Will General McChrystal loose his job because of remarks made in Rolling Stone Magazine?”
General Stanley McChrystal spent more than 30 years in the secretive world of U.S. military special operations, unschooled in the wily ways of Washington. On Tuesday morning he learned that his naivetÉ could cost him his command of the war in Afghanistan. Cutting comments on the Obama Administration by McChrystal and members of his staff reported by Rolling Stone magazine could not have come at a worse time. Progress in Afghanistan has been slow at best, and criticism is mounting in Congress and elsewhere over the Administration’s prosecution of the war. The magazine’s release of the remarks by the general and his aides left Pentagon officials reeling. Many interviewed on background believe McChrystal cannot survive this latest flap – which is not his first. Others, however, say it would be in the Administration’s interest to keep the chastened general in charge. His fate is likely to be sealed on Tuesday afternoon, when Defense Secretary Robert Gates meets with President Obama at the
If history is any guide, McChrystal will not be able to survive the controversy surrounding disparaging comments about President Obama, Vice President Biden and other administration officials that he and members of his staff made to a Rolling Stone reporter. McChrystal has apologized for the comments and been called to a meeting at the White House with the president. It has not been common for generals to publicly challenge policies set by the president, but it has happened. In such cases, they’ve been fired. The bedrock American concept of civilian control over the military essentially demands it. “I can’t imagine, at this point in time, how he could maintain the trust of the president,” Richard H. Kohn, a military historian at the University of North Carolina, says about McChrystal.
General McChrystal Has Offered to Resign General Stanley McChrystal has offered to resign in the wake of the Rolling Stone debacle, according to Time’s Joe Klein, and subsequently confirmed by CBS News’ Mark Knoller. Crucially, both CBS and Klein are reporting that McChrystal has merely offered his resignation, which would hardly be a surprise: Given the quotes attributed to McChrystal and his staff, going to the White House with a resignation letter seems like the minimally polite thing to do. But President Obama doesn’t have to accept the resignation if he wants the general to stay on. Recall that Donald Rumsfeld offered to resign twice during the Abu Ghraib scandal, only to be refused by President Bush because he was doing such a good job with Iraq.
