Introduction To Donald Rumsfeld

Donald Henry Rumsfeld  

Donald Henry Rumsfeld (born July 9, 1932) is currently serving as the 21st United States Secretary of Defense, since January 20, 2001, under President George W. Bush. He is the oldest person to have held that position, and was also the youngest when he served as the 13th Secretary of Defense from 1975 to 1977 under President Gerald Ford. Rumsfeld also served four terms in the United States House of Representatives, and as U.S. ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) (1973-1974).

He served in the U.S. Navy from 1954 to 1957 as an aviator and flight instructor. In 1957, he transferred to the Ready Reserve and continued his Naval service in flying and administrative assignments as a drilling reservist until 1975. He transferred to the Standby Reserve when he became Secretary of Defense in 1975 and to the Retired Reserve with the rank of Navy Captain in 1989.

He has also served as an official in numerous federal commissions and councils.

Rumsfeld married the former Joyce Pierson in 1954. They have three children and six grandchildren.


Early life

Background

He was born in Evanston, Illinois to George Donald Rumsfeld and Jeannette Huster, of German descent (his grandfather was originally from Weyhe near Bremen in Northern Germany).

Education

Donald Rumsfeld graduated from New Trier High School and attended Princeton University on academic and NROTC scholarships (BA, 1954) where he was an accomplished amateur wrestler. While at Princeton, he was roommates with Frank Carlucci. In 1957, after a stint in the Navy, he attended and subsequently dropped out of Georgetown University Law Center (1957).


Military Service

Rumsfeld served in the United States Navy from 1954 - 1957 as a Naval aviator and flight instructor. In 1957, he transferred to the Ready Reserve and continued his Naval service in flying and administrative assignments as a drilling reservist until 1975. He transferred to the Standby Reserve when he became Secretary of Defense in 1975 and to the Retired Reserve with the rank of Navy Captain in 1989.


Early Political Career

In 1957, during the Eisenhower Administration, he served as Administrative Assistant to a Congressman from Ohio. After a stint with investment banking firm A. G. Becker from 1960 to 1962, he was elected to the United States House of Representatives from Illinois in 1962, at the age of 30, and was re-elected in 1964, 1966, and 1968. Rumsfeld is an Eagle Scout and recipient of the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award from the Boy Scouts of America.

Career

Nixon Administration

Rumsfeld resigned from Congress in 1969 during his fourth term to serve in the Nixon Administration as Director of the United States Office of Economic Opportunity, Assistant to the President, and a member of the President's Cabinet (1969-1970); Counselor to the President, Director of the Economic Stabilization Program; and member of the President's Cabinet (1971-1972).

In 1973, he left Washington, DC, to serve as U.S. ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in Brussels, Belgium (1973-1974).

Ford Administration

Secretary Rumsfeld laughing at the Cabinet table with President Gerald Ford in 1975.In August 1974, he was called back to Washington, DC, to serve in the Ford Administration successively as Chairman of the transition to the Presidency of Gerald R. Ford (1974); White House Chief of Staff and member of the President's Cabinet (1974-1975); and the 13th U.S. Secretary of Defense (1975-1977). During this period he oversaw the transition to an all volunteer military and was instrumental in increasing the power of the military within the administration and at the expense of the CIA and Henry Kissinger. This was accomplished by promulgating the view that the Soviet Union was increasing defense spending and pursuing secret weapons programs, and that the proper response was a re-escalation of the arms race. Some say that this view was in direct contrast to CIA and generally accepted reports on the declining state of the Soviet economy, and the earlier success of Richard Nixon in establishing Detente (referring to a thawing of the Cold War) with the Soviet Union.

As part of the Ford administration, Rumsfeld helped formulate the White House response to the death of CIA scientist Frank Olson.

In 1976, a military recruit in New Jersey died and 500 others were infected with a flu that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention diagnosed as "swine flu". A memo from the Health, Education and Welfare secretary to the head of the Office of Management and Budget noted that "the projections are that this virus will kill one million Americans in 1976." At Rumsfeld's urging, the Ford administration quickly produced and distributed large number of doses of the vaccine. However, some batches were contaminated and 52 people died while 600 fell ill. The program was stopped and no one outside of the original outbreak contracted swine flu.

In 1977, Rumsfeld was awarded the nation's highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Private career

From 1977 to 1985 Rumsfeld served as Chief Executive Officer, President, and then Chairman of G.D. Searle & Company, a worldwide pharmaceutical company whose products included, among others, the oral contraceptive pill Enovid. It was under Rumsfeld that Searle got FDA approval for the controversial artificial sweetener, aspartame, which it marketed as NutraSweet. Some believe that the approval of aspartame was influenced by conflict of interest and that persons involved in the aspartame approval process were rewarded with high paying jobs or consulting positions. During his tenure at Searle, Rumsfeld led a financial turnaround of the company that earned him awards as the Outstanding Chief Executive Officer in the Pharmaceutical Industry from the Wall Street Transcript (1980) and Financial World (1981). Rumsfeld is believed to have earned around US$12 million from the sale of Searle to Monsanto.

From 1985 to 1990 he was in private business. During his business career, Rumsfeld continued public service in a variety of posts, including:


Member of the President's General Advisory Committee on Arms Control - Reagan Administration (1982 - 1986);
President Reagan's Special Envoy on the Law of the Sea Treaty (1982 - 1983);
Senior Advisor to President Reagan's Panel on Strategic Systems (1983 - 1984);
Member of the U.S. Joint Advisory Commission on U.S./Japan Relations - Reagan Administration (1983 - 1984);
President Reagan's Special Envoy to the Middle East (1983 - 1984);
Member of the National Commission on the Public Service (1987 - 1990);
Member of the National Economic Commission (1988 - 1989);
Member of the Board of Visitors of the National Defense University (1988 - 1992);
Member of the Commission on U.S./Japan Relations (1989 - 1991);
Member of the Board of Directors for ABB Ltd (1990 - 2001);
FCC's High Definition Television Advisory Committee (1992 - 1993);
Chairman, Commission on the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States (1998 - 1999);
Member of the U.S. Trade Deficit Review Commission (1999 - 2000);
Member of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and
Chairman of the U.S. Commission to Assess National Security Space Management and Organization (2000).
Honorary Vice-Chancellor of Yale University in 2001, in honor of Mr. Rumsfeld's work in U.S. Foreign Policy.

Rumsfeld served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of General Instrument Corporation from 1990 to 1993. A leader in broadband transmission, distribution, and access control technologies for cable, satellite and terrestrial broadcasting applications, the company pioneered the development of the first all-digital high definition television (HDTV) technology. After taking the company public and returning it to profitability, Rumsfeld returned to private business in late 1993. From January 1997 until being sworn in as the 21st Secretary of Defense in January 2001, Rumsfeld served as Chairman of Gilead Sciences, Inc. He was also chair of the RAND Corporation.



Rumsfeld, at the time Ronald Reagan 's special envoy to the Middle East , meeting with Saddam Hussein during a visit to Baghdad , Iraq in 1983 . Video frame capture, see the complete video here  

Rumsfeld sat on the board of ABB, a European engineering giant based in Zurich from 1990 to 2001, earning $190,000 a year. In 2000 this company sold two light water nuclear reactors to North Korea, a country he now regards as part of the "axis of evil" and which has been targeted for regime change by Washington because of its efforts to build nuclear weapons. The reactor deal was part of President Bill Clinton's policy of persuading the North Korean regime to positively engage with the west.

The sale of the nuclear technology was a high-profile contract. ABB's then chief executive, Goran Lindahl, visited North Korea in November 1999 to announce ABB's "wide-ranging, long-term cooperation agreement" with the communist government. Mr Rumsfeld's office said that the Secretary of Defense did not "recall it being brought before the board at any time". A spokesman for ABB told the Guardian that "board members were informed about the project which would deliver systems and equipment for light water reactors".

Rumsfeld has also served in executive responsibilities of various local charities across the United States. From 1986 to 1989 he was appointed to serve as United Way Inter-governmental Director in Washington D.C.

As a result of his foreign policy achievements as Inter-governmental affairs director, from 1990 to 1993, he was hired as foreign policy consultant for the States Department.

Rumsfeld's foreign and defence policy insights in the U.S. President George W. Bush administration, was largely influenced by the experience he obtained as a foreign policy consultant.

Reagan Administration

During his period as Reagan's Special Envoy to the Middle East (11/83-5/84), Rumsfeld was the main conduit for crucial American military intelligence, hardware and strategic advice to Saddam Hussein, then fighting Iran in the Iran-Iraq war. During this period, US policy supported Iraq, believing it to be a useful buffer against Iran's new religious government, although the United States had originally been hesitant to work with a Soviet client state. When he visited on December 19-20, 1983, he and Saddam Hussein had a 90 minute discussion which covered Syria's occupation of Lebanon, preventing Syrian and Iranian expansion, preventing arms sales to Iran by foreign countries, increasing Iraqi oil production via a possible new oil pipeline across Jordan. Not mentioned was Iraqi production and use of chemical weapons. The Iranian government had cited several Iraqi air and ground chemical weapons attacks in the preceding two months, and the Iranian news agency had reported the use of chemical weapons as early as 1981. The US State Department first condemned the use of chemical weapons in the war on March 5, 1984, two days before the ICRC confirmed Iranian allegations.

During his bid for the Republican nomination in 1988, Rumsfeld stated that restoring full relations to Iraq was one of his best achievements.

Rumsfeld's civic activities included service as a member of the National Academy of Public Administration and a member of the boards of trustees of the Gerald R. Ford Foundation, the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowships, the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and the National Park Foundation. He was also a member of the U.S./Russia Business Forum and Chairman of the Congressional Leadership's National Security Advisory Group.

Rumsfeld was a founder and active member of the Project for the New American Century, whose goal is to "promote American global leadership" and which in September 2000 proposed to invade Iraq. He signed the 1998 PNAC Letter sent to President Bill Clinton advocating the use of force in Iraq to "protect our vital interests in the gulf".

George W. Bush Administration

Appointed defense secretary soon after President George W. Bush took office in 2001, Rumsfeld immediately announced a series of sweeping reviews intended to plot the transformation of the U.S. military into a lighter, more nimble force. These studies, led by Pentagon analyst Andrew Marshall, drew widespread resistance from the military services and members of Congress, who worried that Rumsfeld would cancel pet projects. (Eventually, he succeeded in killing the Army's Crusader howitzer and its Comanche armed scout helicopter.) Media reports in the summer of 2001 ran under headlines like "Will Rumsfeld Be The First Of Bush's Cabinet To Go?"

Following the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, Rumsfeld led the military planning and execution of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Rumsfeld pushed hard to send as small a force as possible to both conflicts, a concept codified as the Rumsfeld doctrine.

Rumsfeld's plan resulted in a lightning invasion that took Baghdad in well under a month with very few American casualties. There were almost no preparations for the occupation of Iraq that followed. Many government buildings, plus major museums, electrical generation infrastructure, and even oil equipment were looted and vandalized during the transition from the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime to the establishment of the Coalition Provisional Authority. Critics further complained that there was no plan to deal with the existing Iraqi armed forces. They were disbanded, leaving hundreds of thousands of armed and unemployed men in the country. A violent insurrection began shortly after the occupation started.

After the German and French governments voiced opposition to invading Iraq, Rumsfeld labeled these countries as part of "Old Europe", implying that countries which supported the war were part of a newer, modern Europe.

He gives more press conferences than his predecessors. The BBC Radio 4 current affairs program Broadcasting House had been so taken by Rumsfeld's various remarks that it once held a regular slot called "The Donald Rumsfeld Soundbite of the Week" in which they played his most amusing comment from that week. Rumsfeld himself is said to have found the slot "hilarious." Rumsfeld's penchant for talking with his hands also made him the butt of jokes, including a series portraying him as a martial arts master.

Bush retained Rumsfeld after his re-election, which raised eyebrows among Democrats and some Republicans. In December of that year, Rumsfeld came under fire after a town-hall meeting with U.S. troops where he responded to a soldier's comments about inferior military equipment by saying "you go to war with the Army you have, not the Army you want." The question was later discovered to be planted by Lee Pitts, a military reporter from the Chattanooga Times Free Press. That same month there was also criticism about his use of an Autopen signature machine to sign the condolence letters to the families of the soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan (rather than signing the letters personally, as President Bush purportedly does).

Controversies

Rumsfeld's activities on September 11, 2001 were outlined in a Pentagon press briefing on September 15, 2001. Some critics feel that his actions were ill-advised or incompetent, and that his alleged slowness in reaction was unacceptable in response to what some have called the "Pearl Harbor of the 21st century". Specific actions which have been criticized include his remaining in his office when the crisis management process was ramping up, his resolve in keeping his morning schedule which included a breakfast with then US Representative Chris Cox, and his failure to oversee the launching of interceptor jets from Andrews Air Force base, which some believe may have changed the day's outcome.

One of the most recent controversies involves Rumsfeld's role in the preemptive action of invading Iraq. A Freedom of Information Act release revealed that on September 11, 2001, Rumsfeld instructed the military to, in the notes of one of Rumsfeld's aides, "Judge whether good enough hit S.H. (Saddam Hussein) @ same time — not only UBL (Osama bin Laden) … Hard to get a good case …. Sweep it all up. Things related and not."

Rumsfeld is a also co-founder of Project for the New American Century, which some believe had developed plans for attacking Iraq prior to the September 11, 2001 attacks.

After the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in April 2003, Rumsfeld attempted to explain the looting that followed as an exercise of freedom: "It's untidy. Freedom’s untidy and free people are free to commit crimes and make mistakes and do bad things." This explanation drew many criticisms.

As Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld has come under fire from critics who argue that his decision to detain alleged-enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay is a violation of the Geneva Convention and runs counter to American legal traditions.

Some critics have also argued that Rumsfeld should be held responsible for alleged war crimes committed by the U.S. military in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Several publications, including The Economist called for his resignation following the Abu Ghraib scandal. Rumsfeld claims to have offered his resignation to the president twice during the scandal.

Some Republicans have called for Rumsfeld's replacement after Bush's re-election due to what many perceive as inadequate troop strength (Rumsfeld doctrine) used during the invasion of Iraq.

Rumsfeld stirred controversy by quarreling for months with the CIA over who had the authority to fire Hellfire missiles from Predator drones. According to the 9/11 Commission Report, the argument delayed the program for months (pp. 189-90, 211-214). Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon note:

These quarrels kept the Predator from being used against al Qaeda.... The delay infuriated the terrorist hunters at the CIA. One individual who was at the center of the action called this episode "typical" and complained that "Rumsfeld never missed an opportunity to fail to cooperate. The fact is, the Secretary of Defense is an obstacle. He has helped the terrorists. Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Next Attack (New York: Times Books, 2005) ISBN 0805079416 p. 161.
In December of 2004, Rumsfeld was heavily criticized for using a signing machine instead of personally signing over 1000 letters of condolence to the families of soldiers killed in action in Iraq and Afghanistan. He promised to personally sign all letters in future.

Donald Rumsfeld was Chairman of the Board of Gilead Sciences who is the developer of Tamiflu which is used in the treatment of bird flu. Several news sources including USA Today, and CNN have published stories implying that Donald Rumsfeld profits from sales of Tamiflu to the US government while he is in office.

As of April of 2006, six of the estimated 3,100 to 6,300 retired military generals have said they believe Rumsfeld should resign. They include Anthony Zinni (4-star, Commander, Central Command until 2000), Greg Newbold (3-star, J-3 Operations, the Joint Staff until 2002), John Batiste (2-star, Commanding General, 1st Infantry Division deployment to Iraq in 2004), Paul D. Eaton (2-star, Training of Iraqi forces in 2003-2004), Charles Swannack (2-star, Commanding General, 82nd Airborne Division deployment to Iraq in 2003), and John Riggs (3-star demoted to 2-star grade, Army transformation officer).

Conservative commentator Patrick J. Buchanan reports that: "Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, who travels often to Iraq and supports the war, says that the generals mirror the views of 75 percent of the officers in the field, and probably more. "

Rumsfeld's rebuffed these criticisms, stating that "out of thousands and thousands of admirals and generals, if every time two or three people disagreed we changed the secretary of defense of the United States, it would be like a merry-go-round." President Bush responded to the criticism by stating that Rumsfeld is "exactly what is needed".