AND HOW MUCH MORE WOULD HAVE BEEN ACHIEVED BUT FOR 9-11...:

Rumsfeld’s Rebuttal: The demonized defense secretary answers his critics in his new memoir.: a review of Known and Unknown: A Memoir, by Donald Rumsfeld (Victor Davis Hanson, 27 February 2011, City Journal)

As both a former CEO who had turned around the pharmaceutical giant G. D. Searle and a veteran government infighter, Rumsfeld wanted to reinvent the Pentagon to run more like a cost-efficient enterprise whose capabilities matched its obligations. He was dubious about the status-quo military commitments of the United States but willing to use overwhelming force if need be—but only in areas of vital interest. Without careful deference, then, Rumsfeld’s tight-fisted cost-cutting and questioning of American defense obligations was bound to alienate entrenched interests at both the Pentagon and the State Department. He quickly alienated both, often finding himself at odds with senior generals and admirals, Powell, and Rice. CEOs, after all, make and execute policy in ways that single cabinet officers usually do not.

Several themes are interwoven throughout this massive, exhaustively documented memoir: Rumsfeld’s devout loyalty to and admiration for George W. Bush, unchanged to this day; his four-decade-long friendship and alliance with Dick Cheney; the way the attacks of September 11 radically and unexpectedly altered Rumsfeld’s second Pentagon tenure; his bewilderment over the media’s tarnishing of a sterling, nearly half-century-long record of public service over the Iraq War; and his intimacy with most of the leading American politicians and statesmen—and national crises—of our era.

Why did Rumsfeld so admire the younger Bush, given the family tensions and Rumsfeld’s far more substantial political and executive experience? Bush, Rumsfeld felt, was plain-speaking, decisive, often humble to the point of self-caricature, and unambiguous about the need to further American interests. He was “decidedly down-to-earth, with no inclination to formality; his demeanor was different from his father’s somewhat patrician manner.” Rumsfeld’s Bush appears in part a throwback to a decent Jerry Ford, in part an upbeat Ronald Reagan devoted to American exceptionalism. His chief fault, in Rumsfeld’s view, was perhaps not responding to an unprecedented level of vitriol in his second term, which would eventually overwhelm his cabinet.

W's cabinet was the most qualified ever, but particularly shines by comparison to the UR's.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 28, 2011 6:15 AM