Obama dismisses Stanley McChrystal, the highest U.S. commander in Afghanistan, after his remarks in an interview in 'Rolling Stone '. This is the full article, which criticizes the environment McChrystal Obama and Joe Biden ridiculed the vice president. McChrystal had taken control of the war, never losing sight of the real enemy: the wimps in the White House. By Michael Hastings
"How did I get myself mixed up in this dinner?" Asks the General Stanley McChrystal. It is Thursday evening from mid-April, and the Commander of the Armed Forces and NATO in Afghanistan is sitting in the suite of a Westminster Hotel, four star hotel in Paris.
is located in France to sell his new war strategy to our NATO allies to maintain the fiction, in essence, that we really have allies. McChrystal Since taking office a year ago, the war in Afghanistan has become the exclusive property of the United States. The opposition to the war and ended up with the Danish government, forcing the resignation of President German and causing both Canada and the Netherlands announced the withdrawal of its 4,500 troops. McChrystal is in Paris to prevent the French, who have lost over 40 soldiers in Afghanistan, they shake their legs and begin to doubt.
"The dinner comes with the job, sir," said his chief of staff, Colonel Charlie Flynn. McChrystal
quick turns in his chair.
"Hey, Charlie, is this with the position?" He asks.
Meanwhile, she teaches middle finger.
The general looks around at the room with your travel team of ten people has become a center for large-scale operations. The tables are full of Heavy-duty laptops and blue wires crossed on the thick carpet of the hotel, connected to satellite dishes to provide encrypted phone line and communication via e-mail. He is dressed in civilian
and informal, with blue tie, a shirt and slacks (McChrystal is not in their sauce). Paris, as one of its asesorares says, is "anti-McChrystal city imaginable." The General hates fancy restaurants, rejecting any place with candles on the tables, for being "too Gucci." He prefers his beer-flavored Bud Light Lime (his favorite) to Bordeaux, and movies like Talladega Nights (inconsequential sports comedy) his favorite film, Jean-Luc Godard. Also, being in the window facing the public has never been a place where you felt comfortable McChrystal: before Obama put him in command of the Afghanistan war, spent five years leading the Black Ops (groups special operations) more secrets of the Pentagon.
"What is the last time the bombing of Kandahar?" Flynn asked McChrystal. The city has been hit with two powerful car bombs in one day, raising the question of the guarantees of the General that he could wrest the Taliban.
"It seems that there are two Kias [Killed in action, killed in action], but I have confirmed it, "says Flynn's chief of staff. McChrystal
take a last look at the suite. At 55 years, is gaunt and skinny, somewhat like a larger version of Christian Bale in the movie rescue dawn. His dark blue eyes have the disturbing ability to penetrate you when you are fixed. If you fuck or disappoint, they can destroy your soul without the need for him to raise his voice.
"I'd rather beat hit me all that fit in this room have to go to that dinner," McChrystal said.
pauses.
"Unfortunately, nobody in this room could do":
And out the door.
"Who goes to dinner?" I asked one of his assistants.
"Some French minister," he says, "is bullshit." The next morning
, McChrystal and his team together to prepare a speech he will give at the Ecole Militaire, the French military academy. The General is proud to be sharper and have more guts than anybody. But his nerve has a price: while McChrystal has been in charge of the war for only one year, during which time he has managed to piss off almost all the parties involved in the conflict. Last fall, during a question and answer session after a speech he gave in London, McChrystal's counterterrorism strategy called U.S. vice president, Joe Biden, as "shortsighted," saying it would lead to a state of "chaos-istan." The comment earned him a campion of President Obama himself, who called the General to a laconic private meeting aboard Air Force One McChrystal's message was clear: shut the fuck up and go unnoticed.
now reviewing the notes of his talk in Paris, McChrystal question aloud what Biden was asked about touch today, and how they should respond. "I never know what will happen when I go to answer questions, that is the problem, "he says. Then, unable to provide real help, he and his team imagine what that response would be the vice president: "Are you asking about Biden? Who is that? "McChrystal said, laughing. "Biden?" Suggests his most senior aide. "Did you say bite me [which in English means' bite me 'or a less wrong' that give you the ass']?".
When Barack Obama set foot in the Oval Office, he immediately prepared to act on the promise more important of his campaign in international politics: re-focus on the war in Afghanistan on what led us to invade them first. "I want Americans understand it," he said in March 2009. "We have a clear and focused objective: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan." He sent 21,000 more troops to Kabul, the largest increase since the war began in 2001. Following the advice of the Pentagon and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, also dismissed General David McKiernan, then the commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, and replaced by a man who did not know and with which only had been found: the General Stanley McChrystal. It was the first time that a senior had been relieved General of wartime service in more than 50 years since Harry Truman to General Douglas MacArthur departed in the middle of the Korean War.
Although he voted for Obama, McChrystal and his new commander in chief did not connect. The General first met with Obama one week after he took office, when the President met with a dozen senior military officers in a room in the Pentagon known as El Tanque. According to sources close to the meeting, McChrystal thought Obama seemed "uncomfortable and intimidated" by the room full of high-flying military. Its first meeting was held alone in the Oval Office four months later, McChrystal when he had his work in Afghanistan, and was not much better. "Photography was a ten minute operation," says an adviser to McChrystal. "Obama clearly knew nothing about him or who he was. He was the guy who was directing the fucking war, but did not seem very committed. The chief was very disappointed. "
From the beginning, McChrystal was determined to leave his personal stamp on Afghanistan, using it as a laboratory for a controversial military strategy called Counterinsurgency. COIN theory as it is known, is the new Bible of the Pentagon brass. It is a doctrine that seeks to reconcile the military's preference by the violence of high technology with the demands of prolonged battles in time, in failed states. COIN
call sending huge numbers of troops on the ground, not only to destroy the enemy, but to live among the civilian population and slowly rebuild, or build from scratch, other national government. A process that even his staunchest defenders concede that takes years if not decades, to take place. This theory essentially redefine the military, expand its authority (and funds) to cover the diplomatic and political aspects of war: think of the Green Berets [Army Special Forces U.S.] volunteers like peace operations. In 2006, General David Petraeus tested the theory on Iraq for its invasion and quickly earned a hard-core supporters and advisers, composed of journalists, military officers and civilians. Dubbed by his enthusiasm COINdinistas sectarian, this influential team believed that doctrine would be the perfect solution for Afghanistan. All they needed was a general with enough charisma and political savvy to implement it. McChrystal
When Obama leaned in to push for war, it was with the same courage with which he hunted terrorists in Iraq: learn how to operate your enemy, be faster and ruthless than anyone else and remove these bastards. After arriving in Afghanistan in June 2009, General conducted a performance analysis ordered by Defense Secretary Robert Gates.
The infamous document was leaked to the press, with an ominous conclusion: if we sent another 40,000 troops, swelling the number of armed forces by nearly half, were in danger of "Operation failed." The White House was furious. McChrystal, they felt, was trying to intimidate Obama, exposing him to charges of weakness on national security unless you bend to his will. Obama was against the Pentagon and the Pentagon was ready to kick in the ass to the President.
The previous autumn, with its highest-General asking for even more troops, Obama proposed a review period of three months to reassess the strategy in Afghanistan. "That time was painful," McChrystal told me in one of the many long interviews. "I was selling an unmarketable position." For the General was a battle, in which the bones are left, against experienced men in government as Vice President Biden, who argued that a prolonged counterinsurgency campaign in Afghanistan would plunge the U.S. into a military quagmire without weakening international terrorist networks . "The whole strategy is a fraud perpetrated COIN in the American people, "said Douglas Macgregor, a retired colonel and a leading critic against the counter who attended West Point (U.S. Military Academy) with McChrystal. "The idea that we're going to spend a trillion dollars in the reconstruction of Islamic culture is a total nonsense," says MacGregor.
the end, despite everything, McChrystal got much of what I wanted. On 1 December, in a speech at West Point, the President presented all the reasons to fight in the Afghanistan war was a bad idea: it is expensive, we are plunged into economic crisis, a commitment to undermine a decade-long the power U.S. and Al Qaeda has shifted its base of operations to Pakistan. Then, without using the words "victory" or "win", Obama said he would send 30,000 troops to Afghanistan, almost as many as had been asked McChrystal. The President had registered, although hesitant, with those supporting the insurgency.
Today, while McChrystal accelerated towards an offensive in southern Afghanistan, the prognosis for success is bleak. In June the death toll of U.S. troops exceeded 1,000 and the number of IEDs (improvised explosive devices) has doubled. Spending hundreds of billions of dollars in the fifth poorest country of the Earth, has failed to enlist the support of the civilian population, whose attitude toward the American troops varies from intensely cautious to openly hostile. The largest military operation in the year-a fierce offensive that began in February to regain the southern town of Marja-stretching continues, instigating McChrystal himself to refer to it as his "bleeding ulcer." In June, Afghanistan officially overtook Vietnam as the longest war in American history, and Obama has started to withdraw quietly marked the deadline for the departure of the troops, in July next year. The President is himself caught in something more foolish than a quagmire, a quagmire in which he went alone, knowing, and although it's a mammoth project that he wanted: the creation of a multigenerational nation.
Even those who support McChrystal and his strategy of counterinsurgency know that any success that the general scope will be more like Vietnam than Desert Storm. "It will not seem like a victory, victory or know smell of victory," says General Bill Mayville, who serves as chief of operations for McChrystal. "This is going to end up in fight."
The night before his speech in Paris, McChrystal and his team head to Kitty O'Shea's, an Irish pub for tourists, just around the corner from the hotel. His wife, Annie, has joined him on a rare visit, since the Iraq war began in 2003, has seen her husband less than 30 days a year. But as is its 33 anniversary, McChrystal has invited his inner circle for dinner and drinks at the site "less Gucci" that his team could find. His wife is not surprised. "Once I took Jack in the Box [fast food], but I had arranged a very elegant," he says with a smile. General
The team is a collection, handpicked, murderers, spies, genius, patriot, operators blatantly political and manic. There is a former head of British Special Forces, two Navy SEAL (members of special operations, Navy), a command of the Afghan Special Forces, one lawyer, two fighter pilots and at least two dozen veterans of combat and counterinsurgency experts. They call themselves, jokingly, Team America, taken from a parody about the stupidity of the military in the animated series South Park. And they pride themselves with their attitude of 'I can' and his disdain for authority. After arriving in Kabul in the summer of 2009, the Team America began to change the culture of the International Security Assistance Force [ISAF mission in Afghanistan led by NATO]. American soldiers ridiculed the ludicrous acronyms with different meanings, as I suck at fighting (I'm terrible fighting) or in sandals and flip-flops (sandals and flip flops). McChrystal banned alcohol on base, drove to Burger King and other symbols of the excesses Yankees extended morning training sessions to include thousands of officers and became the command center in a monitoring room. That is, an information center whose design emulates the New York offices of Mayor Mike Bloomberg. It also set a frenetic pace for his team, becoming legendary for sleeping four hours a night, running seven miles every morning and eat once a day (in the month I spent with General I witnessed this last fact.) It has created a superman legend around, as if the ability to go without sleep and without food to translate into the possibility of a man winning the war with one hand.
At midnight, at Kitty O'Shea's, more than half Team America is fart. Two officers do an Irish dance, mixed with steps of a traditional Afghan wedding dance, while McChrystal advisers are caught by the shoulders and sing, slurred speech, a song they created. "Afghanistan!" Roar. "Afghanistan!". And his song called Afghanistan. McChrystal is removed from the circle, watching his team. "All these men," he says. "I would die for them and they would die for me." Men gathered
can look and sound like a bunch of combat veterans vent, but in fact this group is so closely represents the most powerful force, shaping U.S. policy in Afghanistan. While McChrystal and his men have undisputed control of all military aspects of war, there is no equivalent in political or diplomatic side. Are only a few players in the Administration who are vying for control in Afghanistan: ambassador American, Karl Eikenberry, the special representative in Afghanistan, Richard Holborroke, the national security adviser, Jim Jones, and Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, not to mention 40 or so, ambassadors in coalition and a large number of commentators try to get themselves into the mess, like John Kerry or John McCain. This inconsistency has led diplomatic team McChrystal decisions, and hinder efforts to build a stable and credible government in Afghanistan. "It endangers the mission," says Stephen Biddle, a senior member of the Council on Foreign Relations that supports McChrystal. "The military alone can not create a reform of government. "
Part of the problem is structural: the Defense Department budget exceeds 600 billion dollars, while the Department of State will only receive 50 trillion. But another part is personal, private, McChrystal team likes to throw shit on the people of Obama, on the diplomatic side. An aide called Jim Jones, a retired general with four medals and a veteran of the Cold War, a "clown" who is "stuck in 1985." Politicians like McCain and Kerry, another aide said, "come and have a meeting with Karzai (President of Afghanistan), I criticized in a press conference at the airport and time again for the Sunday talk shows. Frankly, that's not very useful. " Hillary Clinton received only good reviews of the tight circle of McChrystal. "Hillary Stan protected during the strategic review," says an adviser. "She said, 'If Stan wants something, give it what it needs." McChrystal
save a special skepticism Holborooke, the reintegration officer Taliban. "The boss says it's like a wounded animal," said one team member General. "Holbrooke is always hearing rumors that are going to be fired, so that makes it dangerous."
In a moment of your trip to Paris McChrystal checks his BlackBerry. "Oh, another mail Holbrooke, no," he growls. "Do not even want it back." Click on the message, read the greeting aloud and again put the unit back in your pocket, without bothering to hide his irritation.
"Make sure that you are not hit in the leg," an aide joked, referring to the email.
By far the most crucial relationship-and-tie is between McChrystal and Eikenberry, the U.S. ambassador in Afghanistan. According to those close to the two men, Eikenberry, a retired three-star General who served in Afghanistan in 2002 and 2005 - can not stand that his former subordinate is now in charge. It is also furious that McChrystal, backed by NATO allies, refused to place Eikenberry at the fundamental position of viceroy of Afghanistan, which had become the diplomatic equivalent of the General. The charge, however, was for the British ambassador Mark Sedwill-a move that very efficiently increased its influence in diplomatic, out of the way after a powerful rival. "Actually, this position needs to be filled by an American so I can have weight," says an American official familiar with the negotiations.
The relationship was further strained in January, when a document Rated Eikenberry wrote was leaked to The New York Times. The writing was so sharp and predictable. The ambassador launched a brutal critique McChrystal's strategy, President Hamid Karzai rejected as "not a suitable strategic partner," and raised the question of whether the counterinsurgency plan would be "enough" to deal with Al Qaeda. "We're going to become too involved here, no way to free ourselves," said Eikenberry, "not prevent the country sliding back into anarchy and chaos."
A McChrystal and his team are furious that letter. "I like Karl [Eikenberry], I've known him for years, but they never told us anything," McChrystal said, who admits to feeling "betrayed" by filtration. "This is one that protects his side to the history books. Now if we fail, we can say 'told you so. "
The most striking example of misuse of diplomatic policy McChrystal is how to deal with Karzai. It McChrystal, not diplomats as Eikenberry and Holbrooke, who enjoys the best relationship with the man in the United States has committed to lead Afghanistan. The counterinsurgency doctrine requires a credible government, and given that Karzai does not have the confidence of his own people, McChrystal has worked hard to give credibility. In recent months, has accompanied the President in more than ten trips around the country, remaining at his side at rallies, or shura, in Kandahar. In February, the day before the offensive to Marja, McChrystal even drove to the palace of the President, to capture his signature on what would be the largest military operation of the year. Karzai's staff, however, insisted that the President was sleeping, trying to overcome a cold and could not be bothered. After several hours trying to convince, McChrystal got help from Afghanistan's defense minister, who persuaded the people of Karzai to wake him from his nap. McChrystal
NOT JUST SEND IN THE FIELD OF BATTLE, BUT IT ALSO TAKES
diplomatic decisions.
This is one of the major failures of the counterinsurgency strategy McChrystal: the need to build a credible government puts the U.S. at the mercy of any leader we have supported minor-a danger that Eikenberry explicitly warned in his letter. McChrystal team even admits privately that Karzai is not far from the ideal partner. "Karzai has been locked in his palace last year," laments one top aide to General. Sometimes, Karzai has actively undermined McChrystal desire to put in charge. During a recent visit to Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Karzai met with three U.S. soldiers who were wounded in Uruzgan province. When Karzai was out, he shouted to McChrystal: "General, did not even know we were fighting in Uruzgan."
De brat, growing up in the army, McChrystal exhibited a mixture of brilliance and bravado that followed him throughout his career. His father fought in Korea and Vietnam, retiring as a General, two stars, and his four brothers joined the navy. Moving through the different bases, McChrystal was busy with baseball, a sport that was never intended to hide his superiority. In the youth league, he shouted to the public before the strikes even get with his quick release. McChrystal
entered West Point in 1972, when the army of the United States was near its lowest point in popularity. His class was the last to graduate before the academy began admitting women. Hudson Jail, as it was known then, was a potent mix of testosterone, hooliganism and reactionary patriotism. The cadets are constantly in war tore the hall during meals, and birthdays are celebrated with tradition "fuck-rats, which often left the birthday boy on the street, snow or mud, covered in cream shaving. "I was pretty out of control," says Lt. General David Barno, a classmate, who became the top commander in Afghanistan from 2003 to 2005. Class, full of what Barno called "tremendous talent" and "wild teens with a strong sense of idealism", also left the General Ray Odierno, the current commander of American forces in Iraq.
son of a General McChrystal was also the leader of the dissidents of campus. A dual role that taught him to move in a rigid environment, while you stand up to authority every chance they had. Accumulated over a hundred hours of absences from drinking, partying and insubordination. A record with their peers swashbuckling, nicknamed Century Man [joke that compares the lack hundred hours of the hundred years of a century]. One of his companions, who prefers not to be named, remembers McChrystal found asleep in the shower down after a case of beer he had hidden under the sink. Riots nearly cost him his expulsion, and spent hours under forced marches in the area, a paved courtyard where discipline was taught to cadets rebels. "Sometimes I would visit him and spent most of his time in the library, while Stan was in the area," says Annie, who began dating him in 1973.
McChrystal won a class ranking of 298, 855, a result below the possibilities of a man identified as consistently brilliant. His most convincing was extracurricular, as editor of The Pointer, the literary magazine of West Point. McChrystal wrote seven short stories that eerily presage many of the issues that confront later in his career. In one story, a fictitious official protest about the difficulty of training for fighting foreign troops, in another, a soldier of 19 years kills a child to be confused with a terrorist. In Brinksman's Note, a piece of fiction and suspense, an unnamed narrator seems to be trying to stop a plot to assassinate the President. Yet as the narrator is the murderer, can to infiltrate the White House: "The President came smiling. The right pocket of his coat I had with me, I got a 32 caliber pistol. For failure of Brinkman, I had got. "
After graduation, the Second Officer Stanley McChrystal joined an army that, having recovered from the Vietnam War, one could criticize many things but one was not found weak. "We felt we were a generation that had lived through times of peace," he recalls. "Was the Gulf War, yes, but even that does not look like much." So he spent his career there McChrystal where there was action, he joined the Special Forces School and became a regimental commander of the third battalion of the assault troops (Rangers) in 1986. It was a dangerous position even in times of peace, about two dozen soldiers during training caused low throughout the eighties. It was also an unusual path in the military career of a man most of the soldiers who want to climb to General positions do not come to the assault troops. Showing a knack for transforming outmoded systems, McChrystal said to revolutionize the training regime of the assault troops. Introduced MMA, demanded every soldier learn to use night vision goggles in their assault rifles and forced the troops to strengthen their resilience to weekly marches involving backpacks loaded with very heavy.
the late nineties, McChrystal, very cleverly, launched an image operation, spending a year at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and then at the Council on Foreign Relations. There was co-authored a treatise on the pros and cons of humanitarian intervention. But while climbing positions, McChrystal also relied on lessons he learned as a problem child in West Point, knew exactly how far he could force a hierarchy rigid military without being expelled. Discovered how far we could go very intelligent being an asshole, especially after the political chaos that happened September 11. "He was a very focused," says Annie. "Even as a young officer seemed to know exactly what I wanted. I do not think his personality has changed in all these years. "
According to some sources, McChrystal's career should have ended twice. One, as a spokesman for the Pentagon during the Iraq invasion, a period in which the General was more an amplifier of the White House that a diligent commander strength to speak for itself. When Defense Secretary Donald Rusmfeld said his infamous phrase "these things happen [Stuff Happens]" during the looting of Baghdad, McChrystal backed him fully. A few days later echoed very proud of the president's claims about the end of the war in Iraq. But it was during his next appearance, against the greatest military elites, including the assault troops, Special Operations Groups of the Navy (Navy Seals) and Combat Applications Group (Delta Force) - when McChrystal involved in a stealth exercise that would have destroyed any other race.
After Corporal Pat Tillman, the former star the NFL turned into soldiers of assault, was killed accidentally by his own troops in Afghanistan in April 2004, McChrystal helped create the feeling that Tillman was killed by the Afghans. Signed a forged recommendation for delivery of a silver star a member of the Armed Forces who had suggested that Tillman had been killed by enemy fire. McChrystal would claim later that the recommendation did not read carefully: enough excuse for a Commander pilgrim with a reputation for paying scrupulous attention to minute details.
A week later, McChrystal sent a report to his superiors in the chain of command warning specifically that President Bush should avoid mentioning the cause of Tillman's death. "If the circumstances of Corporal Tillman's death become public," he wrote, "could mean public ridicule the President." McChrystal
SCREW MAY HAVE GOT TO OBAMA STRATEGY
, but his troops not swallow
"The false reality that McChrystal clearly helped build devalued the real behavior of Pat" wrote Tillman's mother, Mary, in her book Boots on the Ground by Dusk. McChrystal got away with it, add it, because it was the "golden boy" of Rumsfeld and Bush, who adored I was willing, even if its supposed willingness to bypass the rules or circumvent the chain of command. Nine days after Tillman's death, McChrystal was promoted to the position of General.
Two years later, in late 2006, McChrystal was involved in a scandal involving abuse and torture of prisoners at Camp Nama in Iraq. According to a report by Human Rights Watch, prisoners in the camp were the subject of ritual abuse was already habitual: submit to unnatural postures and dragged naked through the mud. McChrystal was not sanctioned by the scandal, although a field interrogator said he had been inspecting the prison on multiple occasions. McChrystal was what was so uncomfortable that tried that operations were not made prisoners under his command in Afghanistan, seeing them as "a political morass," according to an official of the United States Navy. In May 2009, while McChrystal was preparing for his inauguration session, your staff will be trained to answer the tough questions you could ask about Camp Nama and the case of Tillman. But scandals barely dented the Congress and McChrystal was soon back in Kabul to lead the war in Afghanistan.
The media largely McChrystal also gave the nod in all the controversy. While General Petraeus is a kind of memo, a puppet with the eternal hanging sambenito assault soldier, McChrystal is a rebel with a strong stomach, a "Commander Jedi" as Newsweek called it. did not care that his teenage son got home with blue hair and a crest. And that spoke of an unusual sensitivity to an officer upon graduation. Requests opinions and seems sincerely interested in the answer. Bring briefings on your iPod and listen to books on tape. It takes a couple of nunchakus [martial arts weapon] made to measure in their convoy, having printed his name and his four stars. And their work routine usually includes a quotation often just learned of Bruce Lee ("No Limits. Only obstacles and you should not stay in them, but you must pass through "). He was part of dozens of night raids during the war in Iraq, unprecedented for a senior, and appeared in missions by surprise, not just followers. "The kids adore fucking Stan McChrystal," said a British officer serving in Kabul. "You're out there anywhere, in the middle of Iraq, you're going to take a break and someone goes with you. Suddenly a spits you out, 'Who the hell is that? ". And 'this' is the fucking Stan McChrystal. "
was not all bad for McChrystal was a resounding success as head of Command Special Operations forces conducted elite darker operations of government. During the uprising in Iraq, his team captured and killed thousands of insurgents, including Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq. "The Special Operations Command was a killing machine," says General Mayville, its chief operating officer. McChrystal also open to new ways of killing. Systematically scanned terrorist networks, marked as targets for insurgents and went to hunt, often with the help of cyberfreaks traditionally avoided by the military. "The chief put his hand to the typical 24 year old boy with an earring in the nose, with some MIT fucking title of sitting in a corner with 16 computer screens buzzing, "said a Special Forces commando who worked with McChrystal in Iraq and now works with his team in Kabul. "It used to say was, 'Hey, you, fucking muscled, you would have not to throw in their mouths if they do not help us."
Even in his new role as American evangelical leader of the insurgency, McChrystal still retains its hunting instincts entrenched terrorists. To pressure the Taliban, has increased the number of Special Forces units in Afghanistan from four to nineteen. "More than you crush it four or five goals this night, "said McChrystal would have a Navy SEAL was found in the corridors of its headquarters. "But in the morning I have to berate it." In fact, the General often has to apologize for the disastrous consequences of its counterinsurgency. In the first four months of this year, the United Nations forces killed some ninety civilians, 76% more than the same period in 2009, a figure that has created enormous resentment among the population that wants to win the COIN strategy for himself. In February, a night patrol of the Special Forces ended with the deaths of two Afghan pregnant and evidence of attempted concealment. In April, there were Kandahar protests after U.S. forces accidentally opened fire on a bus, killing five Afghan civilians. "We shot a lot of amazing people," McChrystal recently admitted.
Despite the tragedies and mistakes, McChrystal implemented a stricter policy of the United States has deployed in a war zone to avoid civilian casualties. He called it "mathematical insurgent": for every innocent person who killer, I think ten new enemies. Ordered the convoys of control over their reckless driving, restricting the use of effective air and markedly restricted in night raids. Since then, often apologized to Hamid Karzai when civilians are killed. Then, his strategy is to degrade to the commanders responsible for those deaths. "There are moments where the most dangerous place in Afghanistan is in front of McChrystal, after a civil death," said a U.S. army officer.
ISAF has even begun to discuss ways of getting killed is not something that you can get a medal. There is even talk of creating a medal to the "courageous containment," a word that has no chance of gaining much acceptance, given the culture bully the United States military.
But leaving aside how are the new strategic McChrystal orders work, his ideas have caused a backlash among his troops. To say they contain the fire, according to complaints from soldiers exposed to a much greater risk. "Low profile?" Says a former Special Forces operative who has spent years in Iraq and Afghanistan. "I'd give it a kick in the balls to McChrystal. Their standards of loyalty put soldiers in the disparadero. Each and every one of them will tell you the same as me. " In March, he traveled to the outpost McChrystal JFM (a small camp on the outskirts of Kandahar to deal with the accusations of his topas face to face), a typical movement of General Franco. Only two days before had received an email from Israel Arroyo, a division Sergeant twenty-five years had asked McChrystal go on mission with his unit. "I write because he has said he does not care about the troops and has become more difficult to defend," Arroyo wrote.
Within hours, McChrystal replied personally: "I am saddened by the accusation that I do not care for the soldiers, as I suspect it is something that a soldier is taken as something not only professional but also personal. At least I do so. But I have clear perceptions depend on the perspective one takes the time and respect that every soldier have theirs. " Shortly after himself at the forefront where Arroyo was leading and joined a reconnaissance mission on foot with the troops. This is not to go and take a stroll through a market cowardly to go pretty in the picture became involved in a real operation in a dangerous war zone.
Six weeks later, just before he returned from Paris McChrystal, the General received another email from Arroyo. One out of 23-year-old Michael Ingram, one of the soldiers who had gone McChrystal on a reconnaissance mission, was killed by an insurgent the day before. It was the third member of that section, consisting of twenty-five members, had lost in a year, and Arroyo got in touch to see if Ingram attend the funeral. "He had begun to admire him," Arroyo wrote. McChrystal said he would do everything possible to pay his respects as soon as possible. The night before the day the General was scheduled to visit the Sergeant Arroyo for the funeral, I get to put JFM to talk to the soldiers who went on patrol with him. JFM is a small settlement surrounded by walls injured by the explosions and closed with watchtowers. Almost all the soldiers here have been in various rounds of fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq and have seen some of the worst battles of both wars. But ironically, are particularly outraged at the death of Ingram. Their commanders had repeatedly requested permission to demolish the house where Ingram was killed, noting that it was often used as a fighting position by the Taliban. Because of restrictions McChrystal, designed to avoid the discomfort of civilians, the request was denied. "It was an abandoned house," Sergeant Kennith Hicks sputtering. "Nobody would live there again."
A soldier displays the list of new rules that have been delivered to the section. "Patrols in areas where you are reasonably sure that you'll have to defend using deadly force, "reads the laminated cards. Tell that to a soldier who has traveled half the world to fight, is like telling a police officer should only patrol in an area where you know you will not have to arrest anyone. "Does it fucking sense," asks the soldier Jared Pautsch. "We should take a fucking bomb on this place. You sit and wonder: What are we doing here? ". The new regulation
distributed McChrystal is not what was intended, has been distorted as they progressed through the chain of command, but becomes aware of that fact does not help to mitigate the anger of the troops on the ground. "Man, when I got here and I found that McChrystal was in charge I thought we were going to take the gun off, "says Hicks, who has already served in three rounds of combat. "I understand COIN. I understand everything. McChrystal comes here, he explains, and makes sense. But when you pile on his plane while orders come to us from the high command, it's all nonsense. Or because someone is trying to save his ass or simply because they do not even understand them. But here we are biting the dust. "
McChrystal and his team presented the next day. In a tent, the General has a 45-minute discussion with two dozen soldiers. The atmosphere is tense. "I wonder what happens in your world and I think it's important for all of you to understand the overall context as well, "McChrystal begins. "How's the company? Do you understand pain? Do any of you feel you are a loser? "McChrystal said.
"Lord, some guys think they are being beaten, sir," replied Hicks. McChrystal
nods. "Being strong is to lead when they want to lead," he said to his men. "You are leading an exemplary manner. That's what you're doing. Especially in really hard times. " After pulling twenty minutes talking about counterinsurgency, making diagrams with ideas and principles on a blackboard. COIN makes seem like common sense and is very careful not to look like he's teasing the kids. "We stuck to the bottom in the crucial year," he says. "The Taliban", he insists, "have ceased to take the lead, but we do not think the ride." The talk is similar to that given in Paris, but it is gaining popularity. "This is the philosophy that always works with think tanks [group of followers of a military power], but appears not to have the same reception among the infantry companies, is joking.
During question time, frustration budge. The soldiers complained of not being authorized to use deadly force, to have to see how insurgent detainees are released for insufficient evidence. They want to be able to fight, as they had in Iraq and Afghanistan before the period McChrystal. "We're not scaring the Taliban," says one soldier.
"Getting the accession of the population in this war, COIN strategy is a matter of cold blood," McChrystal said, citing the oft-repeated maximum for the soldiers that "you can not leave Afghanistan killing." "The Russians killed a million Afghans and got nothing," he says. "I'm not saying you have to leave and kill everybody, sir, "replies the same soldier. "You say we've stopped pushing the insurgency. I do not think that's true in this area. The more we withdraw, the more we hold them, are stronger, "he adds. "I agree with you," McChrystal said: "In this area we have not made progress. And here is where you have to show you strong and open fire. But what I'm trying to say is that shooting has a cost. What do you do? "Clean the population that is out there and resettlement?."
One soldier complained that under the rules, any insurgent who has no weapon is immediately identified as a civilian. "So goes the game," McChrystal replies: "It is complex. We can not decide: is pears and apples. Pears only to kill. "
When the debate ends, McChrystal realizes that he has not gone unscathed. The anger of the soldiers still there. So I made a last effort to bring them to their land after the death of recognizing Ingram. "I can not make it more bearable," he says, "and by no means am trying to pretend that this is not painful. But I'll tell you something: you're doing a great job. Do not let the frustration master you. "
The session ended without applause and with no real conclusion. McChrystal perhaps Obama has managed to place his strategy, but their own troops did not swallow.
When it comes to Afghanistan, the story is not McChrystal side. The only foreign invader who succeeded here was Genghis Khan, and he was not constrained by things like human rights, economic development and monitoring of the media. COIN doctrine, strangely, is inspired by some of the greatest military failures of the West: the awful French war in Algeria (France was defeated in 1962) and the American misadventure in Vietnam. McChrystal, like other advocates of COIN, and now admits that counterinsurgency campaigns are inherently chaotic expensive and very easy to lose. "Even the Afghans are confused with Afghanistan," he says. If you finally get win, after years of fighting naked with Afghan children who pose no threat to American territory, the war will free to Al Qaeda, which has diverted its activities in Pakistan. Deploy 150,000 troops to build schools, roads, mosques and facilities for water purification in the vicinity of Kandahar is like trying to stop the drug war in Mexico and building occupying Arkansas Baptist churches in Little Rock.
"It's all very cynical, politically speaking," says Marc Sageman, a former CIA officer who has extensive experience in the area: "Afghanistan is our vital interest, there is nothing for us there."
mid-May, two weeks after visiting troops in Kandahar, McChrystal travels to the White House for a high-level visit with Hamid Karzai. It is a triumphant moment for the General, one of those where you can show how much power held by both in Kabul and in Washington. In the East Room, which is filled with journalists and dignitaries, President Obama praises the virtues of Karzai. The two leaders speak of the very good relations that exist and how much they are saddened by the deaths of civilians. Mention the word "progress" sixteen times in the space an hour. But not a single mention of the word "victory." The session represents the total commitment that Obama has with McChrystal strategy for months. "No one can deny the progress that Afghans have made in recent years: in education, health and economic development," said the President. He continues: "The lights around Kabul I saw when I landed there would have been visible a few years ago." A puzzling observation, given that during the worst years in Iraq, when the Bush Administration had no real progress be noted, wore exactly the same data as proof of success. "One of our first impressions was that many glowing lights," said a Republican in 1996 after landing in Baghdad during the worst phases of sectarian violence. So the Obama-speaking of progress, city lights, indicators like health care and education, has adopted a language that only a few years ago would have scoffed. "They are trying to manipulate perceptions because there is no definition of victory. The victory can not even identify or recognize, "says Celeste Ward, a senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation who served as political advisor for U.S. military commanders in Iraq in 2006. "That's the game in which we find ourselves. What we need, for strategic reasons, is to show that we went to the frightened, although field data are not good and in the future will not be much better. "
But the facts on the ground, as history has proven, not discourage militias determined to remain on the battlefield. Even those closest to McChrystal know that the growing anti-war sentiment that has emerged at home does not reflect how things are conflict in Afghanistan. "If the Americans stop for a moment and began to pay attention to this war, would even less popular, "says a senior adviser McChrystal. Such realism fails to prevent the counterinsurgency advocates continue to have big plans: Instead of withdrawing troops next year, as Obama promised, the military hopes to extend the counterinsurgency campaign longer. "There is a possibility that another contingent ask next summer if we observe some progress here," says a senior official in Kabul.
We return to Afghanistan. Has been less than a month after the White House meeting with Karzai and all this talk about progress. McChrystal received a major blow to their vision of counterinsurgency. Since past the Pentagon has been planning to launch a military operation in Kandahar, the second largest city and the original base of the Taliban. Supposedly, this would be a decisive turning point in the war: the main reason for the quota McChrystal asked Obama late last year. But on June 10, admitting that the militias still have much work to do on the field, the General announced that postponed the offensive until the fall. Instead of great battles, such as Fallujah or Ramadi, U.S. troops will be dedicated to what McChrystal called "create a sense of security."
Police and Afghan army will enter in Kandahar to try to gain control of the districts while the United States provides $ 90 million in aid to the civilian population of the city.
Even supporters of the insurgency suffer strong pressure to explain the new plan. "This is not a classic operation," says a U.S. military officer: "This is not going to be Black Hawk Down. There will be kicked in the doors. " Other U.S. officials insist that there will surely be kicking in doors, but it will be a more offensive kind and gentle than the disaster of Marja.
"The Taliban have the city under his boot," says an official armed. "We have to eliminate them, but we must do so in a way that does not annoy the people." White House sources say that when Biden was briefed on the new plan in the Oval Office was surprised to what extent it reflected the more gradual counterterrorism plan that he proposed last fall.
Whatever the nature of the new plan, the delay highlights the fundamental flaws of the counterinsurgency. After nine years of war, the Taliban are too compact and whole so that the U.S. military attack them openly. The same people that the COIN strategy is to win-that is, the Afghan-no Americans want to there. The supposed U.S. ally, Karzai has used his influence to delay the offensive and the enormous outpouring of support led by McChrystal probably only complicate things. "Throw money at the problem only makes it worse," says Andrew Wilder, an expert at Tufts University who has studied the effect of humanitarian aid in southern Afghanistan. "The tsunami of money gives wings to corruption discredits the government and creates an environment in which finger picks winners and losers." This process encourages resentment and hostility among the civilian population. Until now, the only thing that has succeeded counterinsurgency is to create an endless demand essential product that the Army provides: perpetual war. There's a reason that President Obama avoids using the word "victory" when talking about Afghanistan. Winning, it seems, is not possible. Even with Stanley McChrystal at the helm.
source: rollingstone.es
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