Krauthammer spoke highly of his replacement McCrystal on Fox today, FWIW.
bump
Is Afghanistan going to be ZERO’s Vietnam?
Do we know this FOR A FACT or is the Boston Globe just making it up?!
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there is a crucial caveat that Gates and President Obama need to keep in mind as they evaluate the new commanders and their new strategy. McChrystal and the new number two commander in Afghanistan, Lieutenant General David Rodriguez, must make one tenet in their guerrilla warfare playbook an absolute priority: protection of the civilian population.
The Taliban are reaping benefits from a dynamic that should be familiar from other guerrilla wars. When Taliban fighters stage an ambush, US forces frequently feel compelled to call in air strikes or artillery fire. And all too often, as happened last week, innocent Afghan villagers are hurt or killed.
The inevitable outcome is widespread anger against the foreign army. This is what Afghan President Hamid Karzai lamented again and again last week during a visit to Washington. He begged Americans to stop killing Afghan civilians.
not knowing jack about this but hearing that the new brass is a former spec ops guy and that Gates suggested this I think this may be the rare instance maybe Teleprompter in Chief got it right
or didn’t get in the way
somebody correct me please if i’m wrong
Do not alter titles from articles.
Thanks
Sounds to me that the General in Afghanistan probably disagreed with Obama’s plans for more troops, and probably for suggesting going into Pakistan like Obama said he wanted to do in his campaign... I don’t know anything about the former commander in that area, all I know is that Obama can’t really stand being told he’s wrong — he believes he knows best, even if the commanders on the ground are telling him they firmly disagree. I would imagine that would get someone “sacked” in a hurry in Obama’s military...
All just my armchair opinion...
I suspect this general refused to publicly condemn “don’t ask, don’t tell” and wouldn’t get on board Zero’s desire to appease his sodomite constituency by repealing the policy. That’s my guess.
Let’s see what happens over the next couple of months.
Hey 0bama...you’re gonna need a BIGGER BUS!
Not to defend Barry but after a LOT of reading the change in Command makes sense.
I’m guessing this is the most accurate analysis:
“McKiernan warned last year that a satisfactory outcome would take a decade, perhaps 14 years. For his political bosses, that was way too long.
The changes in command underscore the impression that Obama, abandoning long-term nation-building goals, is looking for quick, minimalist results in Afghanistan, chiefly containing and deflating the insurgency. His aides don’t want the war dragging on when he stands for re-election in 2012.”
Anyone who ever served in the military wouldn't think that was harsh at all.
Afghanistan is a quagmire and something has to change. This may well turn out to be a Petraeus-for-Casey kind of swap, and if that's so then Gates and Obama will deserve the credit. If it turns out to be a mistake then they'll deserve the blame. But regardless, the troops in country deserve our hopes that McChrystal has the same kind of positive impact on the war in Afghanistan that Petraeus had on the war in Iraq.
Very little to learn here.
#1: Align cross-hairs on enemy.
#2: Pull trigger.
#3: Check to see if enemy is C, Moving, B, Breathing, C, Has pulse.
If A, B, or C are true, repeat steps 1 and 2.
Very little to learn here.
#1: Align cross-hairs on enemy.
#2: Pull trigger.
#3: Check to see if enemy is A, Moving, B, Breathing, C, Has pulse.
If A, B, or C are true, repeat steps 1 and 2.
In the process of using opposition to the Iraq war for political gain during the campaign, calling it the “wrong war” (and thus Afghanistan the “right war”), the reckless and bumbling political novice 0bama managed to make the war in Afghanistan his own. He is now tethered to it, and dependent on its success.
But in truth, Afghanistan is everything 0bama and his Democrats spent years trying to falsely portray Iraq as being.
There is no long-term military solution there. The war in Afghanistan is ‘unwinnable.’ This isn’t to say we are losing the war or are in any danger of it, but simply that there is no possible exit strategy based on permanent victory there.
Afghanistan is the Wild Wild West. It is ungovernable. No one wants to live there except for outlaws. There are no natural resources except for poppies. It is landlocked with no major sources of water. It is inhospitable. This is the reason why outlaws and terrorists make it their home when no other country will take them.
That is why outlaws will always rule Afghanistan. A country where legitimate people will not live cannot have a legitimate government made up of legitimate individuals. The US will never be able to extract itself by setting up a legitimate, functional, non-corrupt government there. The only solution involving a military presence is one where we are there indefinitely, with US soldiers playing the role of cops. That’s not an exit strategy.
Instead, we need to leave Afghanistan, and destroy what little infrastructure it has, torch all the poppy fields, and level the camps there.
We can do this from 10,000 feet. And we will need to do it once every decade or so, to prevent the likes of Al Qaeda and the Taliban from reconstituting and rebuilding too much.
But 0bama won’t do any of this, and thus he will fail spectacularly in Afghanistan. The contrast between Bush’s success in Iraq and 0bama’s failure in Afghanistan will not be missed by history, and neither will the irony of 0bama’s usage of the two in his campaign.
Luckily for us, unlike with Iraq, it’s really not too important whether Afghanistan succeeds or fails.
Gates is a sack of dog dung. Pig. I hope he gets his one of these days very very soon. The stinking sell out.
it’s effing Bambi what do you expect
Not in the least bit curious; Oworshipme knew he would not be able to get the man to betray his country, so he had to put someone there who would.
Think an American newspaper would dare to use the word “defenestration”?
The public defenestration of General David McKiernan, a distinguished career officer who took command in Kabul less than one year ago, was brutal in that cold, callous way peculiar to American officialdom. More to the point, it remains largely unexplained. “We can and must do better ... We have a new policy set by our president, a new strategy, a new mission ... I believe new military leadership is also needed,” said Robert Gates, the defence secretary.
But when asked what McKiernan had done wrong, or what his mooted replacement, Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal, might do better, Gates and Mullen grew confused in thought and word. “Nothing went wrong, there was nothing specific,” said Gates. “There probably is no more critical ingredient than that – than leadership. And again, along with all the other changes, it's time now,” said Mullen.
Maybe it is Gates who needs replacement (since no one can fire Obama).