Book description
General Stanley McChrystal, the innovative commander of international
and US forces in Afghanistan, was living large. Loyal staff liked to
call him a 'rock star'. During a spring 2010 trip across Europe to
garner additional Allied help for the war effort, McChrystal was
accompanied by journalist Michael Hastings of
Rolling Stone
. For days, Hastings looked on as McChrystal and his staff let off
steam, partying and openly bashing the Obama administration for what
they saw as a lack of leadership. When Hastings' piece appeared a few
months later, it set off a political firestorm: McChrystal was ordered
to Washington, where he was unceremoniously fired.
In The Operators, Hastings gives us a shocking behind-the-scenes
portrait of Allied military commanders, their high-stakes manoeuvres
and often bitter bureaucratic in-fighting. He takes us on patrol
missions in the Afghan hinterlands and to hotel bars where spies and
expensive hookers participate in nation-building gone awry, drawing
back the curtain on a hellish complexity and, he fears, an
unwinnable war.
'The most impact-laden story of the year'
Michael Hastings is a contributing editor at Rolling
Stone. He regularly covers politics and international affairs for
the magazine, including the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. In
2011, he received the George Polk Award in journalism for his
Rolling Stone story, 'The Runaway General'.
