Time Wasting

I guess Obama has a lot of time on his hands. Otherwise, why would he waste it by having McChrystal in for a sitdown about 'the article'? Actually, the main thrust of the article is how poorly things are going in Afghanistan. Yes, there are a few somewhat nasty comments about Washington functionaries, but are the egos of those mentioned so fragile that the conduct of the war has to be interrupted?

While the article does talk about McChrystal's not necessarily polite behavior throughout his career, it raises three fundamental issues:

• Is the COIN strategy working and can it work in Afghanistan?
• The soldiers in the field feel their power slipping away and resent it.
• What are we doing in Afghanistan?

All of which are much more important than McChrystal's supposed insubordination.

How this issue can be compared with the MacArthur-Truman controversy is beyond me. MacArthur wanted to escalate the Korean War and told the world so without giving a fig for Truman's contrary opinion.