Army Illegally Targets U.S. Senators

Caldwell and McCain. Photo courtesy of the AP

Michael Hastings, the Rolling Stone reporter who single handedly brought down Gen. Stanley McChrystal, is reporting the military’s Psychological Operations department was ordered to operate against U.S. Senators visiting Afghanistan.

The orders came from Lt. Gen. William Caldwell, whose hopes were to manipulate legislators into providing more troops and funding for a war in peril. The use of Psy-Ops against Americans, civilian or congressional, is in clear violation of federal law. In fact, each year’s defense budget comes with stipulations pertaining to Psy-Ops ensuring that these types of orders will not be issued.

The article in Rolling Stone details the refusal of a Psy-Ops officer to obey this illegal order, only to face retribution by the Lt. General who was tasked with training Afghani soldiers.

According to MSNBC, both the Pentagon and White House are scrambling to address this issue. Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs Of Staff, was apparently one of the folks Caldwell wanted to target. Mullen’s efforts to corner Obama into a troop surge in Afghanistan were well documented in Bob Woodward’s Obama’s Wars. Was Mullen’s push the result of Psy-Ops targeted against him (as well as Senators ranging from Republican John McCain to Democrat Al Frankin)? Or was pressuring an inexperienced president his idea of effective military leadership?

We will never know if these operations were carried out by other soldiers and if so, to what extent, but even if they weren’t, these shocking disclosures forever taint the decision making process that has gone into this war's strategy for the past two years.