Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => Politics => Topic started by: longeyes on May 28, 2010, 11:30:18 AM
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This raises disturbing questions about our war effort, about many, many things...
Who In the MSM Will Stand Up For Michael Yon?
Posted by Ron Futrell May 25th 2010 at 3:52 pm in Mainstream Media, Military | Comments (49)
The best war journalist of our time has been kicked out of Afghanistan and the media could not care less.
Let the administration boot Helen Thomas out of her seat in the front of a White House press conference and there would be outrage. Remove Jonathan Karl from the Capitol and media would revolt. Kick Andrea Kremer off Sunday Night Football and there would be pandemonium.
And yet nobody in the media seems to have much of a problem with Michael Yon being removed from the front lines by Obama/General McChrystal. Yon has openly stated the problems in Afghanistan right now and how we could lose this war, unless changes are made. He has been critical of the current rules of engagement that have put our troops in danger and could actually make this war like the Vietnam that the leftist media claimed it was early and often when Bush was president (it’s strange you don’t hear those comparisons from them anymore).
Yon’s reward? He’s lost his embed status, banished to Bangkok. Yon could return but his access might be limited and you can’t just pop in and out of that theater like it’s the neighborhood movie palace. Mess with Yon enough and his resources wear thin, but his patience will not. You will not stop this soldier. He is the ultimate warrior for those who fight and die for this country. His reports are honest, chilling, gripping and are as reflective of the battles they represent as anything I have ever read. But this administration is making it as difficult for him to do his job. You can’t believe this is by accident. The most critical battle in Afghanistan is about to take place, the battle for Kandahar, and the voice of the American soldier is not allowed in.
I’ve seen reporters stand shoulder to shoulder with other reporters in situations that seem downright silly when compared to what we’re talking about here. At a boxing news conference years ago one of the fighters didn’t like a certain reporter and didn’t want him there—so he kicked him out. Those of us in the media departed together in a show of support. I’ve been kicked out of an NBA locker room, and watched the rest of the media join me in exodus. The media even stood by Fox News when the Obama Administration went after them last year. The media usually stand together on these issues, but not in this case.
They should exhibit one-tenth of the courage that Michael Yon has by standing up and demanding some answers as to why this administration is essentially shutting out a badly needed voice of reason and honesty in Afghanistan. If there is any time that the American public needs someone in country to give us an honest assessment of what is happening there it’s right now — and that man is Michael Yon. Are honest assessments something that makes this administration uncomfortable?
Stand up in a show of force and find out exactly why Yon is not where he wants to be and where he should be right now. Yon has always offered his spot-on reporting and remarkable photographs free of charge to other media. They have taken advantage of that, rightly so. He survives on donations and is a truly independent voice in the war zone.
As we near this Memorial Day and we think of the ultimate sacrifice that has been given by those who serve, my challenge to the media who can’t wait to get to the Indy 500, the picnics at the parks, and the parades, is to man up and demand to know of this administration why the voice of the soldiers has been silenced in Afghanistan.
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What did he do to get kicked out?
$20 says he published classified data after being asked not to. Any takers?
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What did he do to get kicked out?
$20 says he published classified data after being asked not to. Any takers?
Having read his work for years, I seriously doubt he published anything classified.
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Michael Yon wake up call
Posted By Uncle Jimbo
UPDATE: My answer to Yon's request that I show my cards is here.
I did not want to write this, but I think it is important to do so. I'm not the only one who believes that either; the sentiment is fairly widespread. A number of members of our community have reached out to him and tried to help Yon out but have seen the same kind of behavior that has caused him trouble on his embeds. This isn't about slamming him, it's about telling him to wake the hell up.
Michael Yon has done some excellent reporting from both Iraq and Afghanistan, but if my count is correct he has now been kicked off four embeds. Each time he has excoriated those who booted him and blamed them for his predicament. There comes a time when you have to look in the mirror and accept responsibility. It is not a collection of incompetent public affairs officers or some conspiracy to silence truth telling, it is his own fault. He has broken the rules time and time again and then when that bit him in the ass, he bit back.
Now he has basically started firing in all directions including this unhinged post.
Life was good before I went to Iraq. But after three friends were killed during the GWOT, and my growing mistrust for the media and for the US Government/Military, I quit traveling the world and went to war. The United States was in peril. I am American. Today, I do not trust McChrystal anymore than some people trust the New York Times, Obama or Bush. If McChrystal could be trusted, I would go back to my better life. McChrystal is a great killer but this war is above his head. He must be watched..
Let's be clear now, he didn't go "to war" he went "to the war". He is not a participant, he is a journalist. That sense of personal involvement has appeared many times in his actions and in his writing as he explains the failings of those running the war and our operations. Now he is telling us that Gen. McChrystal is over his head and needs to be watched? I'm sorry but if I have to choose between the eminently qualified and competent McChrystal and Yon, there's not even a question. If this was just one isolated incident I would not have bothered to do this publicly, but it is one in a long string and he has called his own competence into question.
Since his most recent boot from his embed he has been slagging our leadership and the conduct of the war in general; it is important to note that sour grapes are in effect. He has been complaining that McChrystal & his staff were somehow incapable of taking care of his needs.
Crazy Monkeys: Senior Public Affairs people often make me think of crazy monkeys. (Like some monkeys I've seen in India.) They break into the cockpit and start flipping switches with no idea what the switches do. They keep doing it until something breaks or you beat them back. And just when you think you've beaten ...them all back, another monkey slips in. (This time by name of Admiral Smith.)
The disembed from McChrytal's top staff (meaning from McChrystal himself) is a very bad sign. Sends chills that McChrystal himself thinks we are losing the war. McChrystal has a history of covering up. This causes concern that McChrystal might be misleading SecDef and President. Are they getting the facts?
Next time military generals talk about poor press performance in Afghanistan, please remember that McChrystal and crew lacked the dexterity to handle a single, unarmed writer. 100,000 troops -- probably that many contractors -- and no room for one writer. How can McChrystal handle the Taliban?
OK that's about enough self-centered whingeing, and I can't believe he is questioning McChrystal's character. That's BS and low. He has claimed he was told there was no room for him to embed, well that is not what I heard. It appears he was again removed for violating the embed rules. At some point you need to own up to the fact that it's not the rest of the world.....it's you. That point is now.
Disclaimer: I have not embedded...ever. I am not going to embed because I don't want to. I like being in the rear w/ the gear. I have plenty of stamps on my passport, have toured the most craptastic places on the planet, and now don't deploy anywhere w/o room service. I respect what Michael Yon has done, I just think he is acting like a jackass.
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An Open Letter To Michael Yon
Posted By Laughing_Wolf
Sent to him via e-mail and cross-posted at Laughingwolf.net
Michael,
A lot of good people are sending you messages today, and so I thought I would send you this short note.
No one is denying that you've done some good work in Iraq or Afghanistan. In point of fact, most have said all along you have. No one is saying you haven't done some good for others, for you have. Your help with my second embed was and is much appreciated.
What people are trying to tell you -- friends, acquaintances, and others -- is that there is a problem and you and only you can address it. This is indeed a rough form of intervention. Uncle Jimbo has it right: there is one common element to your multiple cases of being disembedded: you.
You've asked me to highlight some of your posts, and help promote them. Time has held up some of that, but a larger issue has been that I've been worried about and unable to honestly recommend your work. Just look at the rants -- pointed out by others -- and look at them as if they had been written by another. From calling people monkeys to making some rather outlandish claims about those in power at almost any level you are showing signs of burnout and more. It's the more that worries me, and others.
My message is just one of many that I believe has come your way. Those efforts, public and private, have not met with success, to put it mildly. You have, in point of fact, slagged some of the people who reached out, and I suspect that such will come my way too.
You have done some good work. But, your actions impact more than just you. Your actions have hurt other good embeds as well as yourself.
Please stop, step back, and think. Take some time before replying to myself or others. If you can do that, and if you can admit that having this many people reach out to you should be telling you something, then I have hope. If the response is what I expect given how you've dealt with things of late, well...
I hope you will stop, step back, and get some input from some good people, even some professional input. Take the time, decompress, restock, rebuild, grow. Everyone is not your enemy, and while not everyone is your friend quite a few are supporters. That's a heck of a resource for you to have, and I hope you will use it well and use it to grow.
LW
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Having read his work for years, I seriously doubt he published anything classified.
I, too, doubt Yon would publish anything classified.
Yon did a lot of good work in the early years of Iraq, at a time when nobody in the news media was reporting honestly about what was happening there. Since then, Yon's work has gone downhill. Lots of ranting, not a lot of substance. I'd be curious to hear what he did to get kicked out this time. He may not like the fact that he got booted, but that doesn't mean the .mil was wrong to do it.
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you gotta love the self described greatest military blogger of all time. >:D
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The issue for me is whether Yon is right or wrong, not whether he made enemies.
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shucks and i thought it was yon saying what you want/need to hear
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Yon may be right or wrong in his assessments, but a couple of nay-sayers with unknown credentials and one or two posters here who have no first-hand knowledge of what's happening in Afghanistan doesn't constitute an argument against Yon.
All I know is we've been in Afghanistan for nine years and no lasting miracles have occurred. I ascribe this to bad strategy, probably deliberately bad, on the part of our political establishment, not on the military itself. We are playing whack-a-mole while we attrit our military. If we wanted to go the root of the matter, we would have dealt with Riyadh and other Islamic centers of influence a long time ago. That we don't is what we ought to be concerned about.
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we would have dealt with Riyadh and other Islamic centers of influence a long time ago
ahhh now we get to the meat tell us how the dealing should be done
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but a couple of nay-sayers with unknown credentials
they're only unknown to you by choice
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All I know is we've been in Afghanistan for nine years and no lasting miracles have occurred. I ascribe this to bad strategy, probably deliberately bad, on the part of our political establishment, not on the military itself.
Are you serious?
Or it could be that we are dealing with the worlds foremost multi-generational insurgancy, trained by the US, in a region that is known for tribalism and hating outsiders.
Or it could be that we don't actually want to level the place and kill everyone, but we're trying to cram 100yrs of social development and theory into A-Stan in less then a decade.
But yeah, I'm sure the evil politicians are deliberatly sabotaging our efforts. ;/
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Believe it or not, I don't know Uncle Jimbo or Laughing Wolf, but if I did theirs would just be two more opinions to weigh against Yon's and others. As I said, we don't really know the facts, do we? Let it out.
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What's going on in the world of terror is planned, orchestrated, and financed from the top. Perhaps you are the last to know. Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn.
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Hey, dogmush, no one said the Afghanistan theater was easy going. I'm saying it's the wrong theater. As for political meddling and maneuvering, let's not be naive, about the fact that we are pulling our punches. We have a lot of high-up Americans who are in bed with people in the Muslim sphere. "It's just business," as Michael Corleone said. Meanwhile, the madrassas and the mosques keep sprouting up, along with the endowed chairs. Keep sleepwalking.
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quote from I'm My Kids' Mom:
we would have dealt with Riyadh and other Islamic centers of influence a long time ago
ahhh now we get to the meat tell us how the dealing should be done
I've never been coy about where I think the problem really lies; surely you should know that if you've been reading my posts. We are playing around the edges of the gang's crib. That suits someone's purpose. Not mine.
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shucks and i thought it was yon saying what you want/need to hear
So then enlighten us as to what's really happening in Afghanistan.
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What did he do to get kicked out?
$20 says he published classified data after being asked not to. Any takers?
Classified data? You mean like not being able to shoot back unless the squad lawyer gives the nod?
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I read all Yon's Astan posts as they were posted and there wasn't anything approaching a classification issue or OPSEC violation.
Thing is, Yon is definitely the problem.
First, he has been making the point, loud & clear, that making Astan stable is a multi-decades-long effort.
And he's right. Astan makes Haiti look like unicorns & rainbows, development, literacy, and every other metric you want to compare. Then, toss in a bunch of different ethnics and exterior influence (Paki, Iran) and we're talking more a good century of American stability, investment, and TLC to bring it to, say, the level of Albania.
Very few folks like to hear the ugly truth about the very nature of Astan and Yon made no friends rubbing it in.
Second, Yon was explicit about the ultra-tight ROEs.
They are not secret, but it is embarrassing for Obama & the .mil to have to explain why it takes damn near an executive order to drop a bomb or arty mission. The best/worst case was the August 2009 screw-up in Nuristan (far east Astan, in a valley in the mountains). Our men at a small (platoon+ sized, IIRC) outpost with helipad had developed good relations with the locals and got good intel that several hundred insurgents were massing in a village a short distance away. The local O gets on the horn & requests arty. Denied. Requests CAS. Denied. Requests Apaches. Well, maybe, but they are in a neighboring valley and it will take hours to get there...
The several hundred insurgents attack and tear the place up for hours & hours. Blow the ever-loving *expletive deleted*it out of the outpost, kill the friendly locals, and kill a bunch of our boys. Finally, the apaches get there and the insurgents melt away. The outpost was a total loss and now it is indian territory, again.
Third, Yon reported on the monumental cock-up that is the multi-national division of labor & responsibility he uncovered after a suicide bomber blew the hell out of a bridge.
Yon dug into just who dropped the baby and found a spaghetti mess of responsibilities. Something like: Local Afghans had the bridge, someone else had the area around the bridge, another entity was responsible for the road, another for the whole area, off the road and excluding the immediate bridge area, etc., etc. Enough dispersed responsibility so that nobody was on the hook yo keep an eye out for a splodeydope.
I'd bet dollars to donuts his digging into the SNAFU nature of ops in that area is what got him kanked. WAY too many guys with lotsa brass on their shoulders ended up with egg on their faces.
Something not in Yon's control is that a whole lot of milbloggers have a hard-on for McChrystal. Full-on guy-crushes on the Special Ops Ninja Master. More than a little nauseating. Heck, I worked for the man and thought him right competent, but I don't worship the ground he walks on. It is entirely possible he is working under severe BHO administration constraints and/or coalition constraints. Even so, it doesn't mean he can't hork it up or if he thinks BHO is truly on hte wrong track, he can resign rather than feed men into a shiitty situation.
I read a good bit about his embed with the Brits and what got him kanked on that one was his explicit coverage of the lack of material (helos, especially).
What the .mil seems to want in an embed is a reporter with little knowledge. Someone who, when they see something imitating a soup sandwich, doesn't recognize the soup sandwich. Yon hollers, "Soup! I see soup! WTF is going on with this mess!?!" This makes enemies.
Anyways, that is how I see it.
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so what got him booted the other 2 times?
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Classified data? You mean like not being able to shoot back unless the squad lawyer gives the nod?
That is not true.
As far as my classified data post, I wasn't trying to accuse Yon of it, but rather guessing the quickest reason for .mil to boot a reporter. It did come out a little more accusitory then I meant. I confess I've never read Yon's reports. My info on Astan comes from my friends that were there recently or are there now.
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so what got him booted the other 2 times?
Hell if I know.
I read him off & on over the years, but only read him regularly after he went to Astan this last time with the Brits, the AF PJs, & our infantry.
(I am working some "south central-asia"-oriented projects and have done a general survey of the place to include terrain, atmo, tech level, settlement patterns, agriculture, etc. For threat org, equip, tactics, etc. I have had to interview a number of folks who have fought there and have followed the operations and any reports I have been able to get my hands on. Yon's blog is about 0.05% of all that, and served mostly to validate other sources. Also, his photographs helped a good bit.)
What has appeared in his blog is more than enough for folks who find him inconvenient to give him the boot. There is no need to invent other reasons. I have little doubt that they didn't want him there in the first place and after unearthing the SNAFU after the splodeydope, many calls were made to influence his embed status. If he is an irascible fellow, that would only add to the desire to see the last of him.
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It does appear that some of what Yon reported on has had some effect on personnel decisions by coalition partners in Astan:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jRpeQhT_C1ekvOO1ZNR4ShylvdEwD9G0R59G0
Canadian commander in Afghanistan dismissed
(AP) – 3 hours ago
KANDAHAR AIR FIELD, Afghanistan — The Canadian military says the chief of Canadian forces in Afghanistan, Brig. Gen. Daniel Menard, has been relieved following allegations of an inappropriate relationship.
Canadian Col. Simon Hetherington made the announcement early Sunday. He said Menard's dismissal would not have an impact on Canadian operations in southern Afghanistan.
No mention of the Canadian BG's negligent discharges of his weapon or his part in the bridge suicide bomber cock up.
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what he do? not enough rank to do an eisenhower?
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what he do? not enough rank to do an eisenhower?
Multiple affairs with subordinates is the stated reason.
Canadian gov't is mum about the BG's NDs and his portion of responsibility for the bridge splodeydope.
I have not read any about the dust-up up to just a while ago. I have a few observations:
Sycophants
For the love of Pete, the comment areas are sick with them. Yon's & the other dude's, Uncle Jimbo. Slightly nauseating. Makes me glad I never delved into the comments of milbloggers before. "Yon is a prince and can do no wrong." "UJ is telling it like it is, grrr, and Yon said mean things about Bush & Cheney."
Obviously, these folks missed Jeremiah 17:5 "Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD."
Uncle Jim's Accusation
It boils down to a rumor, and UJ explicitly said he won't confirm who said Yon's embed was terminated or why...just that Yon broke the embed rules.
Not exactly what I'd call solid.
My Opinion of the Kerfluffle
Yon has criticized folks many in the milblogger community and their toadies revere. The milblogers mention and the commenters go on about how it wasn't helpful for Yon to criticize Bush & Cheney back when Iraq was a complete mess.
IMO, GWB was justly criticized by many. I also believe that a lot of the sum total of the criticism was insincere & politically motivated. The mendacious do not invalidate the criticisms of the honest.
They also will brook no criticism of McChrystal. Now, I served under McC (several layers of command under) and can't claim to know him inside & out. What I did see was good. He was motivated & competent. He was willing to stress his Os to see how they'd perform under stress. He was personable. He persuaded his LTC Army surgeon buddy (not serving under McC) to go on Mongaday with us, which was freaking awesome. Surgeons in the Army don't need to slog through The Suck to get respect. LTC Rawkinsurgeon did it anyway.
But, McC also left the pooch well & truly humped when he spread or let misinformation about Pat Tillman's death by friendly fire go on without correction. Dude's not infallible and the Tillman fiasco was an unforced error...an error relating to the reportage of politically damaging information.
Many of the milbloggers commented that it was Yon's criticism that got Yon kanked. That McC didn't like it one bit. If that really IS the reason Yon got tossed, that is not a violation of embed rules and not a screw-up on Yon's part, if Yon honestly reported what he saw & thought.
Yon's detractors have also made hay about his assessment of Astan as a great big ol' mess and that it would take decades of American intervention to make it stable. After doing my own research for work, I am inclined to agree.
Anyways, Yon could still be screwing up, but unsubstantiated claims of malfeasance on Yon's part are thin gruel.
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Something like: Local Afghans had the bridge, someone else had the area around the bridge, another entity was responsible for the road, another for the whole area, off the road and excluding the immediate bridge area, etc., etc. Enough dispersed responsibility so that nobody was on the hook yo keep an eye out for a splodeydope.
I must be missing something here; it sounds like these people have already distilled and adopted the essence of the American way.
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from The Atlantic:
Michael Yon's War
By D.B. Grady
It began with a bridge. On the morning of March 1, a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device detonated on Tarnak River Bridge near Kandahar, Afghanistan, killing multiple civilians and one American soldier. While the destruction of a single bridge might ordinarily pose a mere inconvenience to the U.S. war machine, in the oppressive terrain of Afghanistan it became a logistical chokepoint, halting ground-based operations for days.
War correspondent Michael Yon sought the answer to an uncomfortable question: who was responsible for the security of that bridge?
Yon is no ordinary reporter. A former Green Beret with U.S. Army Special Forces, he has spent more time embedded in Iraq and Afghanistan than any other journalist. His dispatches have produced some of the most memorable combat narratives of the war, and a large share of its most iconic images. Make no mistake; Michael Yon is not a dispassionate observer of the Columbia J-School variety. When writing about U.S. forces, he says "we." When writing about insurgents, he calls them terrorists or Taliban. And when reporting failures in the war effort, he names names. This has earned him both the respect and ire of senior military staff. In the case of the Tarnak River Bridge, the name most repeatedly mentioned as responsible for its security was Daniel Menard, the Canadian brigadier general in charge of Task Force Kandahar. Yon went public with this information.
In an effort to divert the finger of blame from a valued coalition partner, the military reeled and offered instead a bewildering explanation of which task force was responsible for the tiny bridge, and when. In an email reproduced by Yon, one officer summed the situation up as "a messy gray area that has changed hands a few times." Yon doubted the veracity of the official story, and dug in with continued criticism of General Menard, ultimately demanding his firing. While the bridge incident passed, Menard remained in Yon's crosshairs, and when the Canadian general accidentally discharged his weapon on post soon thereafter, Yon reported it as a symbol of the officer's incompetence. (General Menard was later found guilty of negligence in a court martial.)
In 2009, at the direction of President Obama, General Stanley McChrystal launched an assessment of the campaign in Afghanistan, and recommended a troop surge and counterinsurgency strategy to reverse deterioration in the region. Three years prior, with the world's attention focused on Iraq, Michael Yon was one of the first correspondents to report the tide in Afghanistan shifting to the Taliban's favor. As he described it, the country had devolved into a "consummate narco-state" and "a hunting lodge for our special operations forces." He added, "Since the Afghan campaign has been largely a special forces war from the beginning, we have been able to transition with great secrecy from near victory, to abysmal performance, to what has now become a sustainable human-hunting resort."
However, having reported first-hand the spiraling of Iraq into civil war, and witnessed the subsequent, successful troop surge under the aegis of President Bush and leadership of General David Petraeus, Yon expressed confidence in both McChrystal and the new Afghanistan strategy. This confidence was short lived.
There are conflicting stories about what happened next. His public feud against General Menard was not Michael Yon's first campaign against an ally. He'd previously called out British Minister of Defense Bob Ainsworth over his country's lack of in-theater air support. "Mr. Ainsworth is lying to the British public about the helicopter issue in Afghanistan. Mr. Ainsworth tells the British public that British soldiers have enough helicopters. British troops are suffering -- even dying -- for those lies. Mr. Ainsworth is, in effect, murdering British soldiers by not resourcing them." To be sure, alienating America's key partner in the coalition did not endear him to the commanding generals running the war. But from Yon's perspective, he was reporting simple truths and protecting the lives of soldiers in the field.
His next embed would prove to be his final in the region. Yon was assigned to the 5th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, where he has a strong relationship with its command sergeant major, Robb Prosser. "I spent five months in combat with CSM Prosser in Iraq, and we were roommates in Afghanistan. CSM Prosser earned a Silver Star and I was feet away from him when he performed the actions that earned that honor. People who know me know that I remain ready to go." After three months with the 5/2, Yon received the news. According to a message he sent out on Facebook: "McChrystal's crew has spoken: Embed is ended. This comes from McChrystal's own spokesman (through one CPT Jane Campbell USN cc RADM Greg Smith and COL Wayne Shanks USA). This lends confirmation to ideas that the disembed came from McChrystal's crew. (If not before, 100% now.) McChrystal cannot be trusted to tell the truth about this war. Packing my bags."
The official reason for ending his embed was a simple go at fairness. In spite of a written agreement to remain with 5/2 until redeployment, Michael Yon had already been embedded far longer than most journalists could expect, conceive, or endure. With a backlog of over one hundred reporters eager to cover the war, a decision had to be made, and his time was simply up.
Yon disagrees. He questions the timing of his rescinded embed status, coming on the threshold of the most significant combat operation in theater since 9/11, and on the back of a series of setbacks by coalition forces. Marjah, Afghanistan, for example was to be a showcase of success as seen during the Iraq surge. "Those showcases had a dramatic positive effect in Iraq, and also at home in the United States. We saw success was possible." He continues, "General Petraeus had both sides of his mind working, and so when success began to happen the media was there to cover the good job." In the absence of success, Yon believes the military ended his embed to stifle an independent voice and steer coverage to a less experienced, more docile stenographer pool of reporters. "If McChrystal is perceived to fail in Kandahar, the Taliban will just about have us in media checkmate for 2011. This can have tremendous negative consequences and the Taliban leadership fully understands that."
Though he has relocated to Thailand to report on the civil unrest there, he still covers Afghanistan from afar and remains critical of General McChrystal's leadership. "Today, I do not trust McChrystal anymore than some people trust the New York Times, Obama or Bush. If McChrystal could be trusted, I would go back to my better life. McChrystal is a great killer but this war is above his head."
Some military bloggers believe Yon is lashing out spitefully, and that his words would be tempered and his outlook positive if he were still in-country. Some further suggest that he has simply spent too long in the combat zone, and has lost grip on reality. To be sure, neither side of the hyper-partisan blogosphere has much to gain by negative press coming from Afghanistan. On the left, failure would be a blow to "Obama's war," the "good war" to which the president has added nearly seventy thousand troops. On the right, failure would mar not only a war considered just, but also a neoconservative tent pole of democracy in the region. Yon dismisses most military blogs not written by embeds or troops in the field as political "milkookery."
The most pressing question, then, is can Michael Yon be trusted? His dispatches from Thailand have been acclaimed and widely read - certainly not the work of a man on the ledge. And history tends to vindicate Yon's judgement. Never afraid to put his reputation on the line, he was among the first to call Iraq a civil war in 2005, among the first to single out General Petreaus as the man to save the war, among the first to report the success of the Iraq surge, and among the first to report the collapsing campaign in Afghanistan. Yon's credibility was bolstered last week when his Canadian nemesis General Daniel Menard was relieved of command for an inappropriate relationship with a member of his staff, proof positive to Yon of his unsuitability for key leadership.
If Michael Yon was right about everything else, should his word not be heeded when he writes, "McChrystal is bent over the coffin of the Afghan war with a hammer in his hand and a mouth full of nails"? When asked for his thoughts on the general state of the war, he says one must be intuitive rather than deductive. "Innumerable wild cards are always flying and so the best that one can do is study hard and watch and listen and give it time to mix." If a reliance on feelings alone is hardly the metric from which one should draft a war plan, consider the recent words of General McChrystal. The purpose of the Marjah operation was to create an "irreversible feeling of momentum," but, "You don't feel it here but I'll tell you, it's a bleeding ulcer outside."
Yon believes the war can still be won, but that a change of command is in order. At this level of warfare, he says, "McChrystal is like a man who has strapped on ice skates for the first time. He might be a great athlete, but he's learning to skate during the Olympics." Yon adds that publicly denouncing the commanding general of a war is not an easy thing for him to do, especially considering it means crossing swords with General Petraeus and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, two men he greatly admires. Indeed, if anyone can turn this war around, Yon believes it is General Petraeus. He concedes such a return to the battlefield is unlikely, and suggests another general whose name fewer people have heard. "General James Mattis from the Marines. I get a good feeling about Mattis but I don't know. General Petraeus is a known entity and he is solid gold."
Short of that, Yon's outlook is bleak. "Even if the President commits more forces [next year], they will not be effective until 2012. By that time, more allies likely will have peeled off, requiring us to commit even more forces to cover down. We lost crucial time in building the Afghan National Police and Afghan National Army and so forth, and today we are paying the price. This is not to mention that the Afghan government is sorry at best and criminal at worst."
He concludes, "The trajectory of this war leaves a sick feeling in my stomach. It's as if I've watched a space shuttle liftoff while sitting at launch control, with full knowledge that it will abort to the Indian Ocean. We are trying to reach orbit with insufficient fuel."
Presently, Michael Yon continues to cover the situation in Thailand. As long as General McChrystal is in charge, his days as an embedded reporter are finished, though he intends to return to Afghanistan independently in the near future.
This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2010/06/michael-yons-war/57483/
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Given recent events, I think MY can claim some level of vindication.
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Given recent events, I think MY can claim some level of vindication.
I don't know. Word over on Lightfighter (where a whole bunch of current .mil guys hang out, no BSing, either) the word is that Yon seems to have really gone off the deepend. And that's the word from a bunch of people who have agreed with Yon in the past.
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I don't know. Word over on Lightfighter (where a whole bunch of current .mil guys hang out, no BSing, either) the word is that Yon seems to have really gone off the deepend. And that's the word from a bunch of people who have agreed with Yon in the past.
Well, the "deepest" parts of MY's "deep end" were that Menard was an incompetent who slept with subordinates and that McC & his boys were incompetent and couldn't manage the information war to save their own lives. Both are now gone, due to events that highlight MY's critiques.
I'm thinking that reality was to be found in that "deep end," and rather than MY's end being "deep," the other end was better described as "shallow."
Heck, MY may very well be the broken clock who was right twice, but those two occasions were pretty significant. Past performance provides MY with some credibility that anonymous commenters & bloggers can not match.
I dunno, but being right and making correct predictions carries weight with me.
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I've been reading MY since someone on this board suggested it and have found most of his articles to be mostly enlightening, with very little hyperbole or bashing. I know a a lot of troops idolize (and probably for good reason) McC however, I think some of the current strategy is flawed and MY merely highlighted it.
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Well, the "deepest" parts of MY's "deep end" were that Menard was an incompetent who slept with subordinates and that McC & his boys were incompetent and couldn't manage the information war to save their own lives. Both are now gone, due to events that highlight MY's critiques.
I'm thinking that reality was to be found in that "deep end," and rather than MY's end being "deep," the other end was better described as "shallow."
Heck, MY may very well be the broken clock who was right twice, but those two occasions were pretty significant. Past performance provides MY with some credibility that anonymous commenters & bloggers can not match.
I dunno, but being right and making correct predictions carries weight with me.
I'm not talking about Menard and McCrystal. I'm talking about Yon's stunts such as revealing information that should not be revealed (for the sake of operational security) and just the way he's been acting.
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I'm not talking about Menard and McCrystal. I'm talking about Yon's stunts such as revealing information that should not be revealed (for the sake of operational security) and just the way he's been acting.
OPSEC
Are you referring to the google map images in some of his posts? Given the terrain, it is not great big surprise that vehicles are largely road-bound in the built-up and ag areas and that dismounts are channeled by the innumerable walls. The insurgents know this, having been raised in the area. Heck, I knew it before MY wrote about it, as it was part of my job to learn of it--from open sources. There ain't nothing MY posted that any local boy didn't already know.
Maybe it was mentioning the overland supply routes from airheads and ports? Nah, that has been open knowledge for years.
We're in the age of Google Earth, camera phones, and GPS. I can buy Russian .mil 1:25K maps of the area online. Detailed satellite images are also available to those who can pay. I can access thousands of weather reports to model atmo from several locations in & around Astan--for free! Posting a Google Earth image a week after our boys walked through is an OPSEC violation only in the mind of someone who's mind is still in 1985.(1)
If MY was actually violating OpSec, I think we'd have more than a few anonymous bloggers' & posters' accusations. If they have anything other that what they've yanked from their fourth point of contact, they ought to let us know.
the way he's been acting
Gonna have to elaborate on that one.
Dude, I am open to the idea of MY screwing the pooch.
You're are going to have to give me something to work with other than, "Blogger/poster anonymous_dude wrote "My source (who I will not mention) says MY was doing X, Y, and Z and that's the real reason his embed was kanked."
Remember the report of hte platoon+ outpost in Nuristan that was attacked by a honking huge enemy force? The outpost that was denied arty support due to ROE? Using only open sources, it was possible to determine its location and determine the direction from which hte larger portion of the enemy force attacked.
Welcome to the year 2010, where anyone with half-azzed terrain analysis skillz (me) can go online and get data that tells me not only the above, but I can use freeware to figure out which bits of the terrain are likely inaccessible to our .mil vehicles.
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As far as opsec, one example is how he posted an email from a soldier that contained information about security lapses of an FOB on his Facebook page (June 12th) and just the way MY's been posting lately.
Please take note that I don't have anything against the guy and I don't follow .mil bloggers myself (usually).
Now, as far as the real reason MY's embed was stopped, I don't know for sure. I think part of it was his feud with McChrystal, and part of it was Yon's...bullishness. He's been a bit odd lately from what I've seen.
I hope he is able to settle down and return to Afghanistan now that McChrystal is gone. Maybe he gets along better with Patreaus?
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He's been a bit odd lately from what I've seen.
He's been over the top - best evidence is his appearance on the Liddy Show. This Blackfive feud seems to bring out the worst in him. I did see someone running around in various milblog comments section claiming that he lied about Menard's ND, when Menard had admitted to it - so he does have people/other blog's fanbois out to get him to some degree. I think he obsesses over it way too much.
I hope he is able to settle down and return to Afghanistan now that McChrystal is gone. Maybe he gets along better with Patreaus?
He's very fond of Petraeus. Even has his private email, apparently.
And he violated OPSEC on purpose in that instance - so that people in power and in the know would be forced to get their act together before the story became larger. And they did.
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Still don't make it right to do that. Remember the uproar over that idiot Geraldo Rivera's violation of opsec back in '03? You just don't do that, IMHO, even if it is to make a (valid) point that something needs to be corrected.
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Looks like McChrystal was worried about the wrong reporter, eh?