General Stanley McChrystal likely to get fired for telling it like it is

General Stanley McChrystal may be living out his final hours as the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan following disparaging comments he made regarding several top Washington officials.

"The last thing that President Obama needs is for somehow the impression to get out there that he can be kicked around and disrespected by one of his generals," CBS Chief Washington Correspondent Bob Schieffer said today on Washington Unplugged. "I think General McChrystal has a real problem, and it's going to be very hard for him to survive."

This isn't the first time the general has been chastised by the president. Last year, McChrystal made negative comments regarding Vice President Joe Biden and received a tongue lashing, which won't make it any easier for him to get through round two, Schieffer said.

"You can't do this and get away with it, especially not more than once," he said. "[If] you're looking at Washington politics you have to say 'so who's going to be there to defend him now?' You kind of need a champion when you get into one of these kind of messes in Washington. He's got to find somebody who's going to be on his side, and right now I don't see anybody."

Allies may be tough to come by for McChrystal, who spoke negatively of the president, vice president, national security advisor and special envoy to Afghanistan in a Rolling Stone article. According to Schieffer, the last time a general spoke negatively of civilian leadership in public was when General Douglas MacArthur spoke out against former President Harry Truman's "limited war strategy" in North Korea. MacArthur's remarks were meant to influence strategy whereas McChrystal's remarks appear to have no purpose.

"This is like frat boys all going out and getting drunk and talking about the faculty advisor or something," Schieffer said.

Foreign Policy Managing Editor Blake Hounshell agreed there seemed to be no reason behind the comments. "When you read the article it's hard to discern what's the strategy here," he said. "Here's this guy who's supposed to be a master of counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan, right? And he doesn't even seem to have mastered Washington politics."

The comments seem to have no basis, and according to Schieffer, even if they did, there was no reason to go public with them. "Usually when military leaders have criticism they're much more adroit," Schieffer said. "They go and talk to maybe the ranking member of the other party on the Armed Services Committee and let him make the criticisms. The military is very good at getting their position out in ways that do not come back to them."

McChrystal has always been one to say what others won't, but these comments may be his final act as U.S. Forces commander in Afghanistan. Names such as General Jim Mattis, the commander of U.S. Joint Forces Command, have already been thrown out in talks of replacing him. Although there is no official word on whether or not the general will keep his job, his outlook doesn't look good.

"The president is angry," said The New York Times' Jeff Zeleney. "He's furious about this because he thinks it sort of feeds into the narrative that he is not interested or does not understand the conflict in Afghanistan. It's not good if you're General Stanley McChrystal. We don't know yet at this point if he'll ask for his resignation, we'll find out.

Today's excerpt from "The Interceptors Club & the Secret of the Black Manta.

Hogle stood up from his desk, his face turning crimson, as if his blood pressure had suddenly just shot way up.

Slowly, he ground the stub of his cigar in an over-filed ashtray as if he was trying something, anything to contain his about-to-blow temper.

Hogle reached down. Picked up a newspaper on his desk and suddenly he flung it into Pepper’s face surprising him.

“Sir?” Pepper said astounded at the General’s action.

The newspaper bounced off of Pepper’s face and on onto the floor.

“Pick that up. There’s a very interesting article on page seventeen.”

Pepper picked up the paper, which had come apart. It took him almost a full minute to find the correct page.

While he searched for page seventeen he could feel the General's building impatience.

Finally he found the page. Quickly he scanned every article on the page. Nothing seemed to be of any connection to Excalibur.

“Sir? I don’t see anything.” Pepper said confused.

“That’s your problem. You don’t see.” Hogle said making his point by taking a finger and pressing it hard into Pepper’s forehead.

“Look at the photo on the bottom. See anything familiar?”

Pepper’s eyes dropped to the photo at the bottom of the page. Under it was a caption: Local Modeler’s Display Skills.

Pepper read on.

Stanley Dodson, age 15 stands next to Holloman’s Air Force Base Commander’s wife, Louise Brigotti clutching his award winning scratch-built model of a hypothetical stealth aircraft.

The model designed and built by a group of youths known as “Team Manta” won top honors at the HAFB Tri-Annual Junior Modeling Competition, which includes as first prize a ride in a KC-135 aerial refueling tanker, to take place this Saturday. Standing from left to right are Caysi Johnston, Meinrad --

“What the?" Pepper said as he suddenly recognized the winning model was none other than Excalibur, the very secret project he was charged with protecting.

“Kind of jumps out at you doesn’t it? Imagine what I said when I saw that photo while I was downing my coffee this morning. My five year old grandson will never be the same.” Hogle bellowed.

“It’s – it has to be a coincidence!” Pepper said disbelieving.

“Coincidence my foot! Every angle is perfect. Even the cockpit transparency is the proper shade of amber.” the General shouted.

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ALERT! Afghani military AWOL in Texas

A nationwide alert has been issued for 17 members of the Afghanistan military who have gone AWOL (Absent With Out Leave) from an air Force base in Texas, where foreign military officers who are training to become pilots can learn English.

Fox News reports that, “the Afghan officers and enlisted men have security badges that give them access to secure U.S. defense installations, according to the lookout bulletin, ‘Afghan Military Deserters in CONUS (Continental U.S.) written by Naval Criminal Investigative Service in Dallas and obtained by Fox News.com”

On Wednesday night, “the Be-on-the-Lookout (BOLO) bulletin was distributed to local and federal law enforcement officials.”

The Afghan troops were attending the Defense Language Institute at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas. Military pilot candidates and other Air force prospects from foreign nations allied with the U.S. are taught English at the DLI program.

Gary Emery, Chief of Public Affairs, 37th Training Wing, at Lackland AFB, said, “I can confirm that 17 have gone missing from the Defense Language Institute. They disappeared over the course of the last two years, and none in the last three months.”

According to Fox, “the most recent Afghan to disappear from Lackland was First Lt. Javed Aryan, who went AWOL in January 2010, Emery told FoxNew.com. The others listed in the NCIS report disappeared at various times last year.”

Apparently, the Air Force waited months and years, before alerting the public that at least 17 Afghan troops may be prowling the streets of America, perhaps to determine how to properly conduct another terrorist mission for al-Qaeda and Osama bin-Laden.

UPDATE: Seven of the AWOL Afghanis have been caught - ten are still missing.

L-3 Unit under investigation or spying ...

By ANTONIE BOESSENKOOL

The U.S. government has suspended a unit of L-3 Communications, New York, from doing any new business with government agencies. The government is investigating whether employees at the unit improperly used a military e-mail network to monitor other employees and government workers.

The investigation centers on whether L-3's Special Support Programs Division (SSPD), formerly called the Joint Operations Group (JOG), improperly used the U.S. Special Operations Command's e-mail network to monitor e-mails from L-3 employees, other government contractor employees and government workers, Reuters reported June 10, citing a memo it obtained from the U.S. Air Force's Office of the Deputy General Counsel.

The L-3 unit monitored the e-mails to see if its employees had shared information with another contractor, the memo said, according to Reuters.

The JOG contract is estimated to generate about $450 million in annual revenue for L-3 and contribute about $25 million to earnings before taxes, according to a research note from Jefferies & Co., a New York investment bank.

In documents filed June 9 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, L-3 said the unit is still working on outstanding orders under its existing contracts, and that the suspension will stay in effect until it's lifted by the Air Force. The Air Force also is considering suspending L-3 Integrated Systems, the parent firm of SSPD, L-3 said.

An L-3 spokeswoman declined June 18 to comment on the suspension.

Todays excerpt from "The Interceptors Club & the Secret of the Black Manta.

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“Actually this is pretty straight up program. Works like a flight simulator. If we had decent joystick and a transmitter we could fly her.” Sami said.

“Wait. Try this.” Freaks said handing Sami a cheap plastic gaming joystick.

“I have a better one at the house.” Sami said. “It has full throttle controls and foot pedals.”

“Just see if these will work.” Freaks said.

“Okay. I’ll put it in simulation mode only.” Sami said.

“I’m guessing the simulation mode is used for mission planning?” Caysi asked.

“Yes. You can fly her in manual mode like a pilot or just enter in GPS way-points to a target.”

The Interceptors sat in the dark staring at the screen on Static’s home computer. Just in case, they had drawn all the blinds and curtains lest someone see them exploring a Top Secret military computer program.

Caysi was busy reading pages from the flight manual they had just printed out. It was huge, over 500 pages and took seven ink cartridges and over two hours to print.

Each time they ran out of ink, Static sent Meinrad to the computer store with some of Pepper’s cash.

The cover of the manual bore an ominous looking label: TOP SCERET/ SPECIAL ACCESS REQUIRED, THE CONTENTS OF THIS FILE IS RESTRICTED TO CLEARED PERSONNEL.
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