Naval History Forums

Just read McChrystal's article in Rolling Stone, read it twice as a matter of fact. It's simply discouraging what the article says and what happened to this man.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/ne ... how_page=0

Regards,

Shades of Gen. MacArthur!!

Billy Mitchell, Douglass McArthur and McChristal.

Opposition to the war has........ forced the resignation of Germany's president.....

What a nonsense!

It is interesting that during Billy Mitchell court martial one of the judges was Douglas McArthur. He voted "Not guilty" because he felt that no senior commander must be silenced because he is disputing doctrine with their superiors.

It's ok to dispute doctrine with superiors. It isn't ok for a serving officer to dispute doctrine with superiors in the press. Once he did that, he had to go.

Incidentally, McChrystal's strategy has been extremely unpopular with the troops. They don't like the extremely restrictive rules of engagement he imposed and they have let him know that when he has gone to combat units for pep talks.

Gen Petraeus is making a huge sacrifice in accepting this command. Afghanistan may not be a war we can win, given our respect for human rights and our population's sensitivity to collateral damage. The war is already unpopular at home and the longer it lasts the more unpopular it will become. Right now people's attention is more on the ongoing disaster in the Gulf of Mexico but that will eventually change. Gen Petraeus is a really smart guy and is probably more flexible than Gen McChrystal, but the nature of Afghanistan and it's population might make "winning" impossible.

In order to win that war the lessons are in History: Genghis Khan did conquer that forsaken piece of desert.

Karl Heidenreich wrote:In order to win that war the lessons are in History: Genghis Khan did conquer that forsaken piece of desert.

Yes, a dictatorship is definitely better at controlling an unruly population. If necessary he just kills most of them.

unruly enemy population... like the Dresden population, or Hiroshima or Nagasaki or My Lai or those kind of places attacked by the democratic and political correct forces of the US.

Karl Heidenreich wrote:unruly enemy population... like the Dresden population, or Hiroshima or Nagasaki or My Lai or those kind of places attacked by the democratic and political correct forces of the US.

Do you seriously think those are examples of normal US policy?

Karl Heidenreich wrote:unruly enemy population... like the Dresden population, or Hiroshima or Nagasaki or My Lai or those kind of places attacked by the democratic and political correct forces of the US.

Even the choice here rather indicates an ajenda. There was nothing particularly spectacular about Dresden other than the propagand effort put into it. It's also worth noteing that it was mostly a British mission that caused the fire storm. As for Hiroshima and Nagasaki legitimate military targets that ended the war and saved lives. My Lai was a criminal act and the officer in charge was tried and convicted of it. None of which has any relationship to the question under discussion.

Back on topic has anyone actually read the article? What exactly did McChrystal say? Most of the negative things I've seen were actually attributed to his aides. My impression is the SF types have never thought particualry highly of liberals of any stripe.

What I find disturbing in the Hastings article in Rolling Stone is his claim ''that the US has no allies in Afghanistan.'' Nowhere is the British involvenent mentioned. The fact that the Dutch and French commitments have been withdrawn, the French taking 40 dead are gleefully stated - but Britain has 9,000 troops in Afghanistan, and have lost 300 dead, more than in the Falklands campaign.

This article is biased so spectaculary against Obama that it ignores and distorts the true situation. Hastings is not doing the US forces in Afghanistan any favours, and certainly not the British. To him it seems Britain doesn't exist.

Politic aside I don´t think very much of McChristal because I have never, ever, believed in low intensity conflicts nor in Special Forces or unconventional warfare. Sadly those "solutions" are for those without the will to do what´s necesary. The problem is that in order to do what´s necesary many people, including inocents, must pay. I do remember, still, Kurtz speech at Apocalypse now: "we need men that kill without judgement, without judgement, because it is judgement what defeat us..." Of course, saying something like this is to be wishing to be branded nazi or criminal, but the problem is that wars are not fought in the college classrooms of ethics and moral but in the battlefield. What I intend to say is that a moral standing is not only unnecesary but stupid in extreme: in WWII the US and Britain burned alive hundred of thousands of civilians in order to win. Afterwards both came with fairy tales to give a moral approach to the issue when, in reality, there is none needed: Germany and Japan were their enemies and they deserved what they got because, basically, they would have done the same if they had the resources. If the Taliban have the instruments to vaporize New York or Los Angeles they will do it with criminal happiness, so why is so terrible that the US took the decision of increasing the level of violence and even nuke the mountains of Afganistan in order to render those enemy refuges useless for the next hundred years... and if Mexico, Spain and Bangladesh put a censorship at the UN then it is time for the UN to go and install themselves in Port au Prince, Haiti without any US funding. Still Mexico , Spain and Bangladesh need to do business with the US as the people of Lebannon need to do business with Rome after they burned Carthage to ashes.