Did Obama reap what he sowed with McChrystal?
posted at 2:05 pm on June 22, 2010 by Ed Morrissey
As General Stanley McChrystal wings his way back to the US and face time with an angry Barack Obama, Washington Post columnist Jackson Diehl writes a convincing argument that Obama will be angry at the wrong man. McChrystal should never have allowed those disparaging remarks to be repeated in the presence of a Rolling Stone reporter, but McChrystal’s team is hardly the first to leak opposition to official White House policy on the war. Obama’s lack of action on earlier and obvious sniping through the media showed a lack of leadership that allowed the environment for such nonsense to continue taking place (via Rich Lowry at The Corner):
Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal should not lose his job because of the article about him in Rolling Stone magazine. If anyone deserves blame for the latest airing of the administration’s internal feuds over Afghanistan, it is President Obama.
For months Obama has tolerated deep divisions between his military and civilian aides over how to implement the counterinsurgency strategy he announced last December. The divide has made it practically impossible to fashion a coherent politico-military plan, led to frequent disputes over tactics and contributed to a sharp deterioration in the administration’s relations with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. …
Nor is McChrystal the only participant in the feuding who has gone public with his argument. A scathing memo by Eikenberry describing Karzai as an unreliable partner was leaked to the press last fall. At a White House press briefing during Karzai’s visit to Washington last month, the ambassador pointedly refused to endorse the Afghan leader he must work with.
Biden, for his part, gave an interview to Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter in which he said that in July of next year “you are going to see a whole lot of [U.S. troops] moving out.” Yet as Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates tartly pointed out over the weekend, “that absolutely has not been decided.” Instead, Biden was pushing his personal version of the strategy Obama approved, which calls for the beginning of withdrawals next year, with the size and pace to be determined by conditions at that time.
The real trouble is that Obama never resolved the dispute within his administration over Afghanistan strategy.
That’s one part of the problem. Another part is that Obama failed to sanction those who went to the media to fight out the dispute. Neither Biden nor Gates got a dressing-down like McChrystal will get, even though both owe some loyalty to the man in the Oval Office. Biden would have remained a daffy, gaffe-prone backbencher in the Senate had it not been for Obama’s inexplicable decision to choose Biden as a running mate.
Eikenberry is an even more direct example. His memo ripping Hamid Karzai nearly drove the NATO-backed government in Kabul into the arms of the Taliban, and would have if Karzai thought they’d let him live long enough to enjoy his revenge. His insubordination on Karzai exposed the disarray within the White House on Afghanistan. His antipathy towards McChrystal has also been well known for months. Yet Obama allowed Eikenberry to remain in place despite nearly costing the US its position in Afghanistan, and Eikenberry is still in place to this day.
Under those circumstances, it’s not much wonder that McChrystal opted to fight the disputes through the media, too. That doesn’t excuse the disrespect, nor should McChrystal go unreprimanded for this incident and the obvious disrespect for the chain of command that he either tolerates or encourages, as seen in the article. Whether or not McChrystal should get cashiered is a secondary issue to Diehl’s point, however. Had Obama shown more command and demanded more discipline from his national-security and diplomatic team, McChrystal may never have opted to follow suit.
Obama needs to get more engaged and start kicking some ass where it counts. He can start with McChrystal, but until he starts acting like an actual Commander in Chief with his own team, McChrystal isn’t the real problem.
Blowback
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There is only one person who knows the answer:
Colon Bowel
Why haven’t we heard from him yet ?
macncheez on June 22, 2010 at 3:11 PM
Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahahaha!
Funny one Ed!
As if that jacka$$ in chief and his cronies would know the correct buttons to push. What we have now is government by deluded illusions — the best we can hope for is that the USA will still be in a position to defend itself and western civilization come 2012!
“Let’s Roll”
On Watch on June 22, 2010 at 3:12 PM
Losing Afghanistan would be like losing a tumor.
Tav on June 22, 2010 at 3:13 PM
Cindy Munford on June 22, 2010 at 2:48 PM
You know, I don’t think there will be a director out there who would embarass himself to make a movie about this presidency. After all, it would be an indictment on Hollywood as well since they all had a hand in his worming his way into the White House. Who knows, perhaps a comedy writer/director team would take it on!
KickandSwimMom on June 22, 2010 at 2:56 PM
They already are, its called Atlas Shrugged with Wesley Mouch playing Obama.
Archimedes on June 22, 2010 at 3:14 PM
his crap of running down people in the press while they’re working on the problem doesn’t help anyone, including McChrystal himself. He and McKiernan need to get on the same page.
hawksruleva on June 22, 2010 at 2:49 PM
how else would you draw the attention to a self-absorbed prez who thinks the world exists because he exists :-) perhaps this is the ‘language’ this prez speaks and understands best, the ‘language of the media’ :-), and so the General used it and ‘talked’ to the prez in his ‘language’… he probably used this particular medium to vent his frustrations with Obama’s political/diplomatic appointees to Afgh and possibly with the political constraints that helped create a set of ROE that is inadequate for that theatre, because this prez has very little time for anything else that is not golf, Paul McCartney, football or baseball, or WH concerts…after all this prez is a creation of the media himself, whatever better channel of getting one’s point across than this? :-)
you said: ‘He had the option of saying “no” to any plan. If he didn’t stand up for what he thought was right, then he doesn’t have the backbone required to get the job done’
and when exactly did he have that option, the one (and only) time the prez met with him and when he obviously didn’t have a clue about this particular Gen, what he stood for, what his counter-insurgency philosophy was, etc…like this he has people’s attention, at the risk of his retirement, right…but then only a Gen. can actually afford this, he may be retired after this incident, but he got his point across and made people aware of the divisiveness and petty politics of this admin on the Afghanistan matter and this might mean a change for the better eventually, either in the overall policy, or a change of ROE in the theatre, etc…that might benefit our troops in the long run…so, he will probably lose his post over this, but he has my respect if the result is a change of inadequate policies…
jimver on June 22, 2010 at 3:14 PM
They should both be placed on full time tarball pickup duty on the gulf and kept there until there are no more tar balls.
Tav on June 22, 2010 at 3:17 PM
There’s an article on zerohedge.com about the animosity developing between him and Angela Merkle. Who hasn’t he infuriated? All that money he wasted in Europe prior to the election….. sheesh! But that’s the least of my concerns.
Never have seen anything like it.
Cody1991 on June 22, 2010 at 3:18 PM
I hate to admit this but I still haven’t read the book. I better get on it because the book is always better then the movie.
Cindy Munford on June 22, 2010 at 3:18 PM
Have you met MB4? Haven’t seen him lately but he would agree with you completely.
Cindy Munford on June 22, 2010 at 3:19 PM
why not? the topic of Obama being entirely a media creation (a fictional character that is :-) might have some appeal to the Hollwood types :-)…besides it can give them the illusion that they can do the same, creating fictional characters, then presenting them as real to the large public :-) better special effects too (than the ones found in traditional MSM :-)
jimver on June 22, 2010 at 3:21 PM
Good advice.
DarkCurrent on June 22, 2010 at 3:22 PM
That would be nothing but shear coincidence. Don’t you agree?
Tav on June 22, 2010 at 3:24 PM
McCrystal is in fact Obama’s mirror image. No wonder we started losing when this Taliban-hugging puke took over.It’s the same as having Obama personally run the field campaign. The only joy will be that each will blame the other for the impending, ignominious defeat in their future autobiographies.
MaiDee on June 22, 2010 at 3:27 PM
Exactly correct. McChrystal may deserve to be fired, but just as in the case of his subordinates who went off the reservation, the responsibility for the situation lies squarely on the shoulders of the man at the top – President Pointyfinger.
peski on June 22, 2010 at 3:28 PM
In this case, not necessarily.
Cindy Munford on June 22, 2010 at 3:29 PM
Hmmm…
DarkCurrent on June 22, 2010 at 3:31 PM
There are two issues here, and from most of the comments it appears that one is getting swept aside to make room for the other.
The military is subject to a higher standard of discipline and compliance to the chain of command than civilian government employees. This is because in combat, disobedience to orders can cost lives. This is why the Uniform Code of Military Justice makes disobedience to orders and publicly expressing disrespect for superiors court martial offenses.
Whether the substance of the criticisms is true or false doesn’t mitigate the offense.
Whether the superior being criticized is a blithering incompetent, a wavering coward and/or a traitor doesn’t mitigate the offense.
Whether civilian appointees or other military officers have made such criticisms and gotten away with them doesn’t mitigate the offense.
What it comes down to is, General McChrystal can publicly (and, in my opinion, factually correctly) criticize Obama and his merry band of doctrinaire incompetents in public, or he can continue to serve as a theater commander in the chain of command – but there’s no way he can legally and ethically do both.
bgoldman on June 22, 2010 at 3:33 PM
He made me cry.
Cindy Munford on June 22, 2010 at 3:33 PM
You’re welcome.
Your statement in no way was a clear indictment of the Obama Regime and it’s glaring inability to lead or make rational, clear decisions. Where in that statement condemning the maturity and discipline of the armed forces was that? In saying they’re looking like the civilians in their lack of discipline and maturity? Think again. Say crap like that on the wrong military installation, and you’ll probably get it a lot harder than I dealt it out, and I erased a lot. Now, it just looks like you’re backpedaling.
McChrystal stated, also, that he felt betrayed by the disruptive actions of the civilians (the irresponsible “leaking” of memos):
McChrystal felt “hurt” by Obama’s shiftless meandering, when he should’ve been providing leadership by making comparatively easy decisions:
Quite frankly, impugning the “discipline” and “maturity” of people that have quite probably done a lot more to preserve life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness than you have is just as inexplicable, as it is inexcusable. McChrystal is a Ranger and he’s Special Forces. Those are not career fields for the immature, nor the undisciplined. I hope you were equally critical of the “immature” and undisciplined criticism of President Bush by former commissioned officers, and if you were, I hope that criticism was directed where it should’ve been, and not just used as another excuse to cast aspersions on the entirety of the US armed forces.
Virus-X on June 22, 2010 at 3:33 PM
Yep. There isn’t a horse worth backing here. Unfortunately, our troops are being led by these nags.
funky chicken on June 22, 2010 at 3:34 PM
hawksruleva on June 22, 2010 at 2:49 PM
Oh, and Obama fired McKiernan and replaced him with McChrystal.
funky chicken on June 22, 2010 at 3:35 PM
By George, I think you’ve got it!
funky chicken on June 22, 2010 at 3:37 PM
I have no reason to answer to you.
Cindy Munford on June 22, 2010 at 3:39 PM
Didn’t ask you to. Carry on.
Virus-X on June 22, 2010 at 3:44 PM
In his anger he failed to separate out which be vital and which be incidental.
semloh on June 22, 2010 at 3:44 PM
It’s not important. It’s wrong to give strangers the power.
Cindy Munford on June 22, 2010 at 3:46 PM
That’s not true. Again, while I’m not a McChrystal booster (he’s an Obama voter), he did so a great job in JSOC, but then again, he was working under the Bush Administration, under Rumsfeld. The ROE was very different, though still far too restrained, putting too much emphasis on civilian lives, over those of US servicemen. JSOC, under McChrystal, stacked up bodies, both dead and alive. Now, though, under the Obama Regime, he’s following Obama’s lead. Under Bush, he took the Bush Doctrine to an extreme through SOF activities, and now, under Obama, unfortunately, he’s pushing the Obama non-doctrine to an extreme. He’s trying his best, working under bad rules. What more do you want him to do? He’s been short-changed on manpower, he’s been openly critical of Obama, himself, as well as his operations-disrupting toadies, and may have done so at the cost of his career. Again, while I don’t completely like or trust him, because of being an O-Bot, I’m certainly not going to fail to give credit, where credit’s due.
Virus-X on June 22, 2010 at 3:49 PM
Agreed that the status quo ante cannot endure.
`
Either the General must be fired, or Obama must be impeached. Shall we take a poll?
Adjoran on June 22, 2010 at 3:51 PM
Indeed. It is just another day in the asylum and I have absolutely no sympathy for any of the inmates.
My only problem is the guys and gals over there (some who are personal friends of mine) being put into a very dangerous situation with this mess.
KickandSwimMom on June 22, 2010 at 3:52 PM
Obama gives pretty speeches for mass crowds. But when it comes to leadership in a small team, he’s pointless.
That’s not the point though. It’s all just impressions that we get from the outside.
What’s important is that many of the quotes attributed to McChrystal were not said by him to the reporter, but rather by his aides, describing what he said to them in private. Also, one particular quote explained in the article as McChrystal making fun of Bidan, was actually a joke about REPORTERS asking about Biden, and McChrystal deflecting it.
All of this shiz is being twisted and misrepresented.
And the piece itself, I thought it would be much worse than what it was. It was a seriously researched and overall positive, at least re: his leadership skills. What should’ve happened though, is to keep this inner-circle politics out of the public eye. And for that, this reporter is to blame. It’s nobody’s friggen business to know about these tensions. What team doesn’t have tensions, especially in such a high-stakes project?
Now the punditry (a group of people I loathe deeply) is going to mischaracterize it over and over, create false impressions, and make this job even more difficult for all conerned – the administration, the military heads, the soldiers, coalition countries, the Afghan government, and Afghan people. All because some d-bag reporter felt it was his duty to maximize his “freedom of speech”.
AlexB on June 22, 2010 at 3:53 PM
Why can’t we have both the firing and the impeachment?!
KickandSwimMom on June 22, 2010 at 3:53 PM
So it is that good warriors take their stand on ground where they cannot lose, and do not overlook conditions that make an opponent prone to defeat.
-Sun Tzu
ted c on June 22, 2010 at 3:54 PM
Hey Ed–here’s a long form answer. YES, because:
McKiernan was right, and he got fired for it. He asked for more US troops, got told to ask for more NATO troops, and then:
But here’s the kicker…
So, they fired the old-school “conventional” guy for their flashy, new, politically sophisticated (backstabbers?)….McChrystal and Rodriguez. And now they’re gonna be shocked, shocked by this Rolling Stone article?
snort.
You reap what you sow.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/16/AR2009081602304_3.html?sid=ST2009081700748
funky chicken on June 22, 2010 at 3:59 PM
Gee, perhaps if the white house demonstrated they, you know, “wanted to win”, maybe none of these comments would have been made. When your General says he needs 40,000 troops to succeed and you only give him 30,000 and end up in the quagmire that is brewing over there, what else would you expect?
I think McChrystal is trying to get fired because who would want to be responsible for a strategy that was forced upon you and then have to fight a fight where you are handicapped and not allowed to win?
el hombre on June 22, 2010 at 4:00 PM
You’re right that most of what the General & his aides were ragging on was stupid & didn’t exactly constitute high-minded criticism of strategy.
But isn’t it the responsibility of the people in whose best interest it is to present at least the facade of unity whilst fighting against an enemy to keep discord under wraps?
It’s not the reporter’s professional obligation to keep all this petty snark about their superiors hush-hush, it’s the officers’. That’s their job,isn’t it?
leilani on June 22, 2010 at 4:02 PM
funky chicken on June 22, 2010 at 4:03 PM
Oops, my 4:02 was meant to quote AlexB on June 22, 2010 at 3:53 PM. Sorry.
leilani on June 22, 2010 at 4:03 PM
Impeach……. That’s My Vote ….
wheels on June 22, 2010 at 4:06 PM
The legacy of Vietnam is alive and living in the White House. Until this country starts standing up to its enemies with the utmost conviction, this country will fail to win wars, or choke at the attempt to win as it did in Iraq. McChrystal was wrong to defy the chain of command, but that shouldn’t stop us from reaping the fruits of the many lessons of his defiance. From the inside out we now know, as if we didn’t before, that President Obama never met a center line he didn’t want to walk. It has created havoc in Afghanistan, havoc in the Middle East and havoc in domestic affairs. What we learned today was that President Obama is no leader. But let’s pray for the sake of our country that it’s not too late for him to learn.
~ Halli Casser-Jayne
The CJ Political Report on June 22, 2010 at 4:23 PM
I hear his short game is coming aound.
Will that do?
David2.0 on June 22, 2010 at 4:28 PM
Getting to be the theme of this lazy, incompetent, narcissistic fool. Perhaps instead of Judgment to Lead, Barry’s campaign slogan should have been something like: Leadership, WTF is that? Can’t I delegate it to somebody else, ‘cuz I wanna go golfing!
Barry Hussein’s first important executive decision. Yet 52% of the electorate still voted for this clueless moron.
AZCoyote on June 22, 2010 at 5:12 PM
No nation has ever benefited from a protracted war.
- Sun Tzu
It is McCrystal’s strategy.
Tav on June 22, 2010 at 6:05 PM
Hugh Fitzgerald: We cannot, and should not, be trying the impossible in foreign policy — squandering trillions to make Iraq and Afghanistan something they cannot, because of Islam, ever be.
And similarly, we cannot, and should not, be trying to “integrate” Muslims into our societies as loyal members of Infidel nation-states, because it cannot be done, if they take their Islam seriously. And it is easy to demonstrate that, merely by going to the texts and tenets of Islam itself.
Western Europe and Israel are the real theaters of war, not Iraq, not Afghanistan, not Pakistan. Those countries should be allowed to seek their own Muslim level, and let the world watch as that happens, and let non-Muslims come to grasp all the ways that Islam itself explains the despotism, the economic backwardness, the social and intellectual and moral paralysis, of Muslim societies, and then, once a large number of non-Muslims understands this, and can speak and write about it, Muslims themselves will not be able to avoid overhearing, and will be demoralized to the extent that they realize that this is true, that it cannot be rebutted, that the blame always placed on various Infidels for everything that goes wrong in Muslim states is in fact a blame that should be placed on Islam itself.
Ataturk realized this, when he presided over a state that was about to collapse. Let there be a hundred potential Ataturks. And even if they do not succeed, work to divide and demoralize the Camp of Islam, and to end its triumphalism.
Tav on June 22, 2010 at 7:48 PM
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