Iraq and a hard place
General Stanley McCrystal, the commander of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan is caught in a trap. He knows what the mission is: defeat the Taliban and turn a primitive, backward, religion obsessed, hellhole like Afghanistan into a stable democracy capable of keeping the Taliban out. He’s been given 62,000 American troops to do it but needs 40,000 more. That’s pretty straight forward. 40,000 isn’t a serious strain for a country of 306 million people and we’re capable of fielding many more if we decide it’s necessary. Except…
He’s got a Commander in Chief that hasn’t even worn a Boy Scout uniform and an administration made up of left wing crazies and politicians who look back on the riots of Viet Nam protest with fond nostalgia. Unlike generals in the past who were pushed by their governments to quickly win wars, McCrystal finds himself in a full scale war on one side and answering to an irresolute, waffling Commander in Chief on the other. It’s an impossible situation.
McCrystal is convinced that if he doesn’t get those extra 40,000 soldiers that we’re going to fail. He’s learned the “lesson of Viet Nam” ie: win or get out. He’s also learned the general’s number one rule: Don’t let them pin it on you. So he’s chosen an in-between route to try and push this gaggle of Chicago pols and campus dreamers into action. He went on 60 Minutes and made his case, making an end run around the chain of command. He’s now on record as saying it’s either the extra manpower or failure.
In the meantime Barack Obama ponders his navel and promises to come up with a strategy eventually that will tell the country and the Army what we’re doing in Afghanistan. Don’t hold your breath. It should be obvious by now that this windy empty suit isn’t any Truman or Lincoln. He’s not even George Bush. As Sonny Corleone would put it, “he isn’t a wartime consigliore.”
So here sits McCrystal. If everything goes to hell he’s on record as saying we’ll lose if he doesn’t get the men. So, he’s covered that way. But he’s also a General in the United States Army. He knows that histories full of generals that didn’t win. They’re quickly forgotten. He didn’t get four stars without the ambition to be remembered as a winner. He’s been given this little war for his legacy and he wants to win it. Even if the coach is a dufus and the front office is a bunch of Acorn alums, he wants to win the game.
This is an impossible situation for any commander. Wars are lost in a variety of ways. Sometimes your army is defeated like the German Army in World War II. Sometimes your government quits like the Japanese government did after the atom bombs. Sometimes your will to fight dissolves like Germany in World War I. Sometimes you get over run like the Confederacy. This may be the first time anyone has lost a war through indifference. This administration has its eyes set almost exclusively on ghetto politics. Massive domestic spending on all of the Liberal dreams like wind power and government controlled medicine, while an entire army sits in Afghanistan waiting for it’s commander in chief to come up with a strategy. Or at least some sign that he intends to go, or stay, or run. All of Obamas journalistic mouthpieces are attacking McCrystal for not following the directions of a commander that doesn’t give any directions. Eugene Robinson, the Washington Post columnist and fervent Obama supporter says “Put a sock in it, Stanley,” referring to McCrystal. He also says that all America needs to hear from its commander in Afghanistan is “Yes, Mr. President.”
This reminds me of the classic Jack Benny joke where he’s confronted by a stick up man who points a gun at him. “Your money or your life,” says the hold up man. After a long silence he demands, “What’s it going to be?” to which Benny replies, “I’m thinking. I’m thinking.”
McCrystal and the Army can’t sit there indefinitely taking casualties from IEDs while Obama thinks. If the administration and its lapdog press wants to here “Yes, Mr. President,” they’d better give Obama some lines to speak so there’s something for McCrystal to say “yes” to. If they don’t, McCrystal will announce his retirement and some other ambitious general is going to be stuck into the same situation. If Afghanistan turns into another Viet Nam, or worse, Somalia, the only person in the United States that will be happy is Jimmy Carter. His administration will finally lose it’s distinction of Worst Failed Administration in Modern Times. Obama had better think about that.
