Insubordinate And Disrepecting Chain Of Command

I've been in a rather lengthy exchange with a person on Twitter that goes by the name @melsite1 regarding General Stanley McCrystal's blatant insubordination. To wit, Mr. Melsite1 thinks that I'm misusing the definition of the word "insubordinate". To that end, I clearly stated that he is completely and utterly full of it.

After all, just ask CPAC blogger hero Ed Morrissey who boldly used the tagline of a blog post today to highlight McCrystal's actions as insubordinate.

From The Washington Post on down to The Freepers, the reality of what McCrystal did is being reported.

However, there are those that claim that McCrystal's insubordination is excusable, since it was all Obama's fault

The real trouble is that Obama never resolved the dispute within his administration over Afghanistan strategy. With the backing of Gates and the Pentagon’s top generals, McChrystal sought to apply to Afghanistan the counterinsurgency approach that succeeded over the last three years in Iraq, an option requiring the deployment of tens of thousands more troops. Biden opposed sending most of the reinforcements and argued for a “counterterrorism plus” strategy centered on preventing al-Qaeda from establishing another refuge.

In the end, Obama adopted what is beginning to look like a bad compromise. He approved most of the additional troops that McChrystal sought, but attached the July, 2011 deadline for beginning withdrawals. Since then both sides have been arguing their cases, in private and in public, to the press and to members of Congress.

McChrystal may be at fault for expressing his frustrations to Rolling Stone. He is not at fault for the lack of coherence in the Afghan campaign or the continued feuding over strategy. That is Obama’s responsibility.

Ah, the "dithering" talking point resurfaces. I'll get more into that later.

In the end, the reality of the word "insubordinate" depends largely on the situation at hand and who is involved. Clearly, McCrystal is guilty and should either resign or be fired immediately. I'm of the opinion, though he had to tow the Bush line that "the surge worked" in Iraq, that Petraeus could easily step into Gen. McCrystal's shoes and at least get things marginally squared away in Afghanistan before the scheduled draw-down next summer.

Make no mistake about it, we started losing in Afghanistan the moment that W. got us into a family vendetta in Iraq, and it hasn't improved since. Not only that, but Sec. Of Defense Robert Gates has sacked members of the military for lesser offenses than what McCrystal finds himself embroiled in. So if there isn't some serious restructuring going on in the next few weeks, I'm really going to be disappointed in this administration. Not from the standpoint of the conflict in Afghanistan, but of their desire to bridge the gap between Republicans and Democrats. That just needs to end so we can get the real heavy lifting taken care of.

McCrystal should be out - no question. After all, if he's got such a low opinion of the Obama administration, I'm sure that Fox"News" would gladly hire him on as a military strategist. Isn't Ollie around retirement age? After all, they do love military men that hate Barack Obama.

Just sayin.