Its fairly old news actually, but I found this article very interesting. Not being a proponent of conspiracy theories, I don't think McChrystal's personal political position and the root causes of his departure are unrelated, but its interesting conversation fodder nevertheless. A few highlights: The article has other very interesting information on how it is we are conducting this war in Afghanistan worthy of debating, but just the above quotes left me with a lot of questions. How can someone who ban's the airing of media he disagrees with on base television sets call himself a representative of America? What type of circus are we running when the liberal media buries a liberal general who disagrees with a liberal president?
Wasn't he the same one that disagreed with Obama from the get go? It doesn't surprise me he was replaced.
It's really hard to find a "good guy" in this story. The good guys are the soldiers who are dying because of incompetent leadership like Oblahma and McChrystal.
Since the War in Afghanistan started and since the war in Iraq has been going on there have been 9 changes in military leadership including the generals in particular charge of the war effort in either nation and at Central Command. Those 9 don't include General Shinseki who testified to Congress that we needed more soldiers in attacking Iraq than Rumsfeld provided. Shinseki was correct. He was shitcanned by Rumsfeld. Possibly if they listened to Shinseki rather than Rumsfeld a couple of thousand American soldiers and 10,000's of thousands of Iraqi's would be alive today. So much for good judegement. Nine changes. With all of those changes you'd think that this latest change would not be subject to some wild eyed crazy loony political attack. Not so. Even the attack by the mad dog republicans is pretty stretched. its hard to run a country when the party that strives to command the every day news turns every simple action into a political attack. At least since Lincoln and the Civil War, generals have been canned for speaking out against the civilian command of the military. Maybe that is one reason we haven't had a military coup in this nation as with so many others.
Truman's decision to fire McArthur led to our current issues with a nuclear-armed lunatic running North Korea. LBJ's maniacally insane micromanagement of the Vietnam War led to the deaths of millions of citizens of South Vietnam. These decisions do matter.
Why is everything some partisan attack with you? I support the firing of Mychrystal. I support the changes to the rules of engagement Petraeus will most likely suggest. Its about time our troops started shooting people instead of getting medals for politicing. I started the thread to solicit thoughts on the liberal Mychrystal getting the back stab by the Liberal media, and the boot by the Liberal Administration, to be replaced by a conservative who will unquestionably take less light of a touch to this military effort. Lets not forget the man just put in to handle Afghanistan is the same man being called General "Betray Us" by the same liberals who issue you your talking points. Personally, I think Petraeus has less than a 50% chance of making Afghanistan work. Had he Bush not focused on Iraq, had he been there in 2004, had Obama granted the full amount of troops requested 3 months earlier, perhaps. It all looks like trying to shut the barn door after the cow has already left. Some part of me says, "F*ck it". Save the money, rest the troops up, and get ready for Iran.
"The MoveOn.org ad controversy began when the anti-war liberal advocacy group MoveOn.org published a full-page ad in The New York Times on September 10, 2007 accusing General David H. Petraeus of "cooking the books for the White House". The ad also labeled him "General Betray Us". The organization created the ad in response to Petraeus' Report to Congress on the Situation in Iraq. Move On hosted pages on its website about the ad and their reasons behind it from 2007 to June 23, 2010. On June 23, 2010, Move On erased these webpages and any reference to them from its website after President Obama nominated General Petraeus to be the new top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan on June 23, 2010." Blahahahahaha.... Obama has never been anything but a Soros puppet. Is the puppet now moving the puppeteer?
Too bad... for a 10-minute item on Israeli TV magazine which I saw couple of months ago, I kinda liked the guy. But I really dont understand too much about internal US stuff.
There is nothing scandalous about it really. By all accounts he is a top notch soldier. The guy disagreed with the President's management of the war, as generals sometimes do. He made the mistake of being vocal about it which is insubordination, and the president's response was appropriate. The only part I found to be scandalous was what a hardcore liberal the guy turned out to be. Seriously, banning a mainstream media station from base televisions is freaky hardcore leftist(Civil liberty so long as you agree with them LOL). It might explain a lot of our rules of engagement as they exist right now in Afghanistan. Israel would never conduct a war this way. Taliban jihadis normally attack from positions surrounded by hostage civillians. When US troops shoot back, they come back and create unrest about the brutality of US troops killing innocent Afghans. To counter such propaganda efforts, Mychrystal set up rules of engagement that prohibited returning fire to areas known to have civilians. Its severely upped the cost in NATO dead and wounded(of the NATO troops who will actually fight). I suppose it might be worth it if the Afghans actually came around and helped defeat the Taliban, but that has yet to happen.
Chaos: Welcome to domestic US political debate. In the US their has been a consistent narrow realm of ultra conservative attack philosophy. Recently they have often been called the Neo Conservatives. Moreover they support and promote American wars. They intersect with a group of Republicans that are called chicken/hawks. Chicken as in being utterly afraid and cowards or quitters. Hawks in that they support wars. Recently you could characterize Bush and Cheney as chickenhawks. During the Vietnam era they both escaped service in Vietnam. When a draft was in place they both escaped it. Bush used his family's wealth and power to get immediate access to a National Guard Unit. At that point it was about 99% sure that group wouldn't get its asses shot up in Vietnam. Cheney simply used all kinds of tricks to get draft deferments. In their stead other Americans got shot up in Vietnam. Later those two decided to send hundreds of thousands of American troops to Iraq. Their reasons for provoking the war were found to be false. When hard facts were found that undermined their reasons (so called Nuclear tubes being sent to Iraq) that were not in fact tubes for Nuclear weapons at all....the infamous chickenhawk Cheney attacked a secret CIA agent, thereby undermining the protection of any US secret agent anywhere. He didn't care about their wherewithall and safety. He cared that others couldn't dispute his lies with facts. Chickenhawks avoid wars but send others to die. Will Spenser defines the chickenhawk. He ran away from the US. He tells everyone how to think and act. But he quit. Typical chickenhawk. Will thinks that MacArthur should have had free reign in Korea back during the Korean War of the early 1950's. MacArthur miscalculated attacking north of the 38th parallel and brought in the huge Chinese Army into the conflict. Huge. Potentially millions of soldiers. MacArthur wanted to use nuclear weapons in North Korea. He wanted sole authority on its use. He didn't want to have American civilian authority over the military to rule on this usage. MacArthur disparaged the then American President, Truman. He was relieved of his authority. In America the civilian command has ultimate authority. Later, the new American President, flew over Korea, took a look at the masses of soldiers on either side who were dug down to fight. He knew something about wars and fighting. His name was Eisenhower. He commanded all Allied forces during WWII. One would say he had more experience and knowledge than the highly opinionated Will Spenser. (btw: Eisnehower didn't run away). Eisenhower, popularly known as Ike, pushed a cease fire. The Korean War ended. About 34,000 American soldiers died during that conflict. Over a million Koreans died. He ended the conflict. Since that time, approximately 60 years later, North Korea has developed Nuclear Weapons. It is not the only nation to do so. It is a rogue nation. It is dangerous. China protects North Korea. China is huge and dangerous. In those 60 years there have been 36 years in which Republicans have been the President. None of them stopped North Korea from getting nuclear weapons. In fact during those 60 years of history and 36 years of Republican Presidents quite a number of nations have developed nuclear weapons. Will Spenser, being a politicized chicken hawk blames all this on the then US President of removing MacArthur from his position. That is what US conservative chicken hawks do. They create simple blame for complex and dangerous situations. Also, they run, hide, and refuse to contribute. In Israel nobody would pay them any attention. Israel is a nation that lives under threat every day. It has a draft. It doesn't have the luxury of dealing with chicken hawks. Frankly I would ban Fox News also. Its not a news station. It is a conservative commentary TV station with a constant stream of immature sarcastic commentary that turns every comment into a political attack. Occaisionally it shows some news. Its a form of immature entertainment.
George, I just read in the other thread you are an officer in the US Military. Let me kick off by saying thank you. We Americans, "Chicken Hawks" and all, appreciate your service. Thank you. I thought the absurdity of MoveOn.org's removal of all evidence of their years long all out attack on General Petreaus's character and honor, within hours of Obama appointing him commander in Afghanistan was humorous too. Lets be fair. The threads opening post was not an all out partisan attack like Earlpearl's was. Sure I am curious about our liberal political and military leadership eating itself alive, but aren't you? I would be equally curious about it if conservatives were doing the same thing. As a side note, how did you as a liberal and an officer feel about MoveOn.org's political assault on Petreaus' honor and character? @Earlpearl: Do you really feel everyone who didn't join the military should not ever vocalize their views on US foreign policy, especially if it is a "hawkish" view? Do you really believe all such people should be belittled as cowards and "chicken hawks"? Do you describe Obama or practically his entire administration that way? Would you also ban MSNBC? How bout DemocracyNow? LinkTV? AlJezerra? Why don't you narrow it down for us and tell us which TV stations you would permit. For that matter, why don't you make us a list of books that are OK to read as well. I realize a military base is not America, and soldiers enjoy a smaller/different set of rights, but I'm curious how, in your opinion, you think this type of censorship could ever be a good thing. To me it sounds like the Pakistani's who brag, "We Shut off the internet to our country!" or the other morons on this thread who brag, "We Beat our Wives". Censorship isn't something to brag about. Its something to be explained and justified, and your quote above was hardly a reasonable justification.
If you really believe your country is under attack and is facing danger and you do not participate in the war to defend it, then you are a coward, no if and but about it. little willy and other chicken hawks were claiming that USA is under attack and everyone should go to war and face death with exception of them who wouldn´t raise a finger to defend "their" country.
@gworld... here are two articles about how Military is interfering in foreign policy of US with the help of Neo Cons think tanks, senators, defense industry executives and other retired army officers..if you have time to read it..although writer is obviously not happy with democrats as well.. US foreign policy lines blurred Marching for the military
The only thing more humorous than an article attempting to point out the effect of right wing think tanks on US policy by repetitively quoting Brian Katulis of the Center for American Progress, otherwise known as a George Soros left wing think tank, is citing such an article as a credible source rather than the partisan hackery it is. Seriously dude, I know some people form their political opinions based on what they read in the Vanity Fair but I'm trying to assume you are an adult. Lets not forget George Soros also funded the "General Betray Us" advertisements aired by MoveOn.Org. I'm surprised your article didn't try and quote them as a credible source. Conspiracy theories always crack me up, because they rely on idiots to fill in the blanks. Let me kick one off. George Soros is a Jew. Perhaps this whole thing is an Israeli plot to destroy the peace loving Palestinians. After all, Soros did fund Obama's campaign. Stanley Mychrystal is an unabashed leftist. He may be the missing link we are looking for between the right and the left, providing evidence that Soros, MoveOn, The Center for American Progress, and the Center for Security policy are all part of a clandestine Free Mason conspiracy to control the planet! The conflict between left and right is only a charade to get the rest of us to play along while focusing on partisan bickering!
I think the general, and his staff were talking about stuff that they should not have been talking about. There was a reporter there, from the Rolling Stones magazine and they should be very aware not to say anything that could be used against them. So was their own fault, better to be quiet and be safe, then be loud and out of a job.