Obama sacrifices national interest for his own political ends.

****The sacking of Gen. McChrystal throws away the services of the best person for the particular job and, with his staff, a national asset. This is a loss for the Afghan War and also for national securityh in general since McChrystal's military career is over.
This is certainly not good for the morale of the military, already engaged in a difficult struggle made more so by inadequate materiel and personnel support from the President. Both McChrystal and his extensive staff are being lost to the Afghan War and to the military overall. Generals and their staffs are teams and another cannot step in without developing, or bringing in, his own team. There will inevitably be transitional issues. The middle of a war, especially the middle of a major action, is not the time to undertake such disruption.
Obama compounded the issue by making yet another decision, again in his own political interests at the expense of the nation's. He prevailed on Gen. Petraeus to accept a demotion in order to replace McChrystal in Afghanistan solely in order to maintain the fiction that Obama's war in Afghanistan will continue unabated. Petraeus is good enough ( and loyal enough ) to insure that this is the case ( hence the political advantage to Obama.) However, the nation loses the talents and energies of Petraeus in his current, more senior, position in charge of Central Command ( including both Iraq and Afghanistan.)
Why Petraeus showed such loyalty to the President's image, at the expense of his present and future functioning (with clear ambitions to be Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the entire military), is not clear. He epitomizes the "good soldier" who does whatever is asked of him. It is not, however, optimum for the interests of the country.****
http://tinyurl.com/2g5rnay
McChrystal out; Petraeus picked for Afghanistan
By JENNIFER LOVEN and ANNE GEARAN, Associated Pres
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama sacked his loose-lipped Afghanistan commander Wednesday, a seismic shift for the military order in wartime, and chose the familiar, admired — and tightly disciplined — Gen. David Petraeus to replace him. Petraeus, architect of the Iraq war turnaround, was once again to take hands-on leadership of a troubled war effort. Obama said bluntly that Gen. Stanley McChrystal's scornful remarks about administration officials represent conduct that "undermines the civilian control of the military that is at the core of our democratic system."
He fired the commander after summoning him from Afghanistan for a face to face meeting in the Oval Office and named Petraeus, the Central Command chief who was McChrystal's direct boss, to step in....he said: "War is bigger than any one man or woman, whether a private, a general, or a president."****Well,maybe not bigger than a president,especially a narcissistic one.****
...The announcement came during what is on pace to be the deadliest month for the U.S.-dominated international coalition in Afghanistan... Obama seemed to suggest that McChrystal's military career is over... Petraeus... has had overarching responsibility for the wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq as head of Central Command....The Afghanistan job is actually a step down from his current post but one that filled Obama's pre-eminent need.Petraeus is the nation's best-known military man...Petraeus told Congress he would recommend delaying the pullout of U.S. forces from Afghanistan beginning in July 2011 if need be, saying security and political conditions in Afghanistan must be ready to handle a U.S. drawdown...By pairing the decision on McChrystal's departure with the name of his replacement, Obama is seeking to move on quickly and assure Afghans, U.S. allies and a restive American electorate that a firm hand is running the war...In the magazine article, McChrystal called the period last fall when the president was deciding whether to approve more troops "painful" and said the president appeared ready to hand him an "unsellable" position. McChrystal also said he was "betrayed" by Ambassador Karl Eikenberry, the man the White House chose to be his diplomatic partner in Afghanistan. He accused Eikenberry of raising doubts about Karzai only to give himself cover in case the U.S. effort failed. "Now, if we fail, they can say 'I told you so,'" McChrystal told the magazine. And he was quoted mocking Vice President Joe Biden. If not insubordination, the remarks ...were at the least an extraordinary challenge from a military leader....****We'll see whether Obama's attention to his own image is even smart. Keeping McChrystal contrite and silent under the discipline of being active military is one thing; being retired, a civilian and free to tell the world what he really thinks of Obama and the White House is another. Obama just might have opened a Pandora's Box of justified contempt.****
****What is the effect on allies?****
US allies hope for continuity after McChrystalBy RAPHAEL G. SATTER, AP
LONDON – America's allies in the fight to stabilize Afghanistan are hoping that the ouster of Stanley McChrystal as commander of international forces there still leaves the general's strategy intact, officials and analysts said Wednesday.
From Kabul to London, there was unhappiness with his removal, with some NATO officials saying privately that they believed upheaval at the top sent the wrong message at the wrong time. In Afghanistan, a range of officials expressed dismay at McChrystal's departure, while Peter Felstead, the editor of Jane's Defense Weekly, said he believed the move was "a mistake."...NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said, that while McChrystal will no longer be the commander, "the approach he helped put in place is the right one."
... until he is confirmed by Congress, leadership of the NATO-led force will fall to a British officer, Lt. Gen. Nick Parker, ...The U.S.'s top allies in Afghanistan were eager to emphasize that, at the strategic level, nothing had changed...Analysts agreed that it would be a mistake to shift gears now.... the "McChrystal effect" had led to a reinvigoration of the international campaign — and an appreciable drop in violence in that area....There was a barb, however, from Russia's outspoken envoy to NATO, who suggested in a lyrical posting on social networking website Twitter that a lack of success on the battlefield cultivated a contempt for civilian leaders in McChrystal."War wounds souls," Dmitry Rogozin said. "Bloodshed and hardship at war often arouse soldiers' contempt towards politicians and diplomats."
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