A conversation between the president and the top American commander in Afghanistan has ended, and Gen. Stanley McChrystal has left the White House, ahead of a meeting with the administration's national security team, scheduled to begin at 11:35 a.m. ET.
McChrystal had been recalled from Afghanistan, in part, to attend that policy discussion, which will take place in the White House Situation Room, NPR's Scott Horsley reports.
"The fact that he has left the White House before it's started could be telling," he says. "But we've had no official word."
Considering the general famously doesn't eat more than one meal a day, this reporter thinks it's unlikely he went to grab a quick bite.
According to The New York Times, McChrystal and Obama "began their one-on-one discussion just before 10 a.m., after the general had met with his bosses at the Pentagon."
General McChrystal had prepared a letter of resignation, but the White House has not said whether it was accepted.
NPR's Tom Bowman is on a reporting trip to Afghanistan. Following the release of the Rolling Stone profile of McChrystal, Bowman talked to a few officers there.
One junior officer told him that McChrystal needs "a good swift talking to," but what he did isn't something over which someone should be fired.
Some senior officers told Bowman they were amazed that the general's aides would talk so openly about McChrystal's private views.
"All said they doubted that his ouster would mean that much," he reports. "The Kandahar operation is pretty much a go, and all focus is on that."
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