By Thom Shanker
New York Times
Posted: 04/10/2011 06:19:27 PM PDT
Updated: 04/10/2011 06:19:27 PM PDT
WASHINGTON -- Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who was relieved of command in Afghanistan after a magazine profile quoted his subordinates as disparaging senior civilian leaders, has been invited back to public service by the Obama administration to help oversee a high-profile initiative in support of military families, White House officials said Sunday.
McChrystal will lead the three-member advisory board for the initiative, called Joining Forces, whose aim is to encourage companies, schools, philanthropic and religious groups and local communities to recognize the unusual stress that is endured by families of active-duty personnel, reservists and veterans, and to strive to meet their needs.
The appointment of McChrystal, who commanded elite special operations units before taking over the mission in Afghanistan, can be seen as an effort by both sides of the public-relations mishap to mend any perception of a civilian-military breach following his forced retirement.
More broadly, the new program is an acknowledgment by the administration that while the United States has been described as "a nation at war," the burden of combat is carried by less than 1 percent of the population. The military has been fighting for almost a decade -- since a month after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks -- the longest sustained era of conflict in the nation's history. And unlike previous wars, these have been carried out by an all-volunteer force.
http://www.mercurynews.com/politics-government/ci_17815565?source=rss&nclick_check=1Is this some kind of joke?In the Name of Pat Tillman: Good Riddance to Stanley McChrystal
David Zinn
June 25, 2010
When NFL player-turned-Army Ranger Pat Tillman died at the hands of US troops in a case of "friendly fire," the spin machine at the Pentagon went into overdrive. Rumsfeld and company couldn't have their most high-profile soldier dying in such an inelegant fashion, especially with the release of those pesky photos from Abu Ghraib hitting the airwaves. So an obscene lie was told to Tillman's family, his friends and the American public. The chickenhawks in charge, whose only exposure to war was watching John Wayne movies, claimed that he died charging a hill and was cut down by the radical Islamic enemies of freedom. In the weeks preceding his death, Tillman was beginning to question what exactly he was fighting for, telling friends that he believed the war in Iraq was " illegal." He may not have known what he was fighting for, but it's now clear what he died for: public relations. Today, after five years, six investigations and two Congressional hearings, questions still linger about how Tillman died and why it was covered up.
Now the man who greased the chain of command that orchestrated this great deception is prepared to assume total control of US operations in Afghanistan: Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal. It was McChrystal who approved Tillman's posthumous Silver Star, a medal given explicitly for combat, even though he later testified that he "suspected" friendly fire.
Yet despite this, both Democrats and Republicans are rushing to heap praise on McChrystal, including Sen. John McCain. It was McCain who rushed to speak at Tillman's funeral and then, when the cover-up became known, pledged to help the Tillman family expose the truth. McCain later turned his back on the Tillmans when they raised the volume and demanded answers. As Pat's mother, Mary Tillman, said last year, "He definitely eased out of the situation. He didn't blatantly say he wouldn't help us, it's just that it became clear that he kind of drifted away."
http://www.thenation.com/article/mcchrystals-pat-tillman-connection
McChrystal was Cheney's Chief Assassin
Seymour Hersh says that Dick Cheney headed a secret assassination wing and the head of the wing has just been named as the new commander in Afghanistan.
In an interview with GulfNews, (the Persian Gulf's largest daily English language newspaper published from Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates) on May 12, 2009 Pulitzer prize-winning American investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, said that there is a special unit called the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) that does high-value targeting of men that are known to be involved in anti-American activities, or are believed to be planning such activities.
According to Hersh, the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) was headed by former US vice president Dick Cheney and the former head of JSOC, Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal who has just been named the new commander in charge of the war in Afghanistan.
snip
An interrogator at Camp Nama known as Jeff described locking prisoners in shipping containers for 24 hours at a time in extreme heat; exposing them to extreme cold with periodic soaking in cold water; bombardment with bright lights and loud music; sleep deprivation; and severe beatings.
When he and other interrogators went to the colonel in charge and expressed concern that this kind of treatment was not legal, and that they might be investigated by the military's Criminal Investigation Division or the International Committee of the Red Cross, the colonel told them he had "this directly from General McChrystal and the Pentagon that there's no way that the Red Cross could get in."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/05/16
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