NATO confident in McChrystal despite U.S. article

Tue Jun 22, 2010 3:49am EDT

* Alliance backs U.S. general after Rolling Stone article

* McChrystal says he feels "betrayed" by critical article



BRUSSELS, June 22 (Reuters) - The head of NATO has full confidence in the top U.S. and NATO general in Afghanistan, whose aides were quoted as insulting some of President Barack Obama's closest advisers, a NATO spokesman said on Tuesday.

An article to be published on Friday by Rolling Stone magazine also quotes an aide to the commander, General Stanley McChrystal, as describing his "disappointment" with his initial one-on-one meeting with Obama at the White House last year.

"It's a rather unfortunate article, but it is just an article," NATO spokesman James Appathurai said, providing a response from NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

"We are in the middle of a very real conflict and the secretary-general has full confidence in General McChrystal as the NATO commander and in his strategy."

McChrystal apologised on Monday for the comments by his aides and said he had "enormous respect and admiration for President Obama and his national security team". [ID:nN2178209]

The article, which quotes several McChrystal aides anonymously, portrayed his team as disapproving of the Obama administration, with the exception of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who backed McChrystal's request for additional troops in Afghanistan.

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, who wanted a more focused strategy in Afghanistan, comes in for particular criticism.

McChrystal was quoted as saying he felt betrayed by the leak of a classified cable from the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry, last year which raised doubts about sending more troops to shore up an Afghan government already lacking in credibility.

The article portrays a split between the U.S. military and Obama's advisers at a sensitive moment for the Pentagon, which is fending off criticism of its strategy to turn around the nearly nine-year-old Afghan war.

The article quotes a member of McChrystal's team making jokes about Biden, who was seen as critical of the general's efforts to escalate the conflict and who had favoured a more limited counter-terrorism approach.

It also quotes an adviser to McChrystal dismissing an early meeting with Obama as a "10-minute photo op", and quotes the general as expressing disappointment that the president then clearly did not know anything about him. (Reporting by David Brunnstrom; editing by David Stamp)



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