Ann Scott Tyson, reporting at
Washington Post

Army Officers Criticize Rebuke of Gen. McChrystal

Army officers gathered at a convention in Washington this week said senior White House officials should not have rebuked Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, for saying publicly that a scaled-back war effort would not succeed.

The hallways at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center buzzed with sympathy for McChrystal, who has said the U.S.-led effort in Afghanistan risks failure without a rapid infusion of additional forces. Obama and his advisers are now debating strategy in Afghanistan, with some officials arguing against additional deployments.

"It was definitely a hand slap," one Army officer said of the statement last weekend by national security adviser James L. Jones, a retired Marine general, that military officials should pass advice to President Obama through their chain of command. The Army officer, like others attending the annual meeting of the Association of the United States Army, spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the politically sensitive issue.

Read the rest of the article.

Meanwhile, JohnHuang2 at FreeRepublic had this to say:

A few easy tips on how to lose a war
Obama has managed to cram four years of Jimmy Carter's incompetence and cowardice into less than nine months -- an Olympic record! It took years for Carter to build a track record of fecklessness and cowardice big enough to invite the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, but Obama bested Carter with the Taliban in mere months.

Liberals -- including Obama -- opposed the war in Iraq supposedly because of the theory that Iraq 'diverted' resources from Afghanistan, which was the war they pretended for seven years and eleven months to support. Now libbies say they suddenly oppose the war in Afghanistan because Afghanistan 'diverts' resources from Pakistan, where al-Qaeda is. When liberals finish surrendering to the Taliban in Afghanistan, they'll claim we shouldn't fight in Pakistan either because Pakistan 'diverts' resources from Afghanistan, where al-Qaeda just returned!

Making believe he has a clue about what is going on in Afghanistan, Obama got together with his alleged national security team for yet another 'strategy session' on Afghanistan Wednesday after a 90-minute meeting the day before with House and Senate politicians, including eminent war strategists Gen. Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. To really put the fear in al-Qaeda, more strategy sessions are scheduled. (And on the seventh strategy session, the messiah will rest.)

Winter is just around the corner and American troops in Afghanistan still don't have reinforcements and are running out of ammo and water and are getting bombed and shot at from all directions -- but look at those strategy sessions the White House is having! How can we lose???

Obama spokesman Baghdad Bob Gibbs told "reporters" (or, Democrats with press passes) that Obama "is going to make a decision -- popular or unpopular -- based on what he thinks is in the best interests of the country." Depending on which country Gibbs is talking about, this would mark the first time. His own commander on the ground along with Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike Mullen and CENTCOM Commander David Petraeus all say reinforcements are needed -- versus Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. This is a real brain teaser.

For almost two years, some chap named "Sen. Barack Obama" headed up a subcommittee which oversees NATO ops in Afghanistan, so maybe the 'president' should ask him what to do.

Showcasing his decisiveness, Obama's strategy on Afghanistan since becoming president has been to announce a 'comprehensive new strategy', hold on to it for at least five minutes, then change his mind. In March, Obama announced a 'comprehensive new strategy' on Afghanistan, sending another 21,000 troops to carry out the fight without Obama. Six weeks later, he appoints Gen. Stanley McChrystal as ground commander because McChrystal is against relying too much on drones. Late August rolls around, polls go south, and Obama begins to disagree with decisions made weeks earlier by Obama. Now Obama wants to rely more on drones.

On September 30, just one tiny month after Gen. McChrystal handed in his assessment for Obama to ignore, Obama held a 3-hour strategy session on when to hold the next 3-hour strategy session where no decisions will be made.

Afghanistan was called the Soviets' 'Viet Nam' but warmongering George W. Bush and the other grown ups eight years ago knew it's either invade Iraq, hang a huge flypaper there and get the blanket of swarming jihadists buzzing into it or Afghanistan rapidly becomes the Great Satan's prolonged war/'Nam-style quagmire, too. Win the Afghan war in Iraq or lose both. The run up in the U.S. troop body count in Afghanistan is happening concurrent with talk of bugging out. Even beyond Afghanistan, Bush's 'unnecessary war' in Iraq kept binny and the boys so diverted and distracted that, eight years on, the all-but-certain and inevitable second 9/11 on U.S. soil never happened. But voters sent a former ACORN community organizer to finish a grown up's job so better gird your loins for Viet Nam II.

Anyway, that's...
My Two Cents...
"JohnHuang2"