A Dilema

I think I know how Gen McChrystal feels. He should not have made comments that disparaged his chain of command to the press. However, the comments he made were not not made to the world at large. This is not like Gen. MacArthur's infamous press release. Now, I'll grant that saying anything in front of a reporter is probably a bad idea when you have that many stars, especially if said reporter works for that shining light of journalistic excellence, Rolling Stone.

Now for the biggest "but" of all: Somehow, all we soldiers are expected to keep or mouths tight in the face of this administration? To elaborate, we have to deal with ROE that get in the way of completing missions. We have to face people with intent to kill us with kind words unless the situation is really bad. We have to purge areas of Taliban, but we are not allowed to chase them back to their holes. We have to listen to people who just three years ago were accusing us of being terrorists ourselves tell us how to do our jobs. We have to put up roller coaster manning levels that erode our knowledge base, disrupt logical program progression, and sap morale. We have to live with the idea that our Commander in Chief is cozy with people who have attacked the Pentagon, for crying out loud.

I understand where General McChrystal is coming from. He is a soldier. He's working for a "community organizer", whatever that is. That's the problem: a leader working for a sycophant.

We'd be better off with one McChrystal than a thousand "community organizers". He's a man who does something worthwhile for a living. I'm still struggling to find anything that the President has done that could be construed as worthwhile.