Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld decides to take charge of the Indian Army.
Donald Rumsfeld was the Secretary of Defense when I served in the Navy during the late 1970s. I can’t remember much of anything about him. Neither can I remember the older, “lifers,” as we called those career military people, cussing or discussing Rumsfeld. All I knew was he was somewhere up there in our chain of command.
That is not to say Rumsfeld didn’t do anything as Defense secretary back then. I just don’t have any Rumsfeld-specific memories. This is mainly because I was 21 years old or so during his tenure and I was more interested in having a good time than I was in national defense policy.
It is too bad Rummy didn’t quit while he was ahead because he has turned the U.S. military into a “clusterf**k,” to quote Gunny Sgt. Highway, the Clint Eastwood character in the 1986 film “Heartbreak Ridge.”
We will never know what Rumsfeld would or would not have done to the armed forces had not the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks taken place. Perhaps a reason would have been found anyway to invade Iraq. But Rumsfeld playing general in the so-called “War on Terror” has been about as disastrous as his trying to turn the military into a robotic, privatized force.
The military is at a breaking point. Yet Prez Gee Dubya, Rummy and pals remain in a “State of Denial,” a fact that we really don’t have to read the new Bob Woodward book of the same title to know.
Donald Rumsfeld needs to go. He’s should have never come back for a second tour of duty as Defense secretary. Bush probably won’t tell him to go, so Rumsfeld should do it on his own. Pack up. Leave the Pentagon. Go fishing. And stay the hell away from our military.