Dick Cheney's Chief Assassin Is Now Barack Obama's Commander in Afghanistan

[Orwellian_Ghost]

“The Deltas are psychos…You have to be a certified psychopath to join the Delta Force…”, a US Army colonel from Fort Bragg once told me back in the 1980s. Now President Obama has elevated the most notorious of the psychopaths, General Stanley McChrystal, to head the US and NATO military command in Afghanistan.

McChrystal’s rise to leadership is marked by his central role in directing special operations teams engaged in extrajudicial assassinations, systematic torture, bombing of civilian communities and search and destroy missions. He is the very embodiment of the brutality and gore that accompanies military-driven empire building. Between September 2003 and August 2008, McChrystal directed the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations (JSO) Command which operates special teams in overseas assassinations.

<snip>

McChrystal was a special favorite of Rumsfeld and Cheney because he was in charge of the ‘direct action’ forces of the ‘Special Missions Units. ‘Direct Action’ operative are the death-squads and torturers and their only engagement with the local population is to terrorize, and not to propagandize. They engage in ‘propaganda of the dead’, assassinating local leaders to ‘teach’ the locals to obey and submit to the occupation. Obama’s appointment of McChrystal as head reflects a grave new military escalation of his Afghanistan war in the face of the advance of the resistance throughout the country.

<snip>

The White House and the Pentagon claim that the appointment of McChrystal was due to the ‘complexities’ of the situation on the ground and the need for a ‘change in strategy’. ‘Complexity’ is a euphemism for the increased mass opposition to the US, complicating traditional carpet ‘bombing and military sweep’ operations. The new strategy practiced by McChrystal involves large scale, long term ‘special operations’ to devastate and kill the local social networks and community leaders, which provide the support system for the armed resistance.

Obama’s decision to prevent the release of scores of photographs documenting the torture of prisoners by US troops and ‘interrogators’ (especially under command of the ‘Special Forces’), is directly related to his appointment of McChrystal whose ‘SOT’ forces were highly implicated in widespread torture in Iraq. Equally important, under McChrystal’s command the DELTA, SEAL and Special Operations Teams will have a bigger role in the new ‘counter-insurgency strategy’. Obama’s claim that the publication of these photographs will adversely affect the ‘troops’ has a particular meaning: The graphic exposure of McChrystal’s modus operendi for the past 5 years under President Bush will undermine his effectiveness in carrying out the same operations under Obama.

<snip>

http://www.alternet.org/story/140068/cheney%27s_chief_assassin_is_now_obama%27s_commander_in_afghanistan/

[elleng]

1. This is a rerun.

Where else was it posted at DU recently?

[Orwellian_Ghost]

2. Maybe this info is what you are referring to?

It was under McChrystal’s command, in fact, that JSOC shifted away from the very mission of training indigenous military units in counterinsurgency operations that had been a core mission of Special Operations Forces.

McChrystal spent an unusual five years as commander of JSOC, because he had become a close friend of then Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld. Rumsfeld came to view JSOC as his counter to the covert operations capabilities of the CIA, which he hated and distrusted, and Rumsfeld used JSOC to capture or kill high value enemy leaders, including Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda’s top leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

In 2005, JSOC’s parent command, the Special Operations Command (SOCOM), was directed by Rumsfeld to "plan, synchronize and, as directed, conduct global operations against terrorist networks in coordination with other combatant commanders". That directive has generally been regarded as granting SOCOM the authority to carry out actions unilaterally anywhere on the globe.

Under that directive, McChyrstal and JSOC carried out targeted raids and other operations against suspected Taliban in Afghanistan which were not coordinated with the commander of other U.S. forces in the country. Gen. David Barno, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, has said that he put a stop to targeted airstrikes in early 2004, but they resumed after he was replaced by McKiernan in 2005.

U.S. airstrikes which have caused hundreds of civilian deaths have become a major political issue in Afghanistan and the subject of official protests by Afghan President Hamid Karzai as well as by the lower house of the Afghan parliament. Many of the airstrikes and commando raids that have caused large-scale civilian deaths have involved Special Operations forces operating separately from the NATO command.

<snip>

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46821

[elleng]

5. Nope.

Deltas - - psychos - alternet.

[Orwellian_Ghost]

6. Heh?

Try speaking clearly.

Perhaps the information is creating a bit of cognitive dissonance. Though it shouldn't as it has been clear from the start to those who weren't asleep.

[elleng]

7. Awake yet?

THIS INFORMATION:

“The Deltas are psychos…You have to be a certified psychopath to join the Delta Force…”, a US Army colonel from Fort Bragg once told me back in the 1980s. Now President Obama has elevated the most notorious of the psychopaths, General Stanley McChrystal, to head the US and NATO military command in Afghanistan.

McChrystal’s rise to leadership is marked by his central role in directing special operations teams engaged in extrajudicial assassinations, systematic torture, bombing of civilian communities and search and destroy missions. He is the very embodiment of the brutality and gore that accompanies military-driven empire building. Between September 2003 and August 2008, McChrystal directed the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations (JSO) Command which operates special teams in overseas assassinations.

<snip>

McChrystal was a special favorite of Rumsfeld and Cheney because he was in charge of the ‘direct action’ forces of the ‘Special Missions Units. ‘Direct Action’ operative are the death-squads and torturers and their only engagement with the local population is to terrorize, and not to propagandize. They engage in ‘propaganda of the dead’, assassinating local leaders to ‘teach’ the locals to obey and submit to the occupation. Obama’s appointment of McChrystal as head reflects a grave new military escalation of his Afghanistan war in the face of the advance of the resistance throughout the country.

<snip>

ETC

alternet

WAS POSTED HERE, AT DU, WITHIN THE LAST COUPLE OF DAYS. DO YOU KNOW WHERE?

[TBF]

15. Sometimes things are posted more than once - I probably counted dozens of Susan Boyle

threads for instance.

Do you have an issue with the substance of the article? Or some sort of substantive defense to mount? I'm quite interested in hearing why you don't think this information should be discussed.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

16. In Editorials & Other Articles not in GD - link

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=103&topic_id=449507

[Bolo Boffin]

3. Hersh says he never said anything about Cheney death squads. n/t

[ConsAreLiars]

8. He said nothing of the sort

There is a disinformation operation going on alleging he said Cheney's hit squads, directed by McChrystal, offed Bhutto, which he strongly denies. He did however comment on the fact that these assassination teams reported directly to Cheney. Watch for yourself: http://blacklistednews.com/?news_id=4259 or read a summary: http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Hersh_US_has_been_running_executive_0311.html

Here is the video of the interview in which the Cons and their agents claim falsely claim he made the Bhutto assassination comments: http://rawstory.com/rawreplay/?p=3444

Here is what Hersh said about those lies: http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/05/18/hersh-did-not-say-cheney-ordered-bhutto-assassination/

[leftstreet]

10. You're absolutely right

Wow - it's a total disinfo campaign

Jeez!

[leftstreet]

4. K&R

This guy sounds like a nutter.

[Butch350]

9. Who would suggest? Ghandi?

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

11. Fail.

[Orwellian_Ghost]

13. Say something

What are you disputing?

[ConsAreLiars]

12. K&R - Excellent bio of the new guy and

a very alarming warning of the likelihood that a new version of the CIA's Phoenix Program in Vietnam, which only added to the resistance to the US invaders and occupation army, is being implemented. US occupation forces in Afghanistan are already very widely regarded as enemies of the people. More so-called "targeted" murders will only increase the violence and support for even the still unpopular Taliban fundies as being the lesser evil.

[blindpig]

14. K&R

Any questions?

I'm waiting for the excuses, it's gonna take some mighty contortions to give this the least pretense of being 'the right thing'.

[ProgressIn2008]

17. Obama's man in Afghanistan was caught up in some dirty business, including "interrogations"

at Camp Nama.

"The news that President Obama picked General Stanley McChrystal to run the war in Afghanistan put an old story of mine into the national spotlight last week. In 2006, Esquire sent me around the country to interview military interrogators with a Human Rights Watch investigator named Marc Garlasco. One of those men worked at Camp Nama, a small base near Baghdad where a Special Forces task force was interrogating Iraqis in an effort to find the head of Al Qaeda in Iraq. It was so secret that the officers went by false names there. Bad things happened. They doused people in cold water, used isolation and stress positions and sleep manipulation. These methods all appeared on a checklist. To use each one, they had to check the appropriate box and get approval.

The chain of command for that approval went through General McChrystal. Even more damning, the interrogator told us that he actually saw McChrystal in the camp while such acts were occurring. He also said that his supervisor told him and his colleagues that McChrystal had made a personal promise that the Red Cross would never be allowed into the camp — a violation of our treaty obligations under the Geneva Conventions, which is a violation of the law that we used to follow before the Bush administration."

http://www.esquire.com/the-side/richardson-report/stan-mcchrystal-torture-051909

See also:

"The interrogations were so harsh that five Army officers were convicted on charges of abuse. (McChrystal himself was not implicated in the excesses, but the unit's slogan, which set the tone for its practices, was "If you don't make them bleed, they can't prosecute for it.")"

http://www.slate.com/id/2218160/

[Canuckistanian]

18. We're concerned about the choice in Canada

From the CBC:

Earlier this week, President Obama's Defense Secretary, Robert Gates, announced that he was removing the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan and replacing him with General Stanley McChrystal. General McChrystal is an Iraq War veteran who ran a commando operation so secretive that for years, the Pentagon refused to admit it even existed. He is known for eating only one meal a day ... operating on just a few hours of sleep and running up to 16 kilometres to work and back every day. One former colleague said that the first thing that came to mind when he thought about General McChrystal is "no body fat."

If or when he's confirmed, Stanley McChrystal will oversee President Obama's new Afghanistan strategy including a plan to nearly double the number of U.S. forces in Afghanistan in the months to come.

http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/2009/200905/20090515.html

A lot of eyebrows are being raised at this choice, especially with so many Canadians in Afghanistan. WE would also suffer the blowback if this clown did something STUPID.