Know Your Right-Wing Speakers: Donald Rumsfeld
By Keith White, University of Virginia
Tuesday September 19, 2006
Donald Rumsfeld, mastermind of the U.S. and allied campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq, architect of defense modernization, and occasional pressroom poet, is an old hand at executive posts. He came to government as the brash whiz kid; now he stands as Washington’s most seasoned conservative veteran. Rumsfeld’s resume is hard to beat. His experience in four separate administrations is rivaled only by his one-time protégé Dick Cheney. And throughout his sweeping career, two themes loom large: incredible capabilities shadowed only by astonishing ambition; and a hard-line conservative worldview.
 But don’t forget Rumsfeld’s most impressive accomplishment: his selection as one of 2002’s sexiest men—at the ripe age of seventy. As President Bush says, apparently, go Rumstud!
Rumsfeld’s academic and—even rarer in this administration—military credentials are impeccable. A graduate of Princeton University, Rumsfeld was both a world-class wrestler and Navy ROTC member. Rumsfeld then went on to the Navy, where he served as an aviator and flight instructor for three years.
After a brief stint in corporate America, Rumsfeld came to Washington as an Illinois Congressman in 1962. He showcased a mainstream voting record: while clearly conservative on economics, Rumsfeld was a social moderate who supported civil rights legislation and dismantling the draft. But Rumsfeld’s most fateful decision in his four terms in Congress was his leadership of the successful campaign to place Gerald Ford as his party’s minority leader.
Rumsfeld, always climbing upwards, grabbed at an offer to head the White House Office for Economic Development (OED)—bringing with him a little-known assistant named Dick Cheney. Rumsfeld carved a role out for himself as one of the Nixon administration’s young, moderate voices on both race issues and Vietnam. He was a rare official in the White House favoring a pull-out date for American forces in Vietnam. How times have changed: Today one would be hard pressed to find a more adamant opponent to timetables in Iraq than Rumsfeld.
Rumfeld’s tenure in the Nixon White House showcased both his remarkable skills and towering ambition. After successfully defending the OED from budgetary cuts, Rumsfeld moved on to be a senior advisor to Nixon. He was sure to mention in his numerous chats with Nixon his desire to be his vice presidential running mate in 1972. But like other attempts to vault to the presidency, Rumsfeld faltered. (Historical note: Rumsfeld missed out on being Reagan’s vice president by a phone call. His follow-up? A lackluster campaign for the Republican nomination in 1988). But while Ford catapulted to the presidency after Nixon’s resignation, Rumsfeld was saved from drowning in the Watergate wreck: Rumsfeld was safely residing in Europe as America’s ambassador to NATO during Nixon’s descent.
Then President Gerald Ford, Rumsfeld’s old ally in the House, tapped Rumsfeld as his chief of staff. Rumsfeld now began to reveal his neo-conservative instincts. A diehard enemy of détente, Rumsfeld was instrumental in dethroning Henry Kissinger in the U.S. foreign policy establishment. But the Halloween Massacre that circumscribed Kissinger’s influence also pushed Rumsfeld into the Defense Department—making him the youngest Defense Secretary in history. Rumsfeld here displayed his antipathy towards the foreign policy of accommodation and multilateralism: Killing the third round of Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (otherwise known as SALT, the talks aimed to curb the nuclear stockpiles of the United States and the former Soviet Union, producing two arms control treaties between the superpowers), showing distain towards past arms control agreements, and calling for a massive defense build-up.
After Ford failed to win re-election, Rumsfeld returned to the business world. Yet he continued to play both prominent and subtle roles on America’s political stage.
Named Middle East Special Envoy under Reagan, after the Beirut suicide bombings of 1983, Rumsfeld extended the olive branch to then Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. While in Iraq, Rumsfeld touted the profound disappointment he would feel if “a whole generation of Iraqis and Americans grew up without understanding each other.” [James Mann, The Rise of the Vulcans, pg. 124] It’s understandable if Rumsfeld didn’t catch the irony; he left the post so quickly his memory of it is no doubt hazy.
Rumsfeld, now a multimillionaire, threw himself into various anti-Clinton causes. Rumsfeld was Bob Dole’s national campaign director in 1996; bringing neo-conservative rhetoric into Dole’s campaign rhetoric with the help of Paul Wolfowitz. After the Dole loss, Rumsfeld joined the Republican congressional leadership’s Policy Advisory Board. There, working beside Condoleezza Rice, Cheney, and Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld deepened his neoconservative ideology.
In 1998 Rumsfeld headed his own congressionally authorized commission, the Rumsfeld Commission (a.k.a. the Commission on Ballistic Missile Threats to the United States). The report neither endorsed nor rejected the pursuit of missile defense; rather, it focused on the threat of rogue nations acquiring missile technology. The report focused on three worrisome states in particular: North Korea, Iraq, and Iran. Sound familiar? The “axis of evil” was a pre-packaged concept, courtesy of Rumsfeld and his allies. Also in 1998,Rumsfeld, along with other prominent neo-cons, signed a letter to Bill Clinton demanding regime change in … you guessed it … Iraq.
With George W. Bush capturing the presidency in 2000, Rumsfeld was once again a prime candidate for executive office. While originally slated for director of the Central Intelligence Agency, circumstances jettisoned him back to the Defense Department yet again. Rumsfeld, after over two decades without political office, was back.
His early tenure was no cake-walk. Under orders to modernize our military, Rumsfeld soon found the Bush administration in no mood for increased defense spending. Rumsfeld thus had only one route left: cutting programs. This position, combined with his brash manner and impatience with bureaucratic processes, quickly crippled his authority. Rumsfeld was actually expected by some to be the first cabinet official dropped by Bush.
But then came 9/11. The tragedy rejuvenated Rumsfeld’s career. This development, at first, was well-deserved. He was personally heroic on 9/11, refusing to abandon the Pentagon and rushing back in to retrieve the attack’s victims.
The invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq solidified his powerful post-9/11 standing. While failing to capture Osama Bin Laden, the American attack plan in Afghanistan (based heavily on using foreign fighters) quickly toppled the Taliban regime. But nothing propelled Rumsfeld more than his almost daily briefings during the invasion of Iraq. While at first his battle plan was criticized for insufficient troop levels, the Saddam regime’s surprisingly rapid fall and Rumsfeld’s skillful press briefings reflected the best aspects of the administration’s neo-conservatism. James Mann, author of Rise of the Vulcans, described Rumsfeld at this time as “a cabinet secretary who sometimes appeared more powerful than a president.”
Yet the confident words of Rumsfeld have been revealed as the pernicious illusions of an incompetent administration. Rumsfeld’s baffling response to reports of looting in Baghdad neatly sums up the Bush postwar strategy in Iraq: “Stuff happens!”
So while Rumsfeld delivered initial successes in Afghanistan and Iraq, he substituted speed for lasting success. Today Iraq is slipping into civil war, and Afghanistan has witnessed the reemergence of the Taliban as a potent political and military force. Such results showcase the limitations of Rumsfeld’s vision of a trim and fast military, led not by brigades but special forces units. Unfortunately this model has not created stability in either Afghanistan or Iraq. So while the Bush administration won the battle for Baghdad or Kabul, their mission to build a democratic and pro-Western Middle East has crashed and burned. All this has occurred while Rumsfeld has snagged a 35 percent increase in his budget. (That is not to say there aren’t winners in Iraq: Haliburton—Cheney’s old corporate home—has raked in over $6 billion). Such strategic short-sightedness has imperiled, not strengthened, our nation’s security.
Rumsfeld public standing mirrors that of the Bush Administration’s foreign policy approach. Rumsfeld delivered lightening-speed victories, earning the trust and appreciation of a shocked and despairing nation. But today Rumsfeld faces mounting pressure to resign, soaking up the public’s anger towards the botched policies of the Bush administration.
But don’t fret for Rumstud. He has his own, distinct healing technique: poetry.
Hart Seely documents the political lyricism of Rumsfeld. Here are some highlights:
A Confession
Once in a while,
I'm standing here, doing something.
And I think,
"What in the world am I doing here?"
It's a big surprise.
—May 16, 2001, interview with The New York Times
The Situation
Things will not be necessarily continuous.
The fact that they are something other than perfectly continuous
Ought not to be characterized as a pause.
There will be some things that people will see.
There will be some things that people won't see.
And life goes on.
—Oct. 12, 2001, Department of Defense news briefing
The Unknown
As we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don't know
We don't know.
—Feb. 12, 2002, Department of Defense news briefing
As the costs of the neo-conservative agenda, both in fatalities and finances, continue to mount, Rumsfeld’s lyrical spin has become a cruel, national joke—unfortunately, the joke is on the American people.
Illustration: August J. Pollak
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Comments
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I call on Rumsfeld to step down!
— P. Bolton - Sep 21, 04:49 PM - #So tragic, he’s funny.
— Mr. Robert Brassell, Jr., N.P. - Sep 21, 05:18 PM - #Some interesting facts. History is so helpful to understanding – too bad it’s gone out of style, isn’t it?
— karen - Sep 22, 07:42 PM - #if you have time it is rather informative short biography of Rumsfeld. Not so much for Jasmine as is for Jamie.
— marios psomas - Jan 28, 07:33 PM - #