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Influential but controversial Bush defence secretary during Iraq war
Donald H. Rumsfeld, whose roles overseeing the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and efforts to transform the US military made him one of history’s most consequential as well as controversial Pentagon leaders, died on June 29 at his home in Taos, New Mexico. He was 88. The cause was multiple myeloma.
Rumsfeld’s political prominence stretched back to the 1960s and included stints as a rebellious young Republican congressman, favoured counsellor to President Richard Nixon, right-hand man to President Gerald Ford and Middle East envoy for President Ronald Reagan. He also scored big in business, helping to pioneer such products as NutraSweet and high-definition television, and earning millions of dollars salvaging large troubled firms.
Donald Rumsfeld, the controversial face of US war policy at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, 2002.Credit: Bloomberg
His greatest influence and notoriety came during a six-year reign as defence secretary under President George W. Bush. Rumsfeld was initially hailed for leading the US military to war in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, but his handling of the Iraq War eventually led to his downfall.
Dogged for months by mounting calls for Rumsfeld’s removal, Bush finally let him go in late 2006 – 3 1/2 years into the Iraq War and just after an election in which the Republicans lost control of both chambers of Congress. Rumsfeld’s forced exit under clouds of blame and disapproval cast a shadow over his previously illustrious career.
Nevertheless, in a statement on Wednesday, Bush praised Rumsfeld as “a man of intelligence, integrity, and almost inexhaustible energy” who “never paled before tough decisions, and never flinched from responsibility”.
None of Rumsfeld’s predecessors had come into the Pentagon’s top job with as much relevant experience. Having served as defence secretary once before, under Ford, Rumsfeld was the only person ever to get a second shot at the position.
Donald Rumsfeld, left, shakes hands with President George W. Bush during a 2006 ceremony at the Pentagon honouring Rumsfeld on his final day as defence secretary. Credit: Bloomberg
At the Pentagon, he ruled with a strong hand, persistently challenging subordinates, poring over details of troop deployments and insisting on a greater role in the selection of top officers than his predecessors had exercised.
When Rumsfeld took over at the Pentagon in 2001, Bush charged him with reforming the military bureaucracy to create more agile, adaptable armed forces.
At first, the invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, with its heavy reliance on airpower combined with limited numbers of US Army Special Forces, appeared to validate Rumsfeld’s vision. The invasion also transformed Rumsfeld into a popular national figure.
His wit, directness and folksy language were put on display as the Bush administration’s most spirited spokesman. Capable of being antagonistic and humorous at once, he could speak of killing the enemy on the battlefield, then muse about “known knowns” and “known unknowns” in gathering intelligence.
In the wake of the Afghan invasion, Rumsfeld hoped to devise a similarly innovative war plan for toppling Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq. He expected US troops to stay in Iraq for only a short time, expecting to hand over responsibility for governing the country to an interim Iraqi authority.
Former US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld speaks to sailors on the deck of the USS McCampbell in 2006. Credit: Bloomberg
He played down the scale and significance of widespread looting that immediately followed the invasion. And he went along with a rushed move to disband the Iraqi military and build a new set of Iraqi security forces from scratch.
Rumsfeld’s toughness won him respect among a number of senior field officers. But all too often, he came across as insensitive to strains on the military.
During his tenure, the army restructured itself into more flexible, more easily deployable units. War plans were rewritten to emphasise speed, to require fewer troops and to reposition US forces around the world.
But Rumsfeld never achieved many of the far-reaching reforms called for by his transformational rhetoric. Only two major weapons systems were cancelled on his watch: the army’s Crusader artillery system and the RAH-66 Comanche armed reconnaissance helicopter.
Donald Henry Rumsfeld was born July 9, 1932, in Chicago. His father was a real estate agent, his mother a part-time schoolteacher. He was an Eagle Scout and excelled at wrestling in high school. Known as “Rummy”, he was a popular student but classmates also considered him intense and inwardly driven.
Entering Princeton on a scholarship, Rumsfeld studied politics. He was wrestling team captain and a member of Cap and Gown, one of the university’s top-tier eating clubs.
Iraqi President Saddam Hussein greets Donald Rumsfeld, then special envoy of US President Ronald Reagan, in Baghdad in 1983. Credit: Fairfax
Around the time of his graduation in 1954, Rumsfeld was engaged to Joyce Pierson. The two had dated in high school, then gone separate ways, with Joyce attending college in Colorado. But they had maintained an on-again, off-again relationship.
They were married in December 1954, and Joyce remained her husband’s closest confidante. In addition to his wife, survivors include three children, Valerie Richards, Marcy Rumsfeld and Nick Rumsfeld; seven grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.
After leaving Princeton, Rumsfeld served as a US Navy pilot before landing jobs in Washington assisting two Republican lawmakers. When a chance to run for his own seat opened up on Chicago’s North Shore, Rumsfeld leapt at it. Drawing on a network of schoolmates in the area, he scored an upset win in the 1962 primary and entered the House of Representatives in 1963 as the youngest Republican member.
In time, Rumsfeld emerged as a strong supporter of civil rights, a proponent of greater openness in government and a critic of the Vietnam War. He was among the first in Congress to oppose the military draft, arguing for the establishment of an all-volunteer force.
Australia’s then-defence minister Brendan Nelson with US counterpart Donald Rumsfeld during a joint news conference at the Pentagon in 2006.Credit: AP
Despite his prominence in the House, Rumsfeld was unable to obtain the more senior committee assignments he sought. In 1969, he jumped to the executive branch, accepting an offer from the newly elected Nixon to head the troubled Office of Economic Opportunity, a freewheeling collection of anti-poverty programs.
While at OEO, Rumsfeld hired a young Capitol Hill staff aide named Richard B. Cheney to be his top assistant. The move began a storied relationship that spanned the Nixon and Ford administrations and had major consequences for George W. Bush’s presidency, where Cheney, as vice-president, became Rumsfeld’s most powerful ally and staunchest defender.
Nixon was impressed with Rumsfeld’s toughness and drive, once describing him, admiringly, as a “ruthless little bastard”. He brought Rumsfeld into the White House as a presidential counsellor, considered him for various cabinet positions, then made him head of the Cost of Living Council for a year before sending him abroad as ambassador to NATO.
Following Ford’s ascension to the presidency in 1974, Mr. Rumsfeld returned to Washington as White House chief of staff. Rumsfeld was identified in news media reports then as an up-and-comer. New York Times columnist James Reston advised readers “to keep your eye on ‘Rummy’.”
In late 1975, Ford named Rumsfeld defence secretary, giving him the kind of senior cabinet post he had long coveted. He used his new authority to play up a mounting Soviet threat and press for a surge in US defence spending. He also squared off against Henry Kissinger, opposing the secretary of state’s quest for a new US-Soviet agreement limiting strategic weapons.
After Ford’s presidency, Rumsfeld accepted a distress call from the Searle family of Chicago to take charge of their giant pharmaceutical firm, G.D. Searle & Co, which had grown overly diverse and increasingly less profitable.
Rumsfeld took an axe to the company, selling off at least 20 subsidiaries, dismissing hundreds of employees and refocusing the remaining elements on several core operations. In 1980, Fortune magazine included Rumsfeld in a line-up of the nation’s “ten toughest bosses.”
Even while in business, Rumsfeld maintained his interest in politics and government, campaigning for Republican candidates and, in late 1983, accepting a six-month post as Reagan’s envoy to the Middle East. That job brought him face to face with Saddam Hussein as part of a US effort to reconcile with the Iraqi leader. The cordial encounter, captured in a photo showing the two men shaking hands, became a source of some awkwardness for Rumsfeld 20 years later when, as defence secretary, he helped make the case for invading Iraq.
On several shortlists over the years as a possible vice president, Rumsfeld made his own bid for the presidency after the sale of Searle, hoping to succeed Reagan. His campaign generated little financial support and he withdrew from the race in April 1987.
After leaving government service for the last time in 2006, Rumsfeld established a charitable foundation that focused on supporting military families.
In 2016, he helped develop a digital app, based on a complicated form of solitaire played by former British leader Winston Churchill.
“On the one hand it’s dangerous to do something: it’s risky, it’s not certain, as Churchill pointed out,” Rumsfeld said at the time. “But on the other hand, not doing something is equally dangerous.”
The Washington Post