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May 14, 2009
Obama Fires Top General in Afghanistan
US fires top General in Afghanistan as war worsens
Barack Obama fired the top U.S. general in Afghanistan on Monday, replacing him with a former special forces commander in a quest for a more agile, unconventional approach in a war that has gone quickly downhill. With the Taliban resurgent, Obama's switch from Gen. David McKiernan to Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal suggests the new commander in chief wants major changes in addition to the additional troops he's ordering into Afghanistan to shore up the war effort.
McKiernan, on the job for less than a year, has repeatedly pressed for more forces. Although Obama has approved more than 21,000 additional troops this year, he has warned that the war will not be won by military means.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates echoed that view at a grim Pentagon news conference announcing the leadership overhaul. "As I have said many times before, very few of these problems can be solved by military means alone," he said. "And yet, from the military perspective, we can and must do better."
"It's time for new leadership and fresh eyes."
A new team of commanders will now be charged with applying Obama's revamped strategy for challenging an increasingly brutal and resourceful insurgency. The strategy, still a work in progress, relies on the kind of special forces and counterinsurgency tactics McChrystal knows well, as well as nonmilitary approaches to confronting the Taliban. It would hinge success in the seven-year-old war to political and other conditions across the border in Pakistan.
McKiernan, named to his post by former President George W. Bush, had expected to serve into next year but was told he was out during Gates' visit to Afghanistan last week.
Gates said he asked for McKiernan's resignation "with the approval of the president." The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, and McKiernan's military boss, Gen. David Petraeus, both said they supported the switch.
The White House said the recommended change came from the Pentagon.
"The president agreed with the recommendation of the secretary of defense and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff that the implementation of a new strategy in Afghanistan called for new military leadership," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said in a statement.
McChrystal is a former special forces chief credited with nabbing one of the most-wanted fugitives in Iraq. Taking a newly created No. 2 slot under his command will be Lt. Gen. David Rodriguez, a veteran of the Afghanistan fight who has been Gates' military shadow, the top uniformed aide who travels with him everywhere.
Asked if McKiernan's resignation would end his military career, Gates said, "Probably." But he praised the general's long service, and when pressed to name anything McKiernan had failed to do, Gates demurred.
"Nothing went wrong, and there was nothing specific," he said.
McKiernan issued a short statement in Kabul.
"All of us, in any future capacity, must remain committed to the great people of Afghanistan," McKiernan said. "They deserve security, government that meets their expectations, and a better future than the last 30 years of conflict have witnessed."
In June 2006 Bush congratulated McChrystal for his role in the operation that killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq. As head of the special operations command, McChrystal's forces included the Army's clandestine counterterrorism unit, Delta Force.
He drew criticism for his role in the military's handling of the friendly fire shooting of Army Ranger Pat Tillman - a former NFL star - in Afghanistan. An investigation at the time found that McChrystal was "accountable for the inaccurate and misleading assertions" contained in papers recommending that Tillman get a Silver Star award.
McChrystal acknowledged he had suspected several days before approving the Silver Star citation that Tillman might have died by fratricide, rather than enemy fire. He sent a memo to military leaders warning them of that, even as they were approving Tillman's Silver Star. Still, he told investigators he believed Tillman deserved the award.
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Wild Thing's comment..........
They dumped this guy for bombing the Taliban Insurgents. No kidding. He was killing the enemy so Obama puts him under his bus.
Why does this freaking idiot refuse to understand that the ONLY think Islam understands and fears is BRUTE FORCE!
This General has been asking for more troops as long as he has been there!!!!!!!! Now Obama/Gates say here are your troops and oh by the way, you are fired. Not transferred or re-assigned mind you but fired!!!! There is something we are not being told about GEN McKiernan.( just a gut feeling) Did he perhaps have something derogatory to say to or about the CIC? The truth will come out in time, and I’ll bet it wont make Obama look good. Four Stars don’t get fired everyday.
From what I have heard 65% of the active duty troops detest Obama!
This is nothing against Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal , I jsut feel badly about what Obama has done to Gen McKennan....to fire him that is horrible to do to him.
Here is something about Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal. And a big God bless to our black ops people. I am not a fan of Newsweek and they did out this Gen. regarding the Black ops, but I hate to say this, but Bush outed him first , I will never forget that and I saw it live back in 2006, as well as poor Gen. Caldwell later trying to answer without answering.
The Hidden Genenral
June 26, 2006 issue
No one would have mentioned his name at all if President George W. Bush hadn't singled him out in public. Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, West Point '76, is not someone the Army likes to talk about. He isn't even listed in the directory at Fort Bragg, N.C., his home base. That's not because McChrystal has done anything wrong—quite the contrary, he's one of the Army's rising stars—but because he runs the most secretive force in the U.S. military. That is the Joint Special Operations Command, the snake-eating, slit-their-throats "black ops" guys who captured Saddam Hussein and targeted Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi.
JSOC is part of what Vice President Dick Cheney was referring to when he said America would have to "work the dark side" after 9/11. To many critics, the veep's remark back in 2001 fostered his rep as the Darth Vader of the war on terror and presaged bad things to come, like the interrogation abuses at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo Bay. But America also has its share of Jedi Knights who are fighting in what Cheney calls "the shadows."
And McChrystal, an affable but tough Army Ranger, and the Delta Force and other elite teams he commands are among them.
After the Zarqawi strike, multinational forces spokesman Gen. Bill Caldwell refused to comment on JSOC's role, saying, "We don't talk about when special operating forces are involved." But when Bush revealed to reporters that it was McChrystal's Special Ops teams that had found Zarqawi, Caldwell had to gulp and say (to laughter), "If the president of the United States said it was, then I'm sure it was."
McChrystal has checked all the right career boxes, serving as an unflappable military briefer during the Iraq invasion, and doing fellowships at Harvard and at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York (where he would run to work from Brooklyn, about six miles away). Still, the secrecy surrounding McChrystal's role worries some who note that Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld have given clandestine operations the lead in the war on terror--with little public accountability, including in the interrogation room.
Rumsfeld is especially enamored of McChrystal's "direct action" forces or so-called SMUs--Special Mission Units--whose job is to kill or capture bad guys, say Pentagon sources who would speak about Special Ops only if they were not identified. But critics say the Pentagon is short-shrifting the "hearts and minds" side of Special Operations that is critical to counterinsurgency--like training foreign armies and engaging with locals. (Special Operations Command spokesman Ken McGraw says the Pentagon is "significantly increasing" those units.)
Experts like former Deputy Defense secretary John Hamre are also concerned that Special Ops now has generic authority to deploy where it wants without case-by-case orders. Without proper civilian oversight, a Zarqawi-style success can easily become a "Black Hawk Down." Keeping that from happening is McChrystal's most important mission.
"Experts like former Deputy Defense secretary John Hamre are also concerned that Special Ops now has generic authority to deploy where it wants without case-by-case orders. Without proper civilian oversight, a Zarqawi-style success can easily become a "Black Hawk Down." Keeping that from happening is McChrystal's most important mission."
Screw this guy John Hamre! He is wrong, he was a typical Clintonoid social activist who found the military "distasteful" at best.
Leftist Political type, he is never willing to accept the blame for the consequences of his stupidity.
The Leftist Presidents from LBJ to Carter to Clinton fumbled just about EVERY time they demanded "Civilian Over Sight" of Operations.
What ever their other flaws, bless Bush 1 and 2 with the brains to manage the politics and leave Operations to the pros.
"Blackhawk Down" become a "Black Hawk Down" because of the "civilian oversight" not wanting to do soemthing un-PC, rather than just letting the military do its job! warriors kicked ass that day - When things went to sh*t our guys cowboy'd the hell up and took the fight to'em - They did not lose whatsoever that day or that battle - They got their marks that were at the hit location and they brought them in
OK so bottom line is, this guy will be great it seems. But I still am ticked about what they did to General McKiernan.
Just one more thing, General Petraeus endorsed this change. So again there may be things we don't know about. I trust Petraeus to know what is best.
....Thank you Jack for sending this to me.
Army Combat Engineers
Quang Tri & Chu Lai '68 -'69
67-69
United States Army
1965-1971
Vietnam
1968-1969
Jack's blog is Conservative Insurgent
Posted by Wild Thing at May 14, 2009 05:55 AM
Comments
I agree with you Chrissie...there's something missing from this story...we'll find out in due time. God Bless Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal and his brave rifles!
Posted by: James M at May 14, 2009 07:07 AM
I think you're right, Chrissie. There is something else here that hasn't come out. Gates has been worrying me lately. You just never know which way he's going to go anymore. I'd hate to be in his place tho, with the folks he has to deal with in this administration.
The troops are so frustrated by the ROEs. They just want to get in, do the job they trained for and come home. If it wasn't for all this PC BS, they would have wrapped this up already.
Posted by: yankeemom at May 14, 2009 07:57 AM
Hopefully having a Special Forces General will turn some things around. Special Forces are used quite a bit in Afghanistan.
Like you said, there's more than meets the eye. My main concern is what's best for our troops.
Posted by: BobF at May 14, 2009 09:06 AM
I also agree with you Chrissie. We in the public don't know what is taking place behind the scenes. I just hope it is not LBJ all over again micromanaging a war. Another fear is that it is politics over reality. We will just have to see.
Gates also bothers me. How can he comfortably work easily with two very different presidents. Is he taying on as SecDef to help the war effort and the troops or does he like the title and Wash DC life? Obama uses Rinos to his advantage. Is Gates a Rino?
Best of luck to Gen McChrystal and the troops in Afghanistan. Maybe he can use Special Forces and rebuild the Northern Alliance tribes again against the Taliban on the Pakistan border(and beyond).
Posted by: TomR at May 14, 2009 11:29 AM
If General Patraeus is ok with it, then it should be ok. But as You pointed out we don't know what is going on behind the scenes and what prompted this in the first place.
The first thing the media will do with this is a Lincoln comparison.
Posted by: Mark at May 14, 2009 11:46 AM
Thank you Chrissie. I have grave concerns when any battlefield commander is relieved for the sake of 'change'. Hitler ruled by direct interference with his military(thank God for us), it cost him the war, LBJ interfered and micromanaged the war to the cost of over 58,200 dead Americans. Now we have a Communist-Muslim America hating CIC directing an undeclared war with a bunch of simpering Bush deranged baboons calling themselves Congress, denying their responsibilities before the propagandist media. We have to be the laughing stock of the world amongst our allies, if we still have any.
This statement is telling "Asked if McKiernan's resignation would end his military career, Gates said, "Probably." But he praised the general's long service, and when pressed to name anything McKiernan had failed to do, Gates demurred.
"Nothing went wrong, and there was nothing specific," he said. "
Why then did Defense Secretary Robert Gates destroy the General's career for doing his job, by asking for his resignation, if there was nothing specific??? He could have transferred the General out, this glares of BDS from Obama!!! I hope Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal isn't being set up, Godspeed for a successful mission and a safe return.
"Vietnam. What the hell happened? We were ahead when I left."
Posted by: Jack at May 14, 2009 03:00 PM
This is O'Vomits war and he is going to lose it no matter how many Americans he gets killed. As for the new 3 star guy who is a Black Op's guy, why is he wearing an EIB and not a CIB? Just curious.
Posted by: cuchieddie (DHS suspected terrorist)) at May 14, 2009 03:41 PM
"Consensous is the Absence of Leadership" ~ Margaret Thatcher Kinda fits the anointed one.
Good question cuchieddie (DHS suspected terrorist)
Here's a definition of sorts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_Infantryman_Badge
The Combat Infantryman Badge (CIB) is the U.S. Army combat service recognition decoration awarded to soldiers — enlisted men and officers (commissioned and warrant) holding colonel rank, and lower, who personally fought in active ground combat while an assigned member of either an infantry or a Special Forces unit, of brigade size or smaller, any time after 6 December 1941.
The CIB and, its non-combat analogue, the infantry skill-recognition Expert Infantryman Badge (EIB) were simultaneously created during World War II as primary recognition of the combat service and sacrifices of the infantrymen who likely would be wounded or killed in numbers disproportionate to those of soldiers from the Army’s other service branches.
Never saw an EIB over younder but a lot of CIB's, thank you brother.
Posted by: Jack at May 14, 2009 04:53 PM
I have a little contact now and again with SOF and McChrystal is well thought of and considered sharp. I just wonder how long he will work for a deadender.
Posted by: Avitar at May 14, 2009 05:56 PM
