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The top US commander in Afghanistan has been summoned to Washington in the wake of a magazine article that quotes him and aides criticizing senior Obama administration officials and diplomats. General Stanley McChrystal has apologized over the article in Rolling Stone. In it, McChrystal is quoted as saying he felt betrayed by US ambassador to Kabul Karl Eikenberry. The general’s aides mock Vice-President Joe Biden and say he is “disappointed” with President Barack Obama. The World’s Katy Clark has more.
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MARCO WERMAN: I’m Marco Werman and this is The World. America’s top military commander in Afghanistan said some things he should not have said. And so Stanley McChrystal will have to explain himself to the boss tomorrow. President Obama summoned General McChrystal for a face-to-face meeting at the White House. The President is said to be angry about an article to be published this week in Rolling Stone magazine. The story quoted derogatory remarks the General and his aides made about the Obama administration. The World’s Katy Clark tells us about the article and the fall out.
KATY CLARK: Reporter Michael Hastings had unusual access this spring to General McChrystal and his aides and Hastings says the tension between the military and civilian leadership in Afghanistan was apparent. The reporter cites one instance when General McChrystal checked his Blackberry in the middle of an interview and said oh no, not another email from Holbrook.
MICHAEL HASTINGS: Meaning Richard Holbrook who is the special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan. And then he said, I don’t even want to read it. Now that might not seem like that big of a deal, but in fact when the commanding General is saying that in front of a reporter about another major player within the Obama administration, I think that’s a very telling sign.
CLARK: There were other telling signs. Hastings quotes one of General McChrystal’s aides as calling a top Presidential advisor a clown who was stuck in 1985. Another aide makes jokes about Vice President Joe Biden. General McChrystal has apologized for the remarks, but that may not be enough to save his job. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs declined today to say whether the General is safe in his post, or whether President Obama could continue to view him as an effective commander. Gibbs did, however, describe President Obama’s reaction to the magazine story.
ROBERT GIBBS: I gave him the article last night and he was angry. Angry. You would know it if you saw it.
CLARK: Everyone seemed to be asking themselves today, what could General McChrystal been thinking?
MICHAEL O’HANLON: I’m a little perplexed, to be honest.
CLARK: Michael O’Hanlon is a senior foreign policy fellow at the Brookings Institution.
O’HANLON: This is so extraordinarily out of character for General McChrystal, a man I know quite well and admire greatly.
CLARK: O’Hanlon says the comments by the General and his aides may have made sense last year, when President Obama was still weighing his options for Afghanistan. But he says the military won that battle. The Pentagon got the troop surge it was after. O’Hanlon says at this point, President Obama would be within his rights to relieve General McChrystal of his command.
O’HANLON: But, on the other hand, I don’t think it requires President Obama to change command. I think he has the opportunity here to find a lesser way of sending a very strong message and then keeping a person who is really, I think, as good at counter-insurgency as General Petreaus himself. I think McChrystal is probably the only other high-ranking officer in the American military today, besides Petreaus, who could do this job at the level that he is now performing.
CLARK: Others, including NATO spokesman James Appathurai expressed the hope today that the whole situation will be kept in perspective.
JAMES APPATHURAI: First, it’s a Rolling Stone article. I have great respect for Rolling Stone, but its one article. Second, these are soldiers in a very, very difficult combat situation, in a war zone, under enormous pressure and they say things under pressure that should not have appeared in print, I totally agree with that. But I don’t think we should also exaggerate it.
CLARK: Appathurai added that General McChrystal has the full confidence of the Secretary General of NATO; that it’s McChrystal’s strategy in Afghanistan that member states recently endorsed and that the General should be allowed to see that strategy through. For The World, this is Katy Clark.
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