Review My Share of the Task, A Memoir

McChrystal, General Stanley, My Share of the Task, A Memoir, New York, Toronto, London, Dublin, Victoria, New Delhi, Auckland, Parktown North, Beijing: Penguin Books, 2013

 

My Share of the Task, A Memoir is about the military career of General Stanley McChrystal from when he attended West Point to when he was forced out of commanding forces in Afghanistan. The book is broken up into three main sections. The first is about his start in the military as he went from unit to unit hoping to become a Ranger. The second is about his time in Iraq running Special Forces operations against the insurgency and militias. The third is on the Afghan campaign. The main take away was that McChrystal was not a deep strategic thinker but focused upon tactical decisions.

 

The book begins by comparing McChrystal’s career to the transformation the military went through after Vietnam. McChrystal went to West Point in the 1970s just as the war in Southeast Asia was ending. The army was plagued by low morale and recruiting shortages. That changed in the 1980s as there was a renaissance under President Reagan with increased funding and a rise in personnel. This was when McChrystal achieved his dream of becoming a Ranger. The general’s rise up the ranks paralleled the revival of the Army after its defeat in Vietnam. He represented the reformed force that had a new determination and focus.

 

My Share of the Task then shifts to the Iraq War where McChrystal commanded a special forces unit. His main job became hunting down Al Qaeda in Iraq’s (AQI) leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. McChrystal’s strategy was to put constant pressure upon the militants by steadily increasing the amount of raids, target the mid-level commanders who were in charge of carrying out operations, and work the way up Al Qaeda in Iraq’s leadership until it found Zarqawi. McChrystal’s group got a break when it arrested an AQI member named Mubassir who eventually broke under interrogation and led them to Sheikh Abd al-Rahman who was Zarqawi’s spiritual advisor. Surveillance of Rahman led to Zarqawi who was killed in a 2006 air strike. This section highlights how McChrystal was consumed by day to day routine. He goes through his meetings with his staff. How he created his own drone force and networked with various U.S. government agencies to try to collect intelligence on the insurgency. Very little is given to his strategy and almost everything is about tactics and operations. That continues throughout the book.

 

Things end with McChrystal’s short tenure in Afghanistan. When President Obama was elected he wanted a new strategy for the Afghan War and picked McChrystal to be the commander. The general arrived in theater and did a review of the situation to find out the U.S. wasn’t facing one foe but many. The Taliban wasn’t a unified group but made up of various factions who were only united in their opposition to the government. The Karzai administration was corrupt, beholden to warlords and drug dealers, and barely had a presence outside of the capital Kabul. McChrystal came up with a new plan of protecting civilians, creating unity of command of U.S. and allied forces, and wanted a huge expansion of the Afghan security forces. The problem was the White House then ordered its own review holding things up. Eventually the president agreed to a troop increase but for only 18 months. When McChrystal finally got to start his new campaign he was removed for an article in Rolling Stone where he criticized the administration. There was a constant turnover of U.S. commanders in Afghanistan meaning there was little consistency in the war. McChrystal talked about President Karzai as a partner he could work with but the general admitted that he was isolated and had no real authority outside of Kabul. The Afghan forces had been neglected for years. Most of the U.S. units were focused upon protecting themselves and were completely isolated from the Afghan people. This all showed that any general who stepped into the theater had huge obstacles to overcome to ever be successful. History showed that never really happened.

 

General McChrystal’s book is a mixed bag. His account of hunting down Zarqawi is the most interesting part. His time in Afghanistan gives an insight into how Obama was looking for a new way forward in the war but was caught up in constant discussions and divisions within his administration. On the other hand, the book is focused upon the day to day activities of being a commander from staff meetings to trips to the front to conferences with other officers, etc. That’s what a general has to do but it doesn’t always make for the most engaging reading.

 

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