazine article on General McChrystal.
I have now read the entire Rolling Stone Magazine article. Everyone who knows me or reads this blog know that I am not a fan of President Obama but you will not hear me criticising the President for firing the general. I like General McChrystal and his strategy for Afghanistan but I also believe in the "Chain of Command" and it was stupid for him to allow himself and his staff to talk about their criticism of the President to the Rolling Stone reporter. As I write this I don't know if the President will actualy fire the General but he is justified in doing it.
On the other hand, I agree with the Generals statements, even if he should not as a military man expressed them about his Commander in Chief.
In 2012, we the American people will get the opportunity to fire the Commander in Chief in the Presidential election.
Although President Obama is no Lincoln I am reminded of the insubordination of General George McClellan during the American Civil War.
Bill Kirstol of the Weekly Standard writes:
If Stan McChrystal has to go—and he probably does—it will be a sad end to a career of great distinction and a low moment in a lifetime devoted to duty, honor, and country. But the good of the mission and the prospects for victory in Afghanistan may well now demand a new commander of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.
While there are obvious issues of civil-military relations exposed by the general’s cringe-inducing quotes in the “Runaway General” article in Rolling Stone—and while his staff appear to be off the leash entirely, a command climate for which McChrystal is responsible—the original source of the problem is above the general’s pay grade.
So McChrystal should not be the only one to go. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry and “AfPak” czar Richard Holbrooke should likewise either submit their resignations or be fired by President Obama. Vice President Biden and his surrogates should be told to sit down and be quiet, to stop fighting policy battles in the press. The administration's "team of rivals" approach is producing only rivalry.
Most of all, the commander-in-chief must take command. Barack Obama’s commitment is famously and publicly uncertain. No one—not his lieutenants, nor his cabinet, nor his generals, nor the American people, nor our allies, nor the Afghans, nor our enemies—can be sure whether the president wants to win the war or just to end the war.
The McChrystal contretemps creates an opportunity to right many of these wrongs; the White House should not waste this crisis. Anything less than a clean sweep will leave the war effort impaired.
UPDATE
Just a thought..... what military officer in his right mind would let a reporter from Rolling Stone magazine have such access ? Why not just invite MSMBC !
