General Stanley McChrystal apologizes for comments in Rolling Stone magazine

Still a military man has to show the proper respect for the man elected to be in charge. If we allow the generals to run thing then we end up as a military dictatorship and have our freedoms curtailed in all respects.

Bush had military experience, he was a pilot in the military.

I seem to remember a massacre in Vietnam, My Lai, where keeping a mouth shut was also encouraged, at the expense of murdered civilians. Or perhaps you can recall the events at Wounded Knee, when the innocents were murdered, and 100 years of silence was ordered, or perhaps the atrocities committed by Sherman's Forces on civilians. Soldiers should be free of the political chains imposed by lying, deceitful, corupt, politicians that run our nation!

There is no cover up here, the General made a stupid mistake by speaking with the press. Cover up's in this day and age are near impossible

He is a Military man, and a General he is supposed to preach the morals to his subordinates as well as follow them himself, once a General cannot follow the rules he is tasked with enforcing; he no longer needs to be a General

Colin, I agree with the chain of command being key to mantaining order in the ranks. Going public in a magazine interview was not the correct procedure. He should have spoken directly to his superior and privately voiced any concerns.

AMEN

how right you are.

shall we not forget the little fuck who released videos and classified emails and these same goddamned liberals were singing his praise, about letting the truth out.

now mcchrystal sheds some unfavorable light on the Annointed One and suddenly there is an outroar. "That's not right! it's against the rules!"

hey, just last week they were saying "fuck the rules"

I also find it interesting that many of these leftist media outlets (like MSNBC) are praising Petraus at the moment. While just a few yrs ago they, along with the Democrats were slamming Petraus and his leadership.

LoL i had completly forgot about how they trashed him on the magazine and brought him before the senate so he could mop the floor with the democrats.

First off I will say I salute the rank not the man

Secondly I know that you and I are soldiers, but my question is do you not remember UCMJ? Do you not remember army values? The General is tasked with enforcing those, as well as following them. Speaking to the press in that manner is not the way of a soldier and not the way of a General. It is also misconduct under UCMJ

I personally think he is a good guy, but you are not judged in the Army on whether you are a good guy, you are judged based on actions and performance.

"I'd die for those men" said the General, and he may have thrown himself on the sword to get the word out about what is going on.

McCarther did the same thing. McCarther was wrong, and another Democrat, Truman, lookd for political ways to end the Korean war instead of winning it. And as a result, we have Kim Jong Il with nukes threatening to blow up Seoul and Japan, and then we had the same plitical blunders repeated in Viet Nam, a complete lack of balls and an unwillingness to let the military fight the war to win. This bullshit of drawing imaginary lines and saying "we are too civilized to bomb over there" is a guaranteed path to defeat.

Obama has NO INTENTION of winning the war. He's looking for an exit strategy, and the troops know it. That's going to get a lot of you guys killed for nothing. I hate that. You heard what the troops were saying in that article, they are eager for a fight, and they are sick of being told they can't destroy an abandoned building from which our guys are being killed by snipers.

ya ya ya i get it sgt, but at the same time i think he just fell on the sword for all of us. Obviously things were not going at all like petreyus and him felt needed to be going on. Im starting to think this was for the administration to stop appointing dumbasses to be in charge of the daily operations in afghanistan for the dod, and to get in this war.

UCMJ is put there so that you can convince 19 year olds to follow 25 year olds into horrible situations that normally you wouldnt even think about doing. He was wrong for the article, but he was right in his actions. A 4 start isnt going to throw away his career unless it was in the best intrest of us.

amen

it seems like he slipped on a banana

but i wonder if he really was just furious with obama about not being given what he needed to win and decided to undermine him, maybe to force him to change direction.

we don't know what else went on behind the scene that mcchrystal didn't discuss...there is probably a lot more. who knows what obama said tohim on Airforce 1 that pissed McC off.

and if McC retires, he could easily go rogue and expose the president's failures and missteps openly.

careful here, Mr O. McC might be far more dangerous than you think....

No disrespect, Curtis, but you really have no idea what you are talking about. I think we can assume that there are other details of course, and whether they pissed him off or not is irrelevant. He is a high ranking officer in the military. You do your job and if you have a grievance you go through the proper channels. By divulging his opinions in public, he has severely damaged his credibility with in the armed force. I cannot stress enough how great a transgression this is for a person of his rank. He may go rogue or whatever, but no one of any importance will work or speak with him on record. This isn't the movies, friend. He has for all intents and purposes ended his career.

I never sid it wasn't a transgression, did I? he didn't really say anything "in public", his comments were apparently from private conversations with his staff, his major "blunder" was ever allowing a reporter around him...I can't figure that out. I say "blunder" in quotes because I'm not sure it was an accident.

There is apossiblity he realized that he could not succeed under current situations and limitations placed on him by the President, and decided that the war effort was worth more than his personal career or for protecting the presidnet, maybe he wanted to find a way to "leak" the truth about the morale of the highest eschelon of the brass, and the incompetence of a few of Obama's national security advisers.

Was that insubordinate? Yup. But keep in mind that the VAST MAJORITY of the comments were not actually his, but from his staff. His most direct statement was "disappointment" with Obama who was "intimidated" by the military brass (no fucking surprise there, he hates the military and can't understand them at all, being a former stoner hawaiian druggie liberal opposed to the military, how in the hell can he command them now?)

I heard someone suggest this was "suicide by cop", knowing he couldn't succeed given the current plans imposed on him, he may have decided to go out with a bang to clear the air about the disatisfaction.

Of course, that's not "appropriate", but it's happened before.

curtisreed...you are capable of far more insightful commentary than that, and come on, the story is about so much more than how you feel about Obama.

thanks, but that was just for fun. call me a troll, but i couldn't resist. (cue evil laughter)

LMAO curtisreed....always with the comic relief. The brainless wonder, however, was the last president, not this one.

Bush was clearly a dummy, but Obama looks even more inept, incompetent, over his head, clueless than even Bush, even worse than Jimmy Carter, and you know you have to SUCK to accomplish that.

now you know I am not going to agree with you on that one...I remember Jimmy Carter looked like a buffoon when he was in office, but in retrospect, a lot of what he was trying to point out about our energy over-consumption is now common knowledge...and nobody is EVER going to be able to top Bush for idiocracy....he had a shoe thrown at his head in Iraq, but my own dad threw whatever he could reach at the TV everytime Bush opened his mouth...of course if Sarah Palin ever gets elected I may have to ammend that statement.

there is a huge difference between recognizing a problem and solving it. carter's policies were horrendous, he was feckless, confused, innefectual. His policies created DOUBLE DIGIT INFLATION, people have forgotten what it was like to have loans with 20%+ interest, stagnating economy plus inflation. He had abandoned the Shaw because he idealistically thought that the Shaw was bad so the revolution would be better..boy was he wrong. He wavered on the Iran hostage crisis, putzed around and couldn't figure out what to do.

but all of these idiots have continued to increase government size and expenditures and have promoted trade plans and tax strategies that have driven jobs out of the country.

they all suck in my opinion

whew....ok, I wasn't paying much attention to things like double digit inflation back then, or the Shaw, but I'll take your word for it, and I agree with you on the increasing government size, expenditures, trade plans and tax strategies...and yeah, I am beginning to believe they all suck too, but I don't want to. there is a huge part of me that wants to believe that there are still some good intentions being acted upon in Washington.

That might be okay for a frat boy. Not for a general. Sounds like you have never served. If you have, I feel for those that you served with.

nonsense. Bush got into his greatest problems when he and Rummy ignored the advice of their generals. When the civilians start thinking they know more about how to win a war than their generals, they are in deep shit.

Obama has just repeated Bush's errors.

The reason the Bush administration turned things around in Iraq was that these same generals, Patreaus, McChrystal and others, had the balls to yell up the chain of command and tell their commander that they were making mistakes and had to change direction. Rummy was shuffled off and a new strategy put in place that worked.

but again the civilians are playing war and not listening. When McChrystal asked for 40,000 troops, he should have received all of them and then some.

and obama needs to grow a pair and start thinking of VICTORY, not capitulation, not some early retreat. He seems to be planning how to lose with honor, rather than win.

I can't wait to hear your definition of victory. This article isn't about victory, it's about the chain of command and each person's place in it. You said that you read the article. Did you understand the COIN theory? Do you think we should spend decades in-country? We have already occupied one country under false pretense. When you have a valid point about anything other than how wonderful conservative thought is let me know.

Well, that's kind of how I felt about Congressman Bob grabbing that college kid by the back of the neck...like he felt the rules didn't apply to him.

Agreed 100% +1

so because he was overheard calling national security advisor James Jones a clown? I'd have to agree, General, the Obama administration is filled with clowns. The same brainless shitheads who refuse to seal the border for political reasons, said they'd send 1200 national guard down there and then just "forgot" to do it, while sending 17,000 to the gulf, it's clear that "national security" is NOT on their minds at all.

I'm sure there is a HELL of a lot more McChrystal COULD say about Obama and Biden and the rest but didn't. Fire him, and he will truly be the loose cannon they fear.

Amongst other things yes, his complete disregard and lack of professionalism alone are considered misconduct in the Army; however as a civilian I'm sure you did not know that. This is not about the National Guard in the gulf but rather about a General who forgot he was a General in the armed forces and falls under UCMJ law

He was not bitching because he wants us out of Afghanistan he was bitching because Obama wants us out of Afghanistan and that would ruin his wartime fun

He is allowed to whine, complain, bitch, moan, argue, and disagree with the president and his people. The setting for that is at the weekly briefings he has with the president, not Rolling Stone magazine

That was my first reaction. Then again look at Roosevelt and Patton. At times, in a war the situation calls for a leader of soldiers rather than an apt administrator. Hopefully the right decision for our troops will be made. As for the gay remark, that aide needs to be shown the door.

Something told me you would be the first comment on this one Colin, although honestly, I don't know how I feel about this. The issues surrounding it, however, remind me a great deal of the conversations surrounding the wiki leaks story. Rules are different when you are in uniform, to be sure, but I think it's pretty common knowledge that the military rarely agrees with the civilian leadership when it comes to things like warfare, and maybe this whole affair is just exposing a giant crack in our governing warfare system anyway. How much does this president, or any president (with a few notable exceptions) really know about on the ground warfare, and yet, all of the real decisions are being made by people who have no real military experience. I'm not arguing that military experience is a guarantee of any success either, I'm just suggesting that something besides our policy in Afghanistan may need re-tooling.

Well McCrystal is not popular in the political field and he is not popular with the troops on the ground as the article also mentioned. His COIN technique is set up for failure, as we do not have the money to stay their for decades dropping billions into city's we destroy; to win the hearts and minds.

A General is useless if he is not supported by the white house and his troops

The comments he made to a reporter were just ludicrous, he needed to take the advice of shut the hell up. He is allowed to disagree with the president and others; he just cannot publicly bash them and criticize them.

He has no respect for authority as before this post he was head of black ops and reported to no one essentially.

He may be intelligent and a great military strategist but he has failed at looking like one.
He also took the same oath I did, and it was to obey the orders of the president and those appointed over me. You can't let a guy run wild with his power and step on toes of allies.
It's a tough situation to judge, but he deserves more than a slap on the wrist.

I think that it is unrealistic to want to show a Colonel the door on a "that's so gay" remark. I got the impression he was in no way anticipating being quoted in Rolling Stone, and there is a difference between publicly making that kind of statement and being quoted from a conversation. I don't know, maybe I'm way too tolerant of everything, or maybe I don't know how a gay person feels about that comment, but I don't think it was worthy of being shown the door. I guess if you are gay, you can say something is gay, if you are ghetto, you can call something ghetto, and if you are white, you can call something white bread and get away with it. It is not politically correct or sensitive, but it happens all the time, and granted the military is supposed to be re-examining that don't ask don't tell policy, but to me it just wasn't hate speech.

Well you did recommend it so I had to :D

The president has his cabinet and the pentagon to advise him on military strategy and to make military decisions for him. The president is also told both the positives and negatives of each decision he could make and he will then make his choice. While he may have no military experience that is what makes him free of falling for some of the B.S. that is pitched in those meetings.
The president also has the right to fire any officer in the military, its how the system works, making comments like this to the press in a time of war is an offense you can be fired for.

He is a General not a civilian so the rules for him are different, a lot of people are going to come into this post saying good for Stanley, however they do not realize that he signed on to be at the whim of the president the day he left westpoint and joined the big army.

Yes he had no idea he was going to be quoted when the reporter was sitting in the same room with him.

and it was not "that's so gay" it was "it's fucking gay"

I get that Colin, and largely I get that from reading some of the discussions you and guys like curtisreed have had, but I guess my real question is, just because this is the way we have always done it, does that mean it's still the best way?

Granted, I am deeply distressed reading the multiple daily e-mails coming from the
DOD notifying the interested of the death of another US soldier, and there is a part of me that wonders if Obama isn't handling this war like a community organizer, when in fact, that experience and that strategy may not be what we need to stop losing US personnel, which is my main concern. I guess what I am trying to say here is yes, I think the General might be a bit of a loose cannon, but I'm just not sure we should have people in charge of warfare strategy who do not have any credible warfare experience, and that of course includes the last Commander in Chief and the disastrous way he handled everything. I think fighting a war is a far cry from community organizing, and I don't mean that in a disparaging way, but if you are going to hire the experts to get the job done, then maybe you need to let the experts do what they need to do because they are the experts.

I agree with you but I want to remind you that the General pushed and often times tried to force Obama's hand on the strategy currently being used in Afghanistan and he was also the leading force behind the surge in Afghanistan, and neither of the 2 are showing any signs of success, so while the problem may lie in the white house and their lack of experience it also comes from an over zealous General who desperately wants his COIN theory to be proven to work.

ok, still listening. I am, as always, curious about how other people view this, and open to having my point of view adjusted.

I'm not saying your view is wrong, but for the large part what McChrystal has asked for from Obama he has received, and its not showing success; Afghanistan is a war where strategy falls apart when it is implemented on a force lacking a uniform. I also remember Obama saying the war would have ended within 100 days of him entering office but that's a whole different can of worms. I'm sure the General is great at his former job in black ops, and I think that he is really trying to make a name for himself; by standing up to the man.

I see and understand what you're saying.I have said something is "so gay" before myself. Even in front of gay friends who have also made that statement. My point is that the aide is saying this in front of a member of the press. We are coming to the end of DADT. The military is an extremely macho driven culture. At the same time they are supposed to be a reflection of our civilian culture minus the civil rights. Civil rights are replaced by the UCMJ. If the aide had said "That's so ghetto" in front of the reporter, do you think he would have still had a job? Not trying to argue. Just saying.

point taken

I think you're missing the point on the "gay" comment. Perhaps that term is offensive to gay people, but that is not the problem here. The problem is he made that statement about a dinner with a French minister. France is an ally with troops in this war under McChrystal's command. Having his staff fuck with our foreign policy by insulting the French and one of their leaders is beyond unacceptable.