Was Gen. McChrystal Rightly Fired?

“I’ve got no greater honor than serving as Commander-in-Chief of our men and women in uniform, and it is my duty to ensure that no diversion complicates the vital mission that they are carrying out.”

With those words, President Barack Obama emphasized the dismissal of Gen. Stanley McChrystal as commander of the foreign troops in Afghanistan. With his cooperation in an article in Rolling Stone, he created an enormous distraction.

McChrystal, who was followed for a few weeks by a journalist from Rolling Stone, is said to have called Vice President Joe Biden “Joe Bite Me,” National Security Adviser Jim Jones “a clown” and President Obama himself “indifferent and unprepared.”* And letters from Dick Holbrooke, the special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan are claimed to not even be read by McChrystal anymore, because he is afraid to be fired and is said to be acting as a “hurt animal.”

It becomes clear in the article how the general and his people speak patronizingly amongst themselves about their divided political bosses.

The conflict draws the division in Washington over the last phase of the war in Afghanistan. McChrystal does not want the U.S. to reduce the number of troops next year, while Obama has promised to start the withdrawal in 2011. It places Obama in a difficult situation: like his predecessor George W. Bush, he heads an escalated war that is becoming increasingly unpopular, in which little progress is being made, and in which more and more Americans fall victim. Therefore he had to, according to some, show that he is the real commander-in-chief. The president is under pressure to demonstrate that kind of leadership.

But there are also people who defend McChrystal, like former Ministry for European Affairs Frans Timmermans (PvdA), who reported the following on Facebook:

“Read the whole McChrystal interview and am not shocked by what he said. Some of his men went too far, but he did not. Too bad he was fired. Too bad Obama is in a place where he has to prove that he is boss.”

*Editor’s Note: This quotation, accurately translated, could not be verified.