Goodbye, Rummy
by Charley Reese
A glance at Donald Rumsfeld’s biography will tell you that he is: (1) ambitious; (2) bright; (3) competent; and (4) incredibly experienced in both the private sector and the public sector.
So how did the 74-year-old secretary of defense become the bad guy of the Bush administration? The answer is probably that by his 70s, his ambition and drive had degenerated into stubbornness and arrogance. Richard Nixon described him as a “ruthless little bastard” when he served that administration. Some military people have said meetings with him were pointless, because he had already decided everything before he got there. And his mouth got him into a lot of trouble.
He was, according to some military people, obsessed with the idea of transforming the defense forces into a lighter, more mobile outfit. He forced this on the Iraqi war planners, and what happened proved what his critics had been saying all along. The lighter, mobile force, carefully coordinated with air power, could whip the conventional army, especially one as broken-down and demoralized as Saddam Hussein’s forces, but then it had no staying power. (more…)