MSNBC military analyst Jacobs: McChrystal "is the wrong guy for the job, shouldn't have been in there in the first place"

I'm going to go out on a limb hear and defend McChrystal a little bit. The way I see it, he's the Right man for the job, when a HAMMNER is what's called for. When you've got a battel to win, in a tough situation, and everythign has to be perfect to win the BATTLE, he's your man. He's kind of reminds me of the late baseball manager Billy Martin: If you need someone to kick-@$# until things are working, he's your man.

BUT... He's NOT a "hearts and minds" kind of guy. When the VELVET GLOVE is what's called for, a brash, sometimes arrogant, tough-talking, swaggering @$$-kicker should not be the guy you pick.

But there's one part of that rolling stone article that Obama really needs to take to heart: If there was a Diplmatic equivent to the cohesive team that McChrystal surrounded himself with and built, if the DIPLOMATS had the kind of organization cohesion that McChrytsal created, we'd be doing a lot better in Afganistan and in Europe, with our allies. Obama would do well not to ignore that very valid point.

And in any case, he's obviously not the guy you send to dinner in Paris to woo foreign dignitaries. His role is military missions, and he;s damned good at those. His role is NOT diplomatic missions - which he obviously sucks at.

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IMHO

As a soldier his job is to follow orders even if he thinks they are stupid. In addition he should known that an officer of his rank should keep personal opinions to himself. His staff should have known better too. They were talking to the PRESS. He should resign immediately!

Finnally somebody said it.General McCrystal was put in charge of a counter-insurgency in Afghanistan.A counter-insurgency means the General's job is to pass out money.General McCrystal is about cowboy immage like the Tillman thing.This may be understod,and accepted coming from a soldier who came up through the ranks.The general's behavior,and attitude is not acepted,nor expected from a Westpoint trained officer.The Chinese have been beating the USA for over 3 years at counter-insurgency,in Afghanistan.The Chinese are spending $billions building the largets copper mine on Earth in Afghanistan.And if McChrystal keeps palying cowboy.The Chinese wil get control of Afghanistan's large reserves of lithium,and rare earth minerals needed to make computers,and stuff.Materials the Chinese currently have a strangle hold on.Afghanistan is also an ideal place to pipe line Russian,and Middle East oil for sea shipments.This is Russia's interest.This will let Middle East oil bypass the Suez Canal.This takes Israel hands off of one of the worlds oil valves.Closing the Suez Canal cannot be used as a threat to world oil supplies.Afghanistan is not a place for a cowbow,too many $billions are at stake.

MSNBC military analyst?

That has a hollow ring to it.

As far as Gen. McChrystal goes, he's not going anywhere, he's not resigning and he's sure as heck not getting fired.

He didn't criticize the mission, he hasn't failed to carry it out or even dragged his feet in the matter, he gave an opinion to a magazine writer that he should have otherwise kept to himself, and so he'll be reprimanded for that...

But if he wants to get out of Afghanistan, if he wants to parachute out of his Command (right when it's getting really hot and starting to dawn on everybody how really senseless this mission is), if the General wants out, he's going to have to try a lot harder than this.