Donald Rumsfeld

Overview

Donald Rumsfeld was the 21st United States Secretary of Defense from January 20, 2001 to November 8, 2006, under President George W. Bush" [W], and as such was a member of the 2000-2007 US Presidential Administration.

He also served in this same capacity under President Gerald Ford in 1975-77.

News

• 2006-11-11 Rumsfeld may face criminal prosecution in Germany for detainee abuses
• 2006-11-08 Rumsfeld resigns; Bush nominates Robert Gates to succeed him.
• 2006-11-03 Army Times to call for Rumsfeld's resignation
• 2006-10-02 Bob Woodward publishes State of Denial (book); an excerpt in Newsweek (with an introduction/analysis) focusses on Rumsfeld.
• 2006-09-25 Republican General: Rummy responsible for deaths, failure, Abu Ghraib, the leaning tower of Pisa... (video and transcript) "Donald Rumsfeld is not a competent wartime leader. ...his plan allowed the insurgency to take root and metastasize to where it is today." Includes long statements by "Uber-decorated" Major General John R.S. Batiste, Major General Paul D. Eaton, and USMC Colonel Thomas X. Hammes (all retired)
• 2006-09-15 Rumsfeld's Fake News Flop in Iraq: the US government has spent upwards of $50 million on pro-US/military propaganda in Iraq, violating a basic democratic principle while supposedly in the process of trying to build a democratic society. Rumsfeld's response, when asked about this, indicated that he was far more bothered by the program having been discovered than by its existence; he also lied that it had been shut down when it had not, and did not apologize for the error when it was discovered.
• 2006-09-08 Iraq post-war plan muzzled: "Months before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld forbade military strategists from developing plans for securing a post-war Iraq"
• 2006-08-30 Keith Olbermann Delivers One Hell Of a Commentary on Rumsfeld: includes video and transcript
• 2006-05-10 Ray McGovern to Rumsfeld: 'Why Did You Lie?': McGovern recounts asking Rumsfeld some key questions at a press conference and being largely evaded, but also catching Rumsfeld in clear contradictions
• 2006-04-15 New military offensive against Rumsfeld
  • reaction: David Brin (blog)
• 2006-03-09 Rumsfeld's Free Pass on Iraq
• 2003-06-12 Rumsfeld warns Belgium about war-crimes law

Reference

• Wikipedia

Historical

• Shaking Hands with Saddam Hussein: The U.S. Tilts toward Iraq, 1980-1984 includes still and video clip of Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam as illustration of the text about the US's positive relationship with Iraq in that era

Quotes

“There’s something about the body politic in the United States that they can accept the enemy killing innocent men, women and children and cutting off people’s heads, but have zero tolerance for some soldier who does something he shouldn’t do.” – Donald Rumsfeld, July, 2006 [1]

This idea, i.e. that it's somehow biased or unfair to hold our own forces accountable to any higher standards than those to which we hold the enemy, has been widely propagated in neocon circles. The obvious answer is something like "Well of course people can accept that in the enemy and not in our own troops – that's why they're the enemy! We're supposed to be the good guys! If we're no better than they are, then why does it even matter which side wins?" Claiming or implying that the US shouldn't be held to higher standards than those of our enemies is basically an immoral stance; it denies any moral grounds for doing battle other than an "Us vs. Them" mentality, and implies that we should continue to do battle even if we are not clearly in the right. (I mean, is this not blindingly obvious to anyone except a politician? Do we need a page for further discussion of this idea?)

Articles

• 2007-03-07 Journalist and Author Andrew Cockburn on Donald Rumsfeld: His Rise, Fall, and Catastrophic Legacy: interview on Democracy Now about Cockburn's book

Opinion

• 2006-04-18 from The Syndrome of "The Essential Man", blog entry by David Brin:

The man who oversaw our humiliation in not one but two catastrophic Asian land wars, who supported Saddam for decades till the maniac slipped his leash, who participated in the incredible Blunder of 1991, who later perceived Saddam bulging with hair-trigger WMDs, who suppressed military counsel about troop levels, who confidently predicted we would be greeted by the Iraqi people with "kisses and flowers," who sanctioned torture, who declared "mission accomplished" while predicting a short happy transition to peace and democracy in Iraq, who oversaw the worst decline in our state of readiness in generations and has alienated most of the Officer Corps and most of our allies... ...now appears to be claiming (without offering a scintilla of evidence) that he is such a superior manager of our nation's defense that there are no possible replacements. None at all. Not even from the pool of experienced and well-respected conservatives.

• 2006-04-16 A General Misunderstanding by Michael DeLong, a retired Marine lieutenant general: a defense of Rumsfeld