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Posted By Thomas E. Ricks
Wednesday, February 23, 2011 - 11:05 AM
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So in my research on the Vietnam War I was paging through H.R. Haldeman's diaries to see what he says about General Creighton Abrams and was surprised to come across his comment about a former defense secretary we all know: "typical Rumsfeld, rather slimy maneuver." (657)
Pot calling the kettle, I know. It did make me ponder, for a moment, why it was that Rumsfeld was the senior member of the Nixon administration to enjoy the longest public career.
Meanwhile, I see where Mr. Rumsfeld just told an interviewer that he never read the books by Bob Woodward or me about the Iraq war. "Neither one of them were involved at all," Rumsfeld said. "They were all on the outside listening to people two or three levels down. No, I've not read their books."
Rumsfeld is indeed correct about whom I was listening to -- and I am glad I was. In retrospect, I have come to see my book Fiasco as reflective of the views of many brigade and battalion commanders, and a couple of thoughtful division commanders, who indeed were several echelons below Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. I think they also had a much better understanding of what was going on in Iraq than he did, and they were angry and frustrated, which is why Fiasco amounted to an indictment of the top generals and the civilian overseers of the military in the Pentagon, the White House, and the Congress. How often did Rumsfeld's undersecretary for policy, Douglas Feith, go to Iraq? Anyone know? I can't remember him going more than once or twice.
Apparently Rumsfeld forgot the time he sat down with Woodward for "State of Denial."
Intel Geek, he didn't say he wasn't interviewed for the Woodward books, just that he never read them.
Rummy likes it top down, not bottom-up
Rumsfeld learn his lesson about straying too far away from his pay grade in 2004, when some Soldiers he was addressing surprised him, catching him flat-footed, when they quizzed him about their lack of adequate armor and equipment, to which he finally had to reply, "Now, settle down, settle down. "Hell, I'm an old man, it's early in the morning, and I'm gathering my thoughts here."
Of course that was after he gave his famous, you go to war with the army you have, etc. speech.
Rummy likes it top down, not bottom-up - perhaps the next network interview should ambush him with a young OIF veteran to conduct the interview? You up for the job? : )
Right:
Tom wasn't even in the folks authorized to report to Rumsfeld. How could he possible know, or learn, anything worthwhile.
I remember the first time, in early 2008, that I was asked about sending some generators to a village. My question: How many were sent in prior years? What happened to those?
Nobody knew or could know because each rotation of troops took all their info with them.
Short of books like Fiasco, there were really know sources for what happened the year before, let alone five years before.
Did anyone in mid or upper levels of responsibility in Iraq in 2007/2008 not read Fiasco? It was a basic text to explain what had actually happened.
So now Rummy says he was an insider?
After the decision to disband the Iraqi military became widely second-guessed, Rummy said that he was not involved.
Rumsfeld was the senior member of the Nixon Administration to enjoy the longest public career because he was a master bureaucrat, although he was probably exceeded in the category of Byzantine maneuvering by Cheney, who appears to have the combined skills of LBJ and J. Edgar Hoover.
I believe "Dr. D" credited his longevity to not accpeting the chair of the Committee to Re- elect the President as well as being out of the country at Nato during the Watergate mess.
When Gerald Ford ascended to the Presidency, he was called back. He had been a member of Congress and was involved twice when Republican insurgents took on the entrenched leadership by backing Ford over the leadership's guy for policy committee and then in the defat of Huse minority leader Charles Halleck.
Timing is everything and who you know didn't hurt either.
I believe "Dr. D" credited his longevity to not accpeting the chair of the Committee to Re- elect the President as well as being out of the country at Nato during the Watergate mess.
When Gerald Ford ascended to the Presidency, he was called back. He had been a member of Congress and was involved twice when Republican insurgents took on the entrenched leadership by backing Ford over the leadership's guy for policy committee and then in the defat of Huse minority leader Charles Halleck.
Timing is everything and who you know didn't hurt either.
In the Nixon administration, only the people at the very top of the organization knew what policy was supposed to be. In the Bush administration, even the people at the very top of the organization didn't know what policy was supposed to be.
"Neither one of them were involved at all," Rumsfeld said. "They were all on the outside listening to people two or three levels down. No, I've not read their books."
unreal...Rumsfeld is a complete unapologetic, ego-maniacal moron. Ahem, sir, maybe you should have been listening to those people "two and three levels down". Absolutely unreal that men like this find positions of importance in the American government.
For those who have strong constitutions, watch the fragment below:
http://fora.tv/2011/02/09/Donald_Rumsfeld_Known_and_Unknown#Donald_Rumsfeld_Reflects_on_Iraq_War_Casualties
Michael Beschloss Toadied This
I've developed (I like to think) a rather strong retraint. Most of me wants to "go after" the Architects. When I feel really bad--thankfully less and less as time goes on--I can snap myself out of deep funk by imagining (the screen in my mind) the previous VP and/or SecDef in a room with me, small room, just me and the SOB and a length of 2x4.... Its my own personal therapy. Its brings me back. Stops the hyperventilation. It prevents self medication too early in the day.
Its this sort of absolute delusion (RAYFIN3's link) coming from those that occupied the highest offices in the land in the last decade that portrays the absolute waste clean-up that we face today. Yes, I can find fault in Obama's actions to clear the mess (too slow in stopping fruitless face-saving in the Sandboxes), but I can not, not ever, forgive or forget what the GWB cabal brought upon the nation.
Why anyone gives Donald Rumsfeld a forum to spout his spin-BS is beyond me. What he says is not history; it is merely revisionist bunk, self grandisment,; an attempt to secure himself favorably in history when he knows the truth prevails. It is incredible too that all these Dubbya Administration people lower themselves to--"I met with the families and they are just proud of what we are doing". Yes, many gold star families did support the past administration and they were hand-picked and paraded for political purposes. But, there are many who use my 2x4 mental therapy method to avoid unwanted Secret Service conversations.
Damn them; damn them all for their abuse of good people and a good country.
Only my desire to avoid those same sort of unwanted conversations prevents me from adding what I'd like to do to that lot. And my stakes/losses don't approach yours.
Rummy was one of the youngest people in the Nixon administration. Thus his longevity,
Plus the fact that he was never indicted as a large percentage of the White House staff was.
None of which makes him anything other than what he is - a wanker supreme.
Strategic objective: "Attack, attack, attack!!!"
Haldeman calls him 'slimy', Nixon said 'ruthless'. But the more damning epithet is that he was, or claims as his defense, to be 'clueless'.
He himself never should have risen above 'three levels down', on the strengths identified by Nixon and Haldeman. And his other brother Darryl too.
http://nsarchive.wordpress.com/2011/02/08/rumsfeld-confirms-archive-analysis/
[The Bush administration made no considered decision for war and no effort to evaluate the costs and benefits of the invasion of Iraq which it carried out. Rumsfeld writes in his memoir, “while the president and I had many discussions about the war preparations, I do not recall his ever asking me if I thought going to war with Iraq was the right decision.” ]
Had Rumsfeld replied otherwise..
....would you have been surprised? All beyond that which contributes to his personal annuity of power or praise or most importantly access to school of fish in which Rummy swims is not worth his time. It is not much different than Stalin's response to the importance of the Pope by asking how many division he commanded. There is not much internally that supports him. He must be carried by other selected forces.
Haldeman re Rummy '71, on (suppressing) the Pentagon Papers
''Rumsfeld was making this point this morning,'' Haldeman says. ''To the ordinary guy, all this is a bunch of gobbledygook. But out of the gobbledygook comes a very clear thing: you can't trust the government; you can't believe what they say, and you can't rely on their judgment. And the implicit infallibility of presidents, which has been an accepted thing in America, is badly hurt by this, because it shows that people do things the president wants to do even though it's wrong, and the president can be wrong.''
---
Rummy's pattern is to ally himself with people of greater power and less cunning, so that he can play the conflict and imbalance. The irony is that in their mistrust of Rumsfeld, sending him overseas to NATO, Nixon's men saved his ass and gave him diplo-defense creds.
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