PHOTOS, PAGE 1

       Editor and prime reporter is Doug Terry, a veteran television and radio reporter in   Washington, DC, (details below)

This is a comment filed today (6.23.10) on the NY Times online in regard to the probable firing of General McChrystal by president Obama.

The only shocking thing about the comments of Gen. McChrystal's subordinates was the fact that they were made to a reporter. Does anyone imagine that virtually all presidents in war time, and otherwise, have not been subjected to mocking comments behind their backs? The Roling Stone article revealed that McChrystal himself, who models himself as a "soldier's solider", is mocked by some of his own troops and his orders, however mangled by the time they reach those at the bottom, are ridiculed.

There were many more important points in the article than the mean comments about the president and his aides. It revealed a great deal about the conduct of the war, the conflict between the high blown strategies and the realities on the ground and the difficulty of translating concepts into workable orders. It was, in short, a report card on the war, should Obama and his staff want to read it carefully and closely. These elements, to my mind, were far, far more important than the pop off statements which have flared into headlines and news bulletins.The idea that McChrystal is trying to ignore repeated text messages from Holbrooke at State should not be a crushing blow to Holbrooke's ego nor any great surprise, either.

Disrespecting Biden is no crime. However intelligent and accomplished Biden might be, he makes a good many people laugh. He is deadly serious about what he believes, but he believes it, and himself, so ardently, and is so full of wordiness and the desire to let it all out, that he slops over into self satire very easily.

Get this, too: generals are not generalists. They are warriors. They are technicians, with their hands on the controls day and night. The politicians are, in deep contrast, sweet talkers and baby kissers. The politicians want to make their mark as leaders and thinkers, the generals want them to back off. Ridicule, going both ways, is part of the game plan.

McChrystal made a much more aggressive run at damaging the new president when he insisted before a Congressional committee that more troops were needed. He boxed Obama in before the president had a good chance to get his bearings. He played the big game of retail politics where generals are not supposed to tread.

In the subtext of this article, I get this clarion message: the Pentagon and the generals rolled Obama and his snap smart staff. Obama has been captured by the Pentaon, following many of the Bush policies, even echoing the fear mongering language of Bush and the Bushies in calling terrorism "the enduring struggle of our times". If he is fired later today, that will be the reason: they revealed to a reporter than Obama is not in charge of his own war. If he is not fired, it will be because Obama feels he has reeled him in and that there is a need for an over confident, hard working, protean man to stand between the fulcrum of war and chaos in Afghanistan.

Doug Terry, 6.23.10

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