[Illustration by ALEX FINE]

FOX NEWS: Gen. Stanley McChrystal is no longer the top U.S. commander and strategist for Afghanistan, reportedly being told Wednesday by President Obama that he is out of a job following a scathing article in which McChrystal and his aides were quoted criticizing the commander-in-chief over his leadership in the Afghan war. McChrystal got his marching orders as he held a face-to-face at the White House, where he met with the president after a meeting with Defense Secretary Robert Gates at the Pentagon. MORE

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA:  “Today, I accepted General Stanley McChrystal’s resignation.”

WALL STREET JOURNAL: Gen. David Petraeus, the head of the military’s Central Command and the architect of the surge of forces into Iraq in 2007, will take over as the commanding general in Afghanistan, Mr. Obama said. The shakeup followed comments by Gen. Stanley McChrystal and his aides disparaging the president, his national security team, and U.S. allies. The decision to put Gen. Petraeus in command sends a signal that the president stands behind the counterinsurgency tactics pushed hard by Gen. McChrystal and championed by Gen. Petraeus. MORE

PREVIOUSLY: McChrystal In Dutch With The White House For Loose Cannon-isms In Rolling Stone Profile

PREVIOUSLY: From the beginning of the war, there was constant friction between MacArthur and the Joint Chiefs in Washington. MacArthur constantly pressured to expand the war, claiming that the only way to bring about victory was by taking the war to China. After the defeat of the American forces in November, he claimed that the only way to stop the Chinese was to expand the war. Ridgeway’s victories undermined that position. After it became clear that the conflict was heading towards a stalemate, MacArthur began to oppose that policy, believing in the need for a larger war. He wrote a letter to the House Republican Leader, stating that anything less than total victory in Asia was unacceptable. This, as well as some of his other actions — including his secret communications to the Spanish government — brought about the difficult decision to relieve MacArthur of his command. On April 11, 1951,  he was so informed. MORE

ASSOCIATED PRESS: A college student returning to school after the winter break fell victim to a prank at Philadelphia’s airport by a Transportation Security Administration worker who pretended to plant a plastic bag of white powder in her carryon luggage. The worker is no longer employed by the TSA after the incident this month, a spokeswoman said. Rebecca Solomon, 22, a University of Michigan student, wrote in a column for her campus newspaper that she was having her bags screened on Jan. 5 before her flight to Detroit when the employee stopped her, reached into her laptop computer bag and pulled out the plastic bag, demanding to know where she had gotten the powder. In the Jan. 10 column for The Michigan Daily, she recounted how she struggled to come up with an explanation, wondering if it was bomb-detonating material slipped in by a terrorist or drugs put there by a smuggler. ”He let me stutter through an explanation for the longest minute of my life,” Solomon wrote. ”Tears streamed down my face as I pleaded with him to understand that I’d never seen this baggie before.” A short time later, she said, the worker smiled and said it was his. MORE