Ex-Secretary
of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Ex-Secretary
of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
THESE POSTS ARE FROM LATEST TO EARLIEST
All rummyquotes unless otherwise stated are taken from transcripts at the Department of Defense website http://www.defenselink.mil/
WARNING: TRUTH IS THE FIRST CASUALTY OF WAR
********************************************************Former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld cannot be tried on allegations of torture in overseas military prisons, a federal judge said Tuesday in a case he described as "lamentable."
U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan threw out a lawsuit brought on behalf of nine former prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan. He said Rumsfeld cannot be held personally responsible for actions taken in connection with his government job.
The lawsuit contends the prisoners were beaten, suspended upside down from the ceiling by chains, urinated on, shocked, sexually humiliated, burned, locked inside boxes and subjected to mock executions.
"Despite the horrifying torture allegations," Hogan said, he could find no case law supporting the lawsuit, which he previously had described as unprecedented.
Allowing the case to go forward, Hogan said in December, might subject government officials to all sorts of political lawsuits. Even Osama bin Laden could sue, Hogan said, claiming two American presidents threatened to have him murdered.
"There is no getting around the fact that authorizing monetary damages remedies against military officials engaged in an active war would invite enemies to use our own federal courts to obstruct the Armed Forces' ability to act decisively and without hesitation," Hogan wrote Tuesday, March 27, 2007.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/03/27/national/w130408D08.DTL&type=politics
**********************************************************The Undertaker's Tally--Part 1 and Part 2.
*****************************************************December 18, 2006: Robert Gates was sworn in as the Secretary of Defense this morning.
***************************************************Farewell Parade--As Delivered by Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, The Pentagon, Washington, DC, Friday, December 15, 2006
RUMMY SAYS THAT WE WERE PROVOKED BY A WEAK IRAQ
"When I last departed this post in 1977, I left cautioning that 'weakness is provocative.' That weakness inevitably entices aggressors into acts they otherwise would avoid."
THEN HE PILES ON--
"As the President noted seven years ago, he said, we are living in an era of “barbarism emboldened by technology.”
AND SAYS WE HAVE TO INCREASE CORPORATE WELFARE
"Ours is also a world of many friends and allies, but sadly, realistically, friends and allies with declining defense investment and declining capabilities, and, I would add, as a result, with increasing vulnerabilities. All of which requires that the United States of America invest more."
BECAUSE, LIKE IN IRAQ, OUR "WAY OF LIFE" IS THREATENED
"So it is with confidence that I say that America’s enemies should not confuse the American people’s distaste of war -- which is real and which is understandable -- with a reluctance to defend our way of life. Enemy after enemy in our history have made that mistake -- to their regret."
**************************************************Interview with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld with Brit Hume of Fox News Channel, December 15, 2006
RUMMY HAD NO PART IN THE SIZE OF THE IRAQ INVASION FORCE (AND BEER IS A HEALTH FOOD)
MR. HUME: Now, what effect did the Iraq war have on that project, in terms of the arguments that were mounted for more troops and -- I mean, how did that all fit together, if it did?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Well, I don't know that there's a connection. We had a plan. I shouldn't say "we." The combatant commander, General Franks, had a plan to bring into train so that we could produce and put into the country something in excess of 400,000 troops. At a certain point he decided he didn't need them. And so --
MR. HUME: And how much -- or was he under any pressure from you to make that decision?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Absolutely not. Absolutely not. That's a mythology. This town's filled with that kind of nonsense. No, the people who decide the levels of forces on the ground are not the secretary of Defense or the president. We hear the recommendations, but the recommendations are made by the combatant commanders and by the members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And there hasn't been a minute in the last six years when we have not had the number of troops that the combatant commanders have requested.
MR. HUME: What about --
SEC. RUMSFELD: And the rest of it is mythology.
MR. HUME: So when Generals Abizaid and Casey have recommended what they've recommended, it is clear to you that they're not making those recommendations based upon what they think the boss wants?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Oh, come on. You think these people with four stars on their shoulders run around worrying about that? They've arrived. They are serious people. They're talented people. Ask them. That's utter nonsense.
BUT IN HIS FAREWELL SPEECH RUMMY WAS THE LEADER
"I say this with the perspective of one, as the President indicated, who has had the opportunity to lead this department in two different eras, in two different world conflicts, for two different presidents, and, yes it’s true, in two different centuries."
EUROPE HAS NOT MILITARIZED LIKE THE US HAS
The bulk of the NATO countries are investing less than 2 percent of their Gross Domestic Product in defense. And the world we're living in is not going to tolerate that underinvestment, in my view, and the risk is that over a long period -- a sustained period of time we run the risk of having our principal allies, our major allies there in Western Europe not have the kinds of capabilities that they're going to need in the early decades of the 21st century. They have a different threat assessment. They have an aging population; their demographics are such. They have large numbers of Muslims in their population, and their body politic is adjusting to those things. And those forces are not really likely to lead to an increase in defense investment by the Western European countries.
THE HEAD TORTURER TRIES TO COVER UP
MR. HUME: Your greatest personal regret as secretary? I mean, I keeping thinking that -- I mean, you offered to resign more than once.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Oh, sure. Yeah, I think a president has to feel that he has the ability to have somebody in there who fits the circumstance that he finds himself in. And when the terrible situation occurred in Abu Ghraib, I said to the president that I thought that it might make sense for him to have someone else, simply because of the -- how unfortunate that was. But, you know, life goes on.
**********************************************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on the Laura Ingraham Show, December 14, 2006
Rummy says they were were prepared to up to half a million troops in Iraq (the size of the whole army)
"So I think in retrospect, you know, the truth is it's a -- it's an art, not a science. There's no guidebook, mathematical calculation one can come to as to exactly what the right numbers might be. We had a process whereby we were prepared to go up to between 400(000) and 500,000, they were already in train, and the general in charge decided that he was -- he had sufficient forces and decided to not go that high."
**********************************************************Town Hall Meeting with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Peter Pace--December 8, 2006
Rummy says everything's fine in Iraq: " My goodness. The stock market's open, their free press is there, they've got television, they've got radio. They've got -- schools are open, the businesses are open, hospitals are open, there are new textbooks. I mean, if you -- if you just watched what's happening every time there's a bomb going off in Baghdad, you'd think the whole country's aflame. But you fly over it, and that's just simply not the case. There are people out in the fields working, and there's cars in the gas lines waiting to get fuel." [The recent Iran Study Group Report: "The situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorating. There is no path that can guarantee success... Violence is increasing in scope and lethality."]
Rummy--terrorism isn't the greatest threat: "I don't think terrorism is the greatest threat. I think that terrorism is a weapon of choice for violent extremists, and violent extremism is, in my view, the threat. It is that conviction that they want to destabilize moderate, mainstream Muslim regimes and establish a caliphate and have a handful of clerics determine what everyone in that country can do, and then spread that across the globe from Indonesia to the Middle East through North Africa and Southern Europe."
Rummy doesn't like the "global war on terror": "At the present time -- we've used the phrase 'global war against terror,' which I find not perfect. I think that it is really a long struggle, as opposed to a war, which implies armies, navies, air forces and Marines contesting each other. It is irregular, it's asymmetric, and it is not against terrorism per se; it is against these violent extremists who use terrorism, but they also could use other things."
***********************************************************12/8/2006: The American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights First today argued before a federal court that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld should be held accountable for the torture and abuse of detainees in U.S. military custody. Today’s hearing marked the first time a federal court has considered whether top U.S. officials can be held legally accountable for the torture scandal in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“There must be legal accountability in a court of law for high-ranking government officials who order or allow torture in violation of the most fundamental legal norms that govern our society,” said ACLU attorney Lucas Guttentag, who is lead counsel in the case. “Torture is universally prohibited but Secretary Rumsfeld and the other defendants have not been held responsible for the orders they gave and the abuse they permitted.”
*********************************************************Rumsfeld’s Memo of Options for Iraq Warand its cover letter.
**********************************************************Rummy saw the light just before he got shown the door. According to the New York Times: Two days before he resigned as defense secretary, Donald H. Rumsfeld submitted a classified memo to the White House that acknowledged that the Bush administration’s strategy in Iraq was not working and called for a major course correction.
“In my view it is time for a major adjustment,” wrote Mr. Rumsfeld, who has been a symbol of a dogged stay-the-course policy. “Clearly, what U.S. forces are currently doing in Iraq is not working well enough or fast enough.”
********************************************************Nov. 27: Rummy hasn't said anything in over two weeks. Cat got his tongue? Let's waterboard him, then he'll tell us everything.
********************************************************Rumsfeld okayed abuses says former U.S. general
MADRID (Reuters) - Outgoing Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld authorized the mistreatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, the prison's former U.S. commander said in an interview on Saturday.
Former U.S. Army Brigadier General Janis Karpinski told Spain's El Pais newspaper she had seen a letter apparently signed by Rumsfeld which allowed civilian contractors to use techniques such as sleep deprivation during interrogation.
Karpinski, who ran the prison until early 2004, said she saw a memorandum signed by Rumsfeld detailing the use of harsh interrogation methods.
"The handwritten signature was above his printed name and in the same handwriting in the margin was written: "Make sure this is accomplished"," she told Saturday's El Pais. "The methods consisted of making prisoners stand for long periods, sleep deprivation ... playing music at full volume, having to sit in uncomfortably ... Rumsfeld authorized these specific techniques."
The Geneva Convention says prisoners of war should suffer "no physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion" to secure information. "Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened, insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind," the document states.
A spokesman for the Pentagon declined to comment on Karpinski's accusations, while U.S. army in Iraq could not immediately be reached for comment.
********************************************************Press Availability with Secretary Rumsfeld, November 21, 2006
Q Mr. Secretary, how --
Q (Off mike) -- in Iraq?
Q (Off mike) -- this latest initiative from Iraq -- from Iran and Syria is helpful or not?
(No response as Sec. Rumsfeld leaves the microphones.)
********************************************************Nov. 14: Lawyers for inmates of Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and Guantanamo Bay filed a lawsuit in Germany against outgoing Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, hoping his resignation and testimony from a former general will help to have him investigated for war crimes.
********************************************************Adelman on Rumsfeld: "It's hard to remember, but he was once part of the future."
********************************************************Rummy seems lost since he lost his job.
Kansas State University Landon Lecture, Manhattan, Kansas, Thursday, November 09, 2006
"Unlike the Cold War, our enemy today has no state, territories or citizens to protect. They murder innocent Muslim civilians by the thousands -- men, women and children alike. The enemy cannot be deterred through rational self-interest. Today’s threats come less from nation-states but rather from enemies that operate in the shadows, that strike through asymmetric and irregular means. [Yet the Pentagon budget has increased.]
"On 9/11, we saw the deadly effects of this type of warfare. Armed with five-dollar box-cutters, 19 hijackers killed 3,000 Americans and inflicted hundreds of billions of dollars in economic damage. In Iraq and Afghanistan, insurgents fashion deadly IEDs and roadside bombs using propane tanks and garage door openers. Nations like Iran and Syria seek to undermine U.S. interests and those of our allies by moving weapons and money to terrorist groups like Hezbollah and insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq. In the future, there could be attacks on computer networks, on water supplies, on communications systems. [They just don't fight fair.]
"U.S. efforts to train foreign security forces have been burdened by outdated regulations. In Afghanistan, for instance, building up the Afghan Army was unnecessarily and harmfully delayed because there was no such category in the U.S. federal budget at the time. The painful delays in training the Afghan and Iraqi police forces were a result of the fact that the Department of Defense was prohibited from doing the training." [It isn't Rummy's fault that everything is a mess but he got fired anyhow.]
********************************************************
The Army Times: Editorial: "Time for Rumsfeld to go"
********************************************************Rummy has recently conducted ten radio interviews with mostly adoring commentators within a week's time in preparation for the election. Most of it has been typical Rumsfeld blather which repeats the inanities you can read further on down these pages. But once in a while Rummy surpasses even himself, as in these two comments referring to the security problems in Iraq:
during a radio interview with Scott Hennen on October 24th:
". . .the reality is that about 90 percent of the violence in Iraq occurs about 30 miles -- within 30 miles of Baghdad. And if the international community is there and the press is there and they're reporting on that, one would think that the country is aflame. The country isn't aflame. You fly over Iraq and there's people out working in fields. There's cars driving around. There's people doing things. And so, too, in Baghdad, there's people waiting at a gas line, going to a restaurant."
and then, in a Pentagon briefing on October 26th:
"You could sit down today and take the remaining 16 provinces in the country and say, well, when -- today, when do we -- the U.S. and the Iraqis -- government -- think that this province might move over to the governance of the Iraqis instead of the multinational force? What about this province and that province? And you could lay out and say, well, in this quarter or this two- or three-month period that might -- we might be able to do that, and lay it out. And as I've said before, in some cases you may beat it; you may do it faster than that. In some cases you may do it later than that. In some cases you may do it exactly when you thought and then find it didn't work out, and then you'd have to go back in, take it back, fix it, and then give it back again. . . .our challenge, and it's tough, is to get the Iraqi people capable of governing and providing security for their country."
October 26, 2006: [Prime Minister] Maliki called for more say on security policy once the U.S.-led Coalition's U.N. mandate runs out in December. "If anyone is responsible for the poor security situation in Iraq it is the Coalition," he said. The prime minister spoke on a day when a battle in Ramadi, about 90 kilometres west of the Baghdad, left five U.S. soldiers dead, raising the October toll to 96, the worst monthly number this year. Also yesterday, gunmen ambushed a police convoy north of Baghdad killing 28 officers and wounding 25, while in a town nearby, gunmen attacked a station for special police, killing six and wounding 10.
From the Atlantic Free Press: A leaked-Pentagon report prepared by the US Central Command says the country is in a state of “chaos”. This is the logical corollary of the Rumsfeld approach and it is unlikely to change. . . Alexander Cockburn: “Sunni insurgents have cut the roads linking the city to the rest of Iraq. The country is being partitioned as militiamen fight bloody battles for control of towns and villages north and south of the capital….The country has taken another lurch towards disintegration. Well armed Sunni tribes now largely surround Baghdad and are fighting Shia militias to complete the encirclement. The Sunnis insurgents seem to be following a plan to control all approaches to Baghdad.” http://www.atlanticfreepress.com/content/view/145/32/
And who can forget General Casey's 2004 pre-election prediction, quoted by General Sharp at the Pentagon on September 20, 2004, in response to a reporter's question:
Q: Well, I guess the bottom line is will Iraqi security forces – when will you have enough trained and equipped Iraqi security forces to take over the local control that we’ve talked about in Iraq to achieve their goal of getting the insurgents out of this mess? Will it be by December? Will it be by the [Iraqi] elections in January?
GEN. SHARP: Gen. Casey has taken a look at the plan to what we believe the equipment delivery will be and the training schedule. And he believes that, based upon that, he will be able to be at what his definition of local control is for the majority of the country, not the entire part of the country. There’s going to be areas out there that we’re not going to be able to get the local control by the end of December.
"“Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters.”--Albert Einstein
********************************************************Air Force War College, October 18, 2006
"People think of terrorism as the purpose of terrorism to kill people. It often has that effect. But the purpose of terrorism is not to kill people, it's to terrorize people, it's to alter their behavior, it's to cause them to do something fundamentally different than they otherwise would be doing; that is to say to do exactly what the terrorists want them to do and to live a life and to behave in a manner consistent with what the terrorists want.
"Their battlefield is not just Baghdad or Kabul, but American living rooms and television screens. We talk about where's the center of gravity of the war. The center of gravity of this war is very much in Washington, D.C., and it's in the capitals across the world.
"There's no way our forces can lose, militarily. There's also no way they can win by military means alone. It takes more than military means. And it takes some time. . .
"They live in our country. They live in countries that are our allies in the war on terror. Some 90 nations today are allied with us in the global war on terror. And they live in diffuse cells around the world.
"And with an enemy that is not dissuaded by the threat of prosecution or by reason, our free societies have really two options. One is to be terrorized and to alter our behavior; and the other is to decide we will not be terrorized, we'll not alter our behavior, which strikes at the very essence of free people, but to attack them and to stop them at their roots.
"The government of some 90 nations that we share intelligence with and cooperate with have made the strategic decision to go on the offense, because there really is no other choice. It is not possible to defend in every location, at every moment of the day or night, at -- against every conceivable technique of violence. That can't be done. So the choice -- it is a clear choice that one must be on the offense.
"This war, like other wars, has not been a steady, smooth, upward path. To some, that's a surprise. To those who study history, it is not a surprise. The enemy has a brain. The enemy adapts, just as our folks adapt continuously and must.
"Consider Iraq. At first, Saddam's forces tried to meet Coalition forces in the field -- and they lost. So regime remnants and other extremists began to attack military supply convoys. As convoys became better protected, they began to use the explosive devices, IEDs. And as commanders shifted convoy tactics and increased armor in response, the type and size of the IEDs changed and the method of actuating them changed. And as the effectiveness of the attacks against military targets declined, the extremists obviously, using their brains, shifted to more attacks on civilians in attempts to incite sectarian violence. I mean, the classic example was the attack on the Golden Dome Mosque. . .
NOTE: The mosque attack was a complicated all-night demolition project in Samarra, a city which was under complete US military control. The Iraqi death squads have been trained by the US military--it's called the "Salvador Option"--a still-secret strategy in the Reagan administration’s battle against the leftist guerrilla insurgency in El Salvador in the early 1980s. Then, faced with a losing war against Salvadoran rebels, the U.S. government funded or supported "nationalist" forces that allegedly included so-called death squads directed to hunt down and kill rebel leaders and sympathizers. Eventually the insurgency was quelled, and many U.S. conservatives consider the policy to have been a success. So we're seeing a replay in Iraq--El Salvador with oil--and the next step, according to plan, will be a dictatorial strongman the US government can depend on.
"The great sweep of human history is for freedom. And that's the side we're on. Thank you." (Applause.)
********************************************************Congressman Christopher Shays (R-CT), Chairman of the Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations, this week [First week of October, 2006] provided observations and recommendations resulting from his 14th oversight trip to Iraq. Among them: "Serious consideration should be given to bringing in a new team to lead the Department of Defense."
********************************************************From a 2003 British news report: The two faces of Rumsfeld-- 2000: director of a company which wins $200m contract to sell nuclear reactors to North Korea, 2002: declares North Korea a terrorist state, part of the axis of evil and a target for regime change
Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, sat on the board of a company which three years ago 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.
Mr Rumsfeld was a non-executive director of ABB, a European engineering giant based in Zurich, when it won a $200m (£125m) contract to provide the design and key components for the reactors. The current defence secretary sat on the board from 1990 to 2001, earning $190,000 a year. He left to join the Bush administration.
More on Rummy's North Korea Connection
hat-tip to thinkprogress.org
********************************************************According to a recent Newsweek Poll, Rumsfeld’s approval rating has fallen to just 30 percent, and more Americans believe he should resign than remain, 48 percent vs. 37 percent.
********************************************************The Pentagon has inexplicably published this portion of a July interview on their website October 2d. Here's an extract of the extract.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Interviews with Mr. Bob Woodward -- July 6 and 7, 2006
MR. WOODWARD: The beginning is this question of what was the model for Iraq, because I think it was Bill Luti who was giving briefings here about kind of an occupation -- not necessarily MacArthur style, but it looked like that. And then other people were talking about a quick handover in one of these meetings. You say --
SEC. RUMSFELD: I tilted to the latter, to the quicker handover, and the president did.
MR. WOODWARD: -- that you were looking for Iraq's Karzai, is that correct?
SEC. RUMSFELD: I don't remember that. Clearly, you needed somebody who people could recognize as providing leadership in the country. And I always felt that foreign troops are an anomaly in a country, that eventually they're unnatural and not welcomed really. I think I used the characterization of a broken bone. If you don't set it, everything grows around the break and you end up with that abnormality. And I used the phrase of it's like teaching a youngster how to ride a bicycle. You run behind them with your hand in the seat. And at some point you've got to take some fingers off, and then you've got to let go, and they might fall. You help pick them up and put them back on it. But otherwise, if you don't take your hand off, you're going to end up with a 40-year-old who can't ride a bike. . . . There's also the concept of declining consent and the like. And there's the -- John Abizaid and I and the president talked on many occasions about this, and we used this construct that there is a natural tension between having too many and too few. Too few and the political and economic environment can't go forward. Too many and you have two risks: one, you feed the insurgency and create opposition, engender opposition; and second, you create a dependency. Our folks are so good at what they do, and if there's a ditch to be dug they're going to dig the ditch. And we can't allow that to happen. We've simply got to manage that, and it's an art not a science. And therefore, I tend to want to go, and so does the president, with the person on the ground -- in this case, General Casey -- and he's got to be the artist. You can't do it from 7,000 miles away.
MR. WOODWARD: In '03, though, if I go through the record, talk to people like Garner and go through records, talk to people in the White House, it seemed --
SEC. RUMSFELD: Garner had that model, too.
MR. WOODWARD: Pardon?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Jay Garner --
MR. WOODWARD: Yes, yes --
SEC. RUMSFELD: -- had that model, too.
NOTE: Lieutenant General Jay Garner (Ret), former US Army Assistant Vice Chief of Staff--Garner began Iraq reconstruction efforts in March 2003 with plans aiming for Iraqis to hold elections within 90 days and for the U.S. to quickly pull troops out of the cities to a desert base. He was replaced in his role by Paul Bremer, the Managing Director of Kissinger and Associates, on May 11th, 2003.
MR. WOODWARD: Yes, exactly. Exactly. He was let's set up an interim governing council, let's, you know -- I mean, he briefed the president on we're going to use 200,000 to 300,000 Iraqi troops for border patrol and security and so forth.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Is that right? Well, I don't know that.
MR. WOODWARD: And --
SEC. RUMSFELD: Do you want me every time you say something that I don't know to tell you?
MR. WOODWARD: Absolutely.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Okay. I don't know that.
MR. WOODWARD: My question really is -- what did you envision in the spring of '03 happening? Because, of course, Bremer comes in with a very different model.
SEC. RUMSFELD: He did? I was more in the Jay Garner mode. And Jerry Bremer, of course, is a presidential envoy and, as such, he reported to the president and to Condi at the NSC staff.
NOTE: NOW THE INEXPLICABLE BECOMES MORE EXPLICABLE. RUMMY, IT TURNS OUT, WAS AGAINST THIS IRAQ OCCUPATION IDEA!!! OR SAYS HE WAS.
MR. WOODWARD: I see, but did you -- because you were in charge, you -- particularly Garner was reporting to you in this? And Bremer actually reported ot you initially?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Bremer actually was --
MR. WOODWARD: Reported to you initially --
SEC. RUMSFELD: Technically, but not really. He didn't call home much. In other words, he was out there in a tough environment, making a lot of decisions, calling audibles, and it's a difficult job.
MR. WOODWARD: And he felt he was the President’s man.
SEC. RUMSFELD: You bet, and he was. It wasn't a matter of feeling it; he was. And he had a staff that he put together that was basically from the State Department, and they worked well together, and they did a hell of a good job. It's a difficult job, and they accomplished a heck of a lot in a relatively short period of time.
MR. WOODWARD: One of the things -- and this is John Abizaid who said this to Garner early, before the war, a few months before the war -- January '03 -- we've got to provide an opportunity for the Iraqi army to emerge with some honor.
MR. WOODWARD: Did you agree with that?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Sure.
MR. WOODWARD: Was that a message that was sent?
SEC. RUMSFELD: I mean, I talked to [General] Abizaid all the time, and he felt that way about the military; he felt that way about the Sunnis that they were losing control of the country, and constantly was looking to see that decisions being made in the CPA reflected what he believed to be, and I agreed with, a recognition of the fact that the goal was to have everyone feeling that the country is fair and representative of them. And because of the significant loss on the part of the Sunnis in terms of their role in that country, he was constantly looking to me to try to see that the political side of the house in Iraq reflected that. . .
MR. WOODWARD: But yes and no. I mean, as you know, the current Iraqi army has all these officers back. All the NCOs and officers in the Iraqi army served in Saddam's army.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Certainly a lot did.
MR. WOODWARD: As best I can tell, virtually all. And so the question becomes -- again, looking at the chronology of this -- is that the goal is give them honor. And then there's this disbanding of the army there. Actually, at Garner's feet begging to be brought back. They were sending Garner lists and so forth. I've got the lists and they felt kicked in the face. And the question was how did that happen?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yeah. I don't know. Do you know? . . . . . . It became clear to me that -- fairly early, I think -- that the Iraqi infrastructure had been neglected for decades. I went over and looked at an electric power plant. It was being held together with chewing gum and bobby pins and bailing wire. [after twelve years of us sanctions and aerial bombardment by Rummy and his predescessors] I looked at myself and said, my lord, it took 30 years to get here; it's going to take 30 years to get out of here to get that -- not us out -- for them to get back to looking like Kuwait or Jordan or Saudi Arabia or Turkey or their neighbors. And I said oh, my goodness, that's going to be their job over a long period of time because it just takes that long. And they have -- they've got wealth. They've got water, they've got oil, they've got industrious people. They clearly are going to be the ones that are going to have to be there.
MR. WOODWARD: But there was a point where we put in lots of money -- $21 billion. When did it become apparent to you that we're going to have to pay some of these?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yeah, but I can remember saying in the interagency process and on the Hill that the likelihood of the Congress passing annual reconstruction funds to rectify 30 years of neglect while he was building palaces is unlikely. As a broken down ex-politician, I could smell that.
MR. WOODWARD: Do you remember -- this is June of '03 -- I'm sorry to be so long on this -- when Garner had left, he had been replaced by Bremer. He came back here and you gave him a medal. And he says and he has notes telling you that three tragic mistakes had been made in the postwar period: de-Ba'athification so deep, disbanding the military, and Bremer's decision to let an interim government group that Garner had set up go home. Do you recall any of that?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Vaguely. I remember having a very good discussion with him. I felt that he had not been properly recognized for what he'd done. So we had him come back and had a visit and did give him a medal and expressed my appreciation to him. I think he's a fine retired officer and a very talented guy who cares a lot about Iraq.
MR. WOODWARD: . . . I just wonder whether -- I find it striking -- I pressed Jay Garner on this. I said how can you tell the secretary that three tragic mistakes had been made -- not just errors, but tragic mistakes -- and then go meet with the president and not tell him? And he said well, he reported to you, he stuck to the chain of command. He assumed you would tell the president that Jay Garner thinks --
SEC. RUMSFELD: There's no question that the president was aware of those issues. . . .
MR. WOODWARD: Very anxious to get it [sovereignty]. Give it to the Iraqis.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Damn right.
MR. WOODWARD: This is the theme of the Iraqi "face," give it to them.
SEC. RUMSFELD: It's their country, yeah. More accurately, it would be give it back.
MR. WOODWARD: Did you ever say that to Jerry Bremer, it's their country? Because he's running around -- this is public -- we are sovereign, we are the occupiers, you are occupied. I mean, he is just -- pardon me -- sticking it in their face that we have got our wheel on your neck.
SEC. RUMSFELD: My whole approach has been, as I've said here, that it is their country. They're going to have to run it. We're going to have to take our hands off the bicycle seat, and we have to try to do it in a way that we find a great balance so that they can pull up their socks, grab their country, make a go of it, and we will not create a dependency and we will not feed the insurgency. And John Abizaid and I have been very much in agreement with it and the president was. . . .
MR. WOODWARD: But there was a moment when you said I'll stay or leave if you want.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yeah, I mean I can remember saying that to Andy Card. I can remember saying that to the vice president. I can remember saying something like that to the president, but I don't remember precisely what. I just don't want to get in the habit of resigning every 15 minutes and having them feel they have to beg you to stay. I submitted my resignation in writing twice since I've been here.
MR. WOODWARD: In writing you actually submitted a letter.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yes.
MR. WOODWARD: What did the president say to you when you --
SEC. RUMSFELD: He handed the first one back and said no. And the second one, he handed back, and I handed it back to him, and I said you ought to keep this.
MR. WOODWARD: And?
SEC. RUMSFELD: And he said no, he did not want me to go. He said it publicly. . . .
MR. WOODWARD: In August '05, Kissinger wrote and has talked to the president about this at length. You know he meets with the president regularly?
SEC. RUMSFELD: I helped set it up.
MR. WOODWARD: You did. And you and Kissinger are supposed to be at odds.
SEC. RUMSFELD: no – that’s baloney
MR. WOODWARD: And he says -- Kissinger says victory over the insurgency is the only meaningful exit strategy in this war. Do you agree?
SEC. RUMSFELD: He's right. Sure. No, no, I'd qualify it. First of all, I don't agree that he said that.
MR. WOODWARD: Oh, he did. He's written it publicly and he's --
SEC. RUMSFELD: He may have, I think ultimately, the victory over the insurgency will be made by the Iraqis because it will take time. As I mentioned in the memo I showed you, it could take eight to 10 years. Insurgencies have a tendency to do that. Victory -- is that the word he used?
MR. WOODWARD: Yes. Victory by the insurgency is the only meaningful exit strategy. It's a great line.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yeah, but I would say that our exit strategy is to have the Iraqi government and security forces capable of managing a lower level insurgency and ultimately achieving victory over it and repressing it over time. But it would be a period after we may very well not have large numbers of people there. . . .
MR. WOODWARD: And General Casey's campaign plan calls for neutralizing the insurgency, which has technical meanings. And I understand he's said, look, we haven't neutralized it yet; we've contained it. Is that correct?
SEC. RUMSFELD: If you say it is. I don't know --
MR. WOODWARD: (Inaudible.)
SEC. RUMSFELD: You said he said it.
MR. WOODWARD: Yes, sir.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Is it correct that he said it?
MR. WOODWARD: I sure believe so.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Well, then he said it.
MR. WOODWARD: Now you're on top, wrestling. I mean, the question was do you agree it has not been neutralized, only contained?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yeah, yeah.
MR. WOODWARD: Okay.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Thus far.
MR. WOODWARD: Okay. Last fall, Secretary Rice went over this saying the overall Iraq strategy is clear, hold and build. You had some objections to that.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yeah, I was a little worried that -- and we talked about it. I mean, clearly, you need a bumper sticker, and that's what they were looking for. And they felt that a bumper sticker was needed. I didn't need one. We've got our job to do; we were doing it. And they had to fashion something like that. And they're right. If you're going to communicate with multiple audiences, including ours -- our Congress, our public, the Iraqi people -- they may want to know, well, what are you doing? Do you have a strategy? Do you have a plan? The answer is, we do have a plan.
But the question was clear, is one thing. And my problem was that I wanted -- if that is our strategy for the United States, then I worried about it, because in fact, I wanted -- we've got -- what? -- 263,000 Iraqi security forces. I wanted them clearing and them holding. And I didn't want the idea to be that it was just us. And so that was my concern, because that is grabbing a hold of the bicycle seat and hanging on for dear life.
MR. WOODWARD: Forever.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Forever. Clear, hold and build – worried me -- for the reason I mentioned earlier -- on reconstruction, because that's going to take 30 years and it's going to take a pile of money and it is not going to be the taxpayers' money -- our taxpayers' money.
MR. WOODWARD: Someone said you objected to it so much, a half hour before the president was adopting that in the speech you called Andy Card and said take it out.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Probably true, yeah. I was concerned that it had a connotation that sounded good at the moment, but that it could, over time, come back and -- because of the nuances in it -- not be seen right. So then we tried to define it. We left the words and we tried to define it in a way that was accurate.
MR. WOODWARD: And what was that definition that's accurate, do you know?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Well, the way I said it. In other words, it's not just us clearing, it's the coalition. And the holding -- it's clearly increasingly them and not us. And the building is we want to help create environments that they can reconstruct their own country, and that type of thing. And those refinements are in there now.
NOTE: THERE'S A LOT MORE OF THIS TWO DAY INTERVIEW HERE
***********************Secretary Rumsfeld Interview with Frank Sesno, CNN, September 30, 2006
MR. SESNO: An awful lot of people familiar with the Middle East, with its people and its cultures, are worried now that we're seeing a deepening secular divide across the region, a rise in the influence of Iran, groups like Hamas and Hezbollah that are really flexing their muscles, the growth of terrorism potentially, and increasing hostility toward the United States. What does Donald Rumsfeld see when he looks out that window?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Well, we certainly see all of those things. They, in fact, are occurring. We do see a situation in the Middle East where you see every day on television manifestations of a divide, of differences. Certainly what is taking place in Israel and has been taking place in Israel and Lebanon is worrisome. On the other hand, we've seen these things over many, many years. I was a Middle East envoy for President Reagan back in the mid '80s, early '80s, 1980s, and it was a difficult time then as well -- 241 Marines killed in the barracks there in Lebanon. But these things tend to come and go. And the fact that there are differences within the Muslim faith is a reality.
MR. SESNO: The question is, is it getting --
SEC. RUMSFELD: The Shi'a effort that Iran represents is something that is of concern in the Sunni community, and we see that every day, one way or another. So it is a complicated part of the world. It has been. And I suspect it will remain so. What we're facing, however, is this struggle within that faith, from a very small minority of violent extremists who attempt to impose their will on everyone else in the Muslim faith. The overwhelming majority are not violent extremists. And that struggle is taking place and playing out in a very violent way in many parts of the world.
OUR NOBLE CAUSE--TO GET INVOLVED IN A MUSLIM DISPUTE
MR. SESNO: Is there a plan B? I mean, if it really were to break out and become worse than it is and be a definable civil war, does the United States stay in the middle of that?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Well, there are obviously any number of courses that we could take, and it would depend on the facts at the time.
BUT RIGHT NOW IT'S SAME-OLD SAME-OLD--BLOOD FOR OIL
MR.SESNO: To Iraq, given the last several months of violence and the developments there, are we winning? How do you measure it?
SEC. RUMSFELD: You can look at the things that are on the plus side. You can look at the things that are on the minus side.
MR. SESNO: But take it as a whole.
SEC. RUMSFELD: Each person has to look at it in the aggregate and say what they think about it.
********************************************************Presenter: Secretary Of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld and President of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai, September 25, 2006
RUMMY AND OUR AFGHAN PUPPET PRESIDENT DO THEIR HAIKU POETRY
SEC. RUMSFELD: Look at this on a beautiful day. Welcome. Nice to see you all.
Mr. President, the microphone's yours. We're very pleased you're here.
PRESIDENT KARZAI: Thanks very much.
SEC. RUMSFELD: And thank you for coming again.
PRESIDENT KARZAI: Thank you. Good to see you again. Thank you.
SEC. RUMSFELD: We hope your trip to the United States is an excellent one.
PRESIDENT KARZAI: It's beautiful always --
SEC. RUMSFELD: And we brought good weather for you.
PRESIDENT KARZAI: -- especially during the fall, and all the colorful trees.
********************************************************"“I wish I had an answer to that, because I'm tired of answering that question”--Yogi Berra
Media Availability with Secretary Rumsfeld at the Senate Armed Services Committee, September 21, 2006
Q Mr. Secretary, there are almost 300,000 Iraqi security forces right now --
SEC. RUMSFELD: Three hundred and two (thousand), I'm told.
Q Excuse me. Three hundred and two (thousand) trained and equipped right now in Iraq. Yet even though the number continues to rise, the number of American forces in there has gone up by about 20,000 in the last few months. I mean, at what point are there going to be enough Iraqi security forces that are trained and equipped that United States troop levels begin to go down?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Yeah. If we look at it one dimensionally like that, there's no answer to the question, because the problem is not a military problem. The implication of your question is that at a certain point there will be enough security forces that the problems will be solved. But in fact the reality is, it's a political governance problem, and it's a governmental problem, and it's a problem of reconciliation. It's a problem of the people of that country deciding they're going to do something rare in that part of the world, really rare, and rare for that country. And that's to say that they're going to put their faith in a piece of paper, a constitution, and an election and believe that it will keep each other from each other's throat. Now, that is a big thing in a country that was held together by a vicious dictatorship and repression.
Now, we talk about the violence that's going on in that country, and there is violence in that country; let there be no doubt. But there was violence before. I mean, there are -- hundred thousands of people are in mass graves all over that country. Saddam Hussein gassed the Kurds, his own people, as well as his neighbors. So violence is not something that's new to Iraq. Indeed, it's a pattern in that country.
And what's going to -- what it's going to take is a recognition that it is not simply security forces, it is not going to be won militarily -- it can't be lost militarily, but it's going to be won by the Iraqi people, over time, as they are able to move forward on all three fronts -- the political front and the governance front and assurance of people that in fact it's a fair system, it's a fair constitution; they're going to get a fair break when they amend the constitution; they're going to get a fair break in the federalism debate; they're going to get a fair break in the oil legislation that has to pass; and the economic progress -- when people say, "Okay, it's going to make it," and they start nodding their heads, and they vote with their feet, and the economic circumstance improves.
The security situation is a function of all of that. You can't take them apart and say, "Gee, if you -- when you get to X number of hundreds of thousands of security forces, everything's going to be just fine," because that isn't the case.
********************************************************Center for Security Policy's 2006 Keeper of the Flame Award Dinner, September 20, 2006
All the hawk biggies were there at this neocon lovefest: Senators Kyle and Inhofe; Generals Pace, Swarzkopf, Jones, and Cody; Admiral Keating, Cap Weinberger of Iran/Contra fame; Congressman Lewis of earmark fame, but Congressman Duncan Hunter, Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, was the honoree as this year's recipient of the Keeper of the Flame Award.
There's a symbiotic relationship between Hunter and Rumsfeld. Hunter keeps Rummy out of trouble with the Congress over his mismanagement, his torture policies and his disfavor with the military, and Rummy makes sure Hunter is supplied with huge kickbacks from Pentagon contractors. Hunter was close to fellow San Diego County Congressman Randall Cunningham, who is now in prison for accepting $2.4 million in kickbacks.
Hunter has come under fire from constituents for accepting nearly a quarter million dollars in campaign contributions from missile defense contractors over the past five years. Hunter has also drawn criticism for accepting $46,000 from un-indicted co-conspirators implicated in bribing Hunter’s friend and San Diego colleague, Randy “Duke” Cunningham, who resigned from Congress after pleading guilty.
Rumsfeld: "I've come to know Chairman Hunter very well over the years, and I can tell you that those of us in the Department rely very heavily on his wisdom, his leadership, his experience and his "get it done" attitude. It is something when he comes into your office like a whirling dervish and starts discussing a subject first at the national level and then down at the microlevel, and then leaves you pieces of metal on your desk that you can hardly lift and has explained exactly where it goes, what it's for, why it should be there and wants to know why it isn't. And God bless him for it. (Applause.)
"You know, these past years are the years when it's been particularly important to have knowledgeable and experienced and capable leadership in the Armed Services Committee, in the Congress. Duncan has been determined to see that the Department of Defense and the men and women in uniform have the resources they need, to see that they're well-equipped and well-supported. He's never let the troops down, and as a result of his leadership and his hard work, our nation is a safer place today.
"Duncan understands that ever since September 11th, it's been essential that we put aside that September 10th attitude and recognize that we have to get up every morning recognizing that it's September 12th and that we have to ask ourselves what it is that we can do to protect the American people and to see that we inject a sense of urgency into our government and our country. (Applause.) We have seen that we needed to go on the offense to fight the enemy's territory rather than to wait for them to attack us on our own territory."
********************************************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld and Eileen Byrne, WLS 890 AM Chicago, Ill., at the Pentagon, September 11, 2006
BYRNE: How do you feel when some Democrats say that because of Iraq and because we have waged the war in Iraq, we are less safe? And what's happening -- (off mike).
SECRETARY RUMSFELD: Well, I guess - how do you feel about it - I guess the first thing you feel about it…it's politics, and it's election season, and people are going to say whatever they say. The fact of the matter is - if Saddam Hussein were still in power in Iraq, he would be rolling in petrol dollars. Think of the price of oil today. He would have so much money. And he would be seeing the Iranians interested in a nuclear program, he would be seeing the North Koreans developing a nuclear program, and he'd say well why shouldn't he - and he would. So we're fortunate that he's gone.
THE NOBLE CAUSE--KEEPING IRAQIS FROM BENIFITTING FROM INFLATED OIL PRICES
RUMSFELD: We're fortunate that the Taliban have been thrown out of Afghanistan and that 50 million people have been liberated.
ACTUALLY, AFGHANISTAN IS SPIRALING OUT OF CONTROL (AGAIN)
RUMSFELD: The situation in Iraq is difficult and people are -- the violent extremists that are trying to hijack that faith have killed an awful lot of Muslims in Iraq and elsewhere around the world.
ANOTHER NOBLE CAUSE--STOP THE HIGHJACKING OF THE MUSLIM FAITH
*****************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld and Monica Delta, UNIVISION, at the Pentagon
DELTA: Do you think that we are splitting fighting in two worlds -- the people who are with the United States in their war against terror and the other people?
SECRETARY RUMSFELD: Actually, what's really taking place in the world is a struggle within the Muslim faith. There's a very small number of extremists, violent extremists and the overwhelming tens of millions of Muslims that are perfectly peaceful people, and that struggle taking place within that faith is ultimately going to be won within the faith. And all we can do is try to strengthen and empower those people that believe in peaceful approaches and not murdering and beheading and trying to destabilize the moderate Muslim states in the Middle East.
SO: WE ARE TRYING TO STABILIZE THE MIDDLE EAST
********************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on the Charlie Brennan Show, KMOX, St. Louis, Mo., from the Pentagon, September 11, 2006
Brennan: . . . is it possible that we'll ever beat al Qaeda? It seems as if there are more recruits on all continents right now, Mr. Secretary.
Rumsfeld: Well, there have been recruits for many, many years, I mean, if you think about it. We were attacked in the Marine barracks in Beirut back in the mid- -- early 1980s; lost 241 Marines. The USS Cole was attacked in Yemen some years later. Other countries have been attacked -- London and Madrid and Bali. This is not a totally new phenomenon. What's new is the fact that they are raising money, and recruiting, and attempting to destabilize moderate Muslim governments in the world to try to reestablish a caliphate. . . But the purpose of terrorism isn't really to kill you, it's to terrorize you, it's to alter your behavior. And as free people, what we are about is being free, is the ability to say what you want, and go where you want, and think what you wish to think; send your children off to school and know they'll come home safely. And for a terrorist to win, we have to be terrorized and alter our behavior, and we have not been terrorized. We have not altered our behavior.
SO: THE "TERRORISTS" ARE TRYING TO REESTABLISH A CALIPHATE AND ALTER OUR BEHAVIOR.
Brennan: Somehow, people say, Osama bin Laden can get a tape to Al-Jazeera, but we can't get to Osama bin Laden. How is that possible?
Rumsfeld: Well, it's obviously possible. We've had people on the 10 most wanted in the FBI for 20, 30, 40 years and never been caught. The answer is it's much easier to find an army, navy or an air force than it is to find a single individual.
OR COULD IT BE THAT WE JUST NEED AN ENEMY?
*************************Address at the 88th Annual American Legion National Convention, August 29, 2006
RUMSFELD: We need to consider the following questions, I would submit:
* With the growing lethality and the increasing availability of weapons, can we truly afford to believe that somehow, some way, vicious extremists can be appeased? [Is he talkiung about us?]
* Can folks really continue to think that free countries can negotiate a separate peace with terrorists? [Or should we ask: Why do they hate us?]
* Can we afford the luxury of pretending that the threats today are simply law enforcement problems, like robbing a bank or stealing a car; rather than threats of a fundamentally different nature requiring fundamentally different approaches? [Like invading Iraq, which didn't threaten us?]
* And can we really afford to return to the destructive view that America, not the enemy, but America, is the source of the world's troubles? [Destructive, or instructive?]
THE TRUTH SHALL SET US FREE
"Those who know the truth need to speak out against these kinds of myths and distortions that are being told about our troops and about our country."
LIKE, WAR IS AN EXERCISE IN HUMANITY (AND BEER IS NUTRITIOUS)
"You know from experience personally that in every war there have been mistakes, setbacks, and casualties. War is, as Clemenceau said, 'a series of catastrophes that result in victory.' And in every army, there are occasional bad actors, the ones who dominate the headlines today [Bush, Rumsfeld?], who don't live up to the standards of the oath and of our country. But you also know that they are a very, very small percentage of the literally hundreds of thousands of honorable men and women in all theaters in this struggle who are serving our country with humanity, with decency, with professionalism, and with courage in the face of continuous provocation."
DISSENTERS ARE CONFUSED, AND THEY WEAKEN THE COUNTRY
"And that is important in any long struggle or long war, where any kind of moral or intellectual confusion about who and what is right or wrong, can weaken the ability of free societies to persevere."
BUT WE'LL GET THEM TO AGREE WITH US
"The good news is that most Americans, though understandably influenced by what they see and read, have good inner gyroscopes. They have good center of gravity. So, I'm confident that over time they will evaluate and reflect on what is happening in this struggle and come to wise conclusions about it.
BECAUSE (A RANDOLPH BOURNE QUOTE)
War is the health of the State. It automatically sets in motion throughout society those irresistible forces for uniformity, for passionate cooperation with the Government in coercing into obedience the minority groups and individuals which lack the larger herd sense. The machinery of government sets and enforces the drastic penalties; the minorities are either intimidated into silence, or brought slowly around by a subtle process of persuasion which may seem to them really to be converting them. . . . Democratic control of foreign policy is therefore a contradiction in terms. Open discussion destroys swiftness and certainty of action. The giant State is paralyzed. http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/hist_texts/warhealthstate1918.html
WE'RE BUILDING A NEW NATION ABOVE OUR IRAQI OIL
"Iraq, a country that was brutalized by a cruel and dangerous dictatorship, is now traveling the slow, difficult, bumpy, uncertain path to a secure new future under a representative government that will be at peace with its neighbors, rather than a threat to their own people, to their neighbors, or to the world.
IT WAS 'MISSION ACCOMPLISHED'--AND NOW IT'S FUBAR
As the nature of the threat and the conflict in Iraq has changed over these past several years, so have the tactics and the deployments. But while military tactics have changed and adapted to the realities on the ground -- as they must -- the strategy has not changed, which is to empower the Iraqi people to be able to defend, and govern, and rebuild their own country.
THE ENEMIES 'THEMSELVES' SAY IRAQ IS KEY--SO IT MUST BE!!
"The extremists themselves call Iraq the “epicenter” in the War on Terror. And our troops know how important their mission is.
LET'S BRING GOD INTO IT
"May God bless each of you. May God bless the men and women in uniform, and their families. And may God continue to bless our wonderful country."
AND MAY GOD DAMN YOU, RUMSFELD
********************************************************Remarks by Secretary Rumsfeld during a Town Hall Meeting at Fallon Naval Air Station, Fallon, Nevada, August 28, 2006
DOES CRITICISM BOTHER YOU?
SEC. RUMSFELD: That's an interesting question. I don't sense that it has. One would think that at a certain level it could reduce one's effectiveness because of questions that get raised in people's minds. I think that from my standpoint it doesn't. I don't feel it myself because I've read so much history and am aware that in every conflict we've ever been in there have been heated criticisms of those individuals who were involved. George Washington came close to being fired during the Revolutionary War, and goodness knows the leadership during the Civil War was wrongly criticized. And in World War II you think of the loss after loss after loss of the Pacific and the -- I don't know -- 70,000 Americans killed in North Africa in less than a year -- or casualties, killed or wounded. And there have always been criticisms in every conflict and I expect that, I understand that.
But at least thus far -- you know, on the one hand, you have a free country, and that means people are free to say what they what they want, think what they want and they do. And so that's a great system. People also have the privilege of listening to what people say and judging them for what they say, and that's also a good fact. The thing that bothers me most is not that. The thing that bothers me the most is how clever the enemy is. They are actively manipulating the media in this country. They plan their attacks to get maximum notoriety and publicity. They hide among civilians, and when they're attacked by people and killed, and some civilians may be killed, they then claim that there were innocent civilians being killed by us when we're not doing it.
They can lie with impunity. They seem to be held -- we're held to the laws of war, as we should be, and we are held to a standard of perfection, near perfection, and people who go outside that line are punished. There's no accountability for the enemies we face, and they seem to be able to say what they wish and get away with it -- with lies with impunity. And that's what worries -- that does worry me, particularly in an era of this new media era of the 21st century where you've got 24-hour news and bloggers and Internet and digital cameras and Sony-cams. I mean, just last month we had instances where doctored pictures were being put out and carried on all the legitimate media -- not all of them, but some of those legitimate media in our country. And the world all saw these doctored pictures, and it wasn't until sometime later that people discovered they were doctored, and thank goodness they did. But it is -- that problem, it seems to me, is that the enemy is so much better at communicating and is held to no account for what they say.
You know, in a town where you grow up, some guy tells lies every day, pretty soon everyone looks around the corner and says, "Here comes Joe, the liar." And everyone gets to know he's a liar, so no one believes him.
But these folks, they have media committees. They plan how they're going to lie. They arrange themselves to do it, how they're going to manipulate the media, how they're going to get -- how they're going to weaken our will. And it is that the thing that keeps me up at night and worries me and makes me wish we were better able to counter that, because the constant drum beat of the things they say -- often which are not true -- is harmful over time; it's cumulative, and it does weaken people's will and lessen their determination and raise questions in their minds as to whether the cost is worth it. And that's worrisome.
IT TAKES ONE TO KNOW ONE!!
********************************************************Address at the 107th National Convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, August 28, 2006
OUR ENEMIES LIE AND GET AWAY WITH IT . . .
"Today we are engaged in conflicts that are again testing whether or not we believe that the defense of liberty is worth the cost. As we have seen recently, our enemy is seeking to strike again on a massive scale. This enemy lies constantly -- almost totally without consequence. . . the enemies have media committees, and time their attacks, pick their targets, hide among civilians -- precisely to distort that debate, to manipulate the media, hoping they will focus on the violence terrorists create, not the progress being made against them."
BUT WE SHOULD BELIEVE THEM ON IRAQ
"In Iraq, a country that was brutalized by a cruel and dangerous dictatorship is undertaking the slow, difficult, and uncertain steps trying to secure a new future under a representative government -- one that is at peace with its neighbors, rather than a threat to them and to the world. The extremists openly call Iraq the “epicenter” in the War on Terror. And they mean it. Yet even today there are many who argue otherwise."
********************************************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on "Bill Bennett's Morning In America", August 22, 2006
WE'VE GOT TO STAY IN IRAQ, RIGHT RUMMY?
"That's exactly right. The consequences -- were we to pull out precipitously and leave that country, you can imagine -- I mean, think of the mischief that Iran is engaged in today, and if you had a situation in Iraq, that was a sponsor of terrorism, and with that oil wealth and with that water wealth and with that population, the difficulties in the Middle East would be compounded."
WHAT WILL BE THE SIGNS OF VICTORY?
"Well, it would be a situation where people increasingly were respectful of the government and supportive of the government, that a reconciliation process got some steam under it and assured the various sectarian elements in the country that they could get a fair shake from the government, that there was a national compact and support from the neighboring countries, which -- Jordan just very recently assigned an ambassador there, for example, which was a good sign.
"The basic fundamentals in the country, the economy -- the currency's been stable, the schools are open, the hospitals are open, and many of the provinces are relatively peaceful. Baghdad is not, and there are three or four provinces that have a high degree of sectarian violence going on, but there are 14 that don't have a high degree of sectarian violence."
AND BACK TO A FAMILIAR NONSENSICAL RUMMY REFRAIN THAT NO ONE (TO THEIR CREDIT) EVER REPEATS--THAT THE 'WAR ON TERROR' IS AN INTERNAL MUSLIM STRUGGLE
". . . there's a tendency when you call this a global war on terror to think of it as a war of big militaries -- armies, navies, and air forces -- against armies, navies and air forces, and it is not. It is a totally different thing, and it is not something that the Army is going to be able to prevail and -- or the Navy and have a signing ceremony on the USS Missouri at the end of World War II. It is going to be something that's going to take time. It's going to be a long struggle. It's a struggle basically within the Muslim faith of a small minority of violent extremists against the overwhelming majority of Muslims who are not violent extremists, and we need to find ways to empower and strengthen those moderates who are determined to not have their faith hijacked by these violent extremists."
********************************************************August 21, 2006: Rummy hasn't made any public statements since August 2. Could something be up?
********************************************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on the Jim Villanucci Show, 770 KKOB, Albuquerque, NM, August 2, 2006
RUMMY DESCRIBES OUR ENEMIES AND OUR EFFORTS TO DESTROY THEM
"They completely ignore the laws of war. They are engaged in attempting to terrorize people and alter their behavior. They use terror as a weapon. It is -- it means that those countries, like ours, that are organized to fight big armies, big navies and big air forces are going to have to recognize that to protect our people, we're going to have to be able to deal with these irregular types of war, have to deal with so-called asymmetric attacks that do not directly go after your army, navy or air force. It's going to be a long effort. It's going to be an effort that's global. It's going to be an effort that's going to require all elements of national power -- not simply the military, but also financial instruments and diplomacy and alliances with many other countries."
BUT THEN FALLS BACK ON THE OLD IMPERIALISTIC ANSWERS
"And the current battlefields are what you're seeing in Lebanon and Israel, clearly in Iraq and Afghanistan. And of course, we've seen these periodic attacks in London and Madrid and the United States and many other places -- Bali. And it is -- it is possible for people to blow up people -- innocent men, women and children -- and terrorists do that."
********************************************************DoD News Briefing with Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Peter Pace, August 2, 2006
RUMSFELD: "We are currently as a country spending about 3.7 percent of gross domestic product on defense, maybe 3.8, depending on how you do it. That compares with 10 percent of gross domestic product going to defense back in the Kennedy and Eisenhower era when I first came to Washington. It compares with 5 or 6 percent when I was here 30 years ago as secretary of Defense. And it's now down to 3.8 percent."
RELATING MILITARY EXPENDITURES TO CORPORATE FINANCES? ANY ECONOMISTS OUT THERE? WHAT DO YOU THINK--TELL US. smedleybutlersociety(at)msn(dot)com
********************************************************Radio interview with Secretary Rumsfeld and Kirby Wilbur, KVI 570 AM Seattle, WA, July 27, 2006
THE WHOLE IRAQ THING IS BEING CAUSED BY OUTSIDE AGITATORS
RUMSFELD: "Outsiders are trying to stimulate conflict between the Shi'a and the Sunnis, and people in the country who would like to have the Sunnis take back the country are doing that. The Iranians are doing it on behalf of the Shi'a, and the damage that accrues to the country is serious."
THE CENTER OF GRAVITY:
RUMSFELD: "Well, you know, you've called it. I mean, the center of gravity of this war is not in Iraq or in Afghanistan. It is really in the United States, and it's in the capitals of the countries around the world where the people are free and they recognize that we're in a struggle against violent extremists."
AMERICANS HAVE A GOOD ONE
RUMSFELD: "You know, if you think about it, there were times in the Civil War, in the Revolutionary War, there were always people that were opposed. There were always people who said the loss of life and the loss of funds were too great for the -- to continue, and we should toss in the towel. We wouldn't have the country we have today if the American people didn't have a good center of gravity and the ability to understand what's truly important, and then to persevere. And that's been our whole history."
************************************************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld and Dave Elswick, KARN, Little Rock, AR, July 27, 2006
ON IRAQ
RUMSFELD: "Well, I think you're certainly right that there is an enormous amount of negative press coverage about Iraq. On the other hand, the prime minister of Iraq was elected by -- 12 million people voted in that election, based on a constitution that the Iraqi people risked their lives to draft and then to have a referendum passing it. He came here and told the American people how much the Iraqi people and he appreciate what the American people have done, what the troops have done, the support that the coalition has provided and the opportunities that it's provided the Iraqi people. He's a serious person; he's a thoughtful person; he's a courageous person. He's appointed some excellent people to his cabinet. And I think we have every reason to believe that, given some time and the opportunity, that he'll be successful in doing what's seeking to do.
TRUTH: Mr al-Maliki only became Prime Minister because the US and Britain were determined to get rid of his predecessor, Ibrahim al-Jaafari. Mr al-Maliki is inexperienced, personally isolated without his own kitchen cabinet, guarded by American guards and heavily reliant on shadowy US advisers. http://www.counterpunch.org/patrick07262006.html
ON LEBANON
RUMSFELD: "Well, I think it does, in this sense: We've seen indication that people are giving additional money to Hezbollah and that they're gaining some recruits, which ought not to be surprising, since they're being traumatized on the press -- in the press -- as being a fighter for their beliefs. Actually, they went in and kidnapped people and are firing rockets and killing innocent people in Israel. It's not terribly admirable, but the effect of the publicity is that they do gain some benefit."
TRUTH: So the chronology of war has been reorganized: now we are being told that Israel was forced to attack Lebanon to defend itself from the barrage of Hizbullah rockets falling on Israeli civilians. The international community is buying the argument hook, line and sinker. "Israel has the right to defend itself", says every politician who can find a microphone to talk into.But, if we cast our minds back, that is not how the "Middle East crisis", as TV channels now describe it, started. It is worth recapping on those early events (and I won't document the long history of Lebanese suffering at Israel's hands that preceded it) before they become entirely shrouded in the mythology being peddled by Horowitz and others. http://www.counterpunch.org/cook07262006.html
********************************************************Remarks by Secretary Rumsfeld during a Town Hall Meeting with U.S. Troops, Balad Air Base, Iraq, July 12, 2006
WE'VE OCCUPIED IRAQ FOR OVER THREE YEARS BUT HAVEN'T YET SECURED THE CAPITAL CITY--NOW THAT'S MILITARY SUCCESS
"General Casey, thank you so much, and thank you for your superb leadership on behalf of the country and the armed forces of the United States here in this important -- critically important theater. George Casey, you are -- or your country is in debt to you, and we appreciate it." (Applause, cheers.)
WE COULDN'T DO IT WITHOUT THE AIR FORCE
"Not only do we have Air Force pilots providing close air support for the ground troops, as they have in previous wars, but with nowhere near the coordination and precision that we see today. We also have Air Force mechanics helping to up-armor Humvees and airmen guarding Army convoys."
AND THE NAVY
"There are Navy people here doing things that Navy people normally would not be doing in a ground combat environment"
AND THE NEW IRAQI ARMY
"More than a quarter of a million Iraqi security forces have now been trained and equipped by coalition forces. Increasingly, they're leading operations and taking control of their country."
BUT FOR A MORE REALISTIC LOOK AT THE NEW IRAQI ARMY GO HERE
WHAT IS VICTORY?
"First and foremost, it's helping the Iraqi people take the fight to the enemy." [BUT THE IRAQI PEOPLE ARE THE ENEMY, SO .. .]
WE'RE FIGHTING IRAQIS BECAUSE OF 9/11, OF COURSE (EVEN THOUGH THERE'S NO CONNECTION)
"When you think about it, something important, something new happened on September 11th, 2001. Up until that point, America and our allies almost exclusively reacted to what the terrorists did. Now, terrorists are being forced to react to what our coalition is doing to them."
RUMMY INVENTS HISTORY, AGAIN
"Early on at various times, our efforts in postwar Germany and in postwar Japan were declared failures before those two nations developed to become America's allies during the Cold War and thereafter."
WITH FIBER AND GRIT
"And it's because our people persevered that America is the truly amazing nation that it is today. This was not happenstance. This was not luck. It was fiber. It was grit."
AND GOD'S BLESSING ON OUR BENEVOLENT CRUSADE
"So God bless you, and God bless our wonderful country."
SPEAKING OF GOD, HOW ABOUT THE CALIPHATE THREAT?
"If you think about it, the sectarian violence has a purpose. The people engaged in it are not engaged in it for no reason at all, and one of the purposes they're -- they have in mind, probably the first and most important, is there are those who would like to see a civil war in this country. They would like -- they have decided -- they know they can't win on the battlefield. The only way they can win, they believe, is to create anarchy and to cause the country to become a failed state so that they can then pick up the pieces and impose their will and establish a caliphate here."
AND THE (LOGICAL) RESISTANCE TO CHANGE
"A second reason for sectarian violence, in my view, and General Casey may want to make some comments on this as well, second reason is a desire to affect the political process so that they can improve their position with respect to economic power in the country. So to the extent the Sunnis ruled this country for many decades and they now see that they're in the minority and they have a Shi'a prime minister and a majority of -- a large number of Shi'a in the Parliament, they look at that and say, "How might that be changed, and what can we do to find a way to assure that our group ends up with greater economic power?" And I think that's another reason."
SO THE POLITICAL (NOT MILITARY) PROCESS MUST GO ON
"Let's say that I'm right and that those are two of the most important reasons. The solution to that is not military. The solution to that obviously is what the Prime Minister Maliki is trying to do, and that is, a reach-out to the Sunni community to attempt to fashion a reconciliation process that will bring together the elements of this country on a basis that they can kind of nod their head and say, "That's fair, that process that we’ve just gone through where we're going to share power and it's going to be balanced and reasonable and we're going to be protected by that piece of paper, that constitution."
THE ENEMY TRIES TO SHOCK AND AWE--JUST LIKE US!
"They have media committees. They sit down and they plan what are the kinds of attacks that can have the -- not necessarily to kill the maximum number of people, but designed specifically to alter behavior, to intimidate, and to instill fear in people, all people, free people, and to get them to alter their behavior. So they know what they're doing and they're good at it."
HOW ABOUT THE IRAQI GOVERNMENT PARDONING OUR ENEMIES?
"Historically, it is a very normal process after a conflict for there to be a period where there is some sort of a reconciliation process where people are brought together in a variety of different ways. They try to see that each element of that country has an interest in and a stake in the success of that country. And so they draw people in."
IT'S KIND OF LIKE THE PARDONING OF OUR 'NAM ERA DRAFT EVADERS (???)
"We had, for example, in our country an amnesty for people who went to Canada and didn’t want to serve, and it was after a period of time to try to end that chapter in a way that brought the country together."
****************************************Media Availability with Secretary Rumsfeld En Route to Iraq, July 12, 2006
WE'VE OCCUPIED IRAQ FOR OVER THREE YEARS, AND ACCORDING TO RUMMY THE IRAQIS HAVE OVER 265,000 SECURITY FORCES [http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2006/tr20060708-13428.html] BUT THE CAPITAL IS STILL NOT SECURE, SO HAVE WE CONSIDERED PUTTING MORE US TROOPS IN BAGHDAD?
"I'm sure there is. I mean, we do -- those people consider those things all the time. But they just went from -- I'm going to guess 40,000 to 55,000."
AND BAGHDAD SECURITY IS A US RESPONSIBILITY
"And the people that are in charge of Baghdad security, my recollection is it's General Thurman who ?? there, working with General Chiarelli and General Casey. I'm sure they consider these things all the time."
BUT THE IRAQIS NEED TO DO MORE
"The problem in Baghdad is basically that -- first of all, there are portions of Baghdad that are quite without incidents. And then there are groups that are -- armed groups that rove the place, and when our forces go in, they disappear. So that tells you something. It's not like you can find an enemy and go in an address them. It is a task that's as much a political task as any, and they're going to have to engage in the reconciliation process with the Sunnis, and they're going to have address the Shi'a armed groups politically, and then they're going to have to use Iraqi forces and coalition forces to deal with the remnants. And at what pace they do that is not something which is my level of detail. . . They have to persuade as many people as possible that it's in their interest to support the government and to participate in the political process. Anyone who doesn't want to, they're going to have to go find and do something about. That's what I mean."
THE JOKE OF THE DAY
"They're a sovereign country [EXCEPT IN THEIR CAPITAL, BAGHDAD], and they're going to have their priorities. And our people will be working with them to see that they understand the things that we think are important, and then they'll come to a conclusion and proceed."
BECAUSE WHEN IT COMES TO THE RAPE/MURDER OF IRAQIS
"We have arrangements so that our people are processed by our people, and that's under the Coalition Provisional Authority regulations which have been blessed by the Iraqi government. Until changed, that's the way things will be handled."
BUT SHOULDN'T THE "SOVEREIGN" IRAQIS BE INVOLVED?
"The fact is that under the rules that exist with the Iraqi government, these matters will be handled as I've suggested. And that is exactly how they're being handled."
WILL THE SUPREME COURT DECISION CHANGE THE WAY WE KIDNAP, TORTURE AND IMPRISON PEOPLE WITHOUT TRIAL?
"No. I don't think it will change the treatment. The president, from the very outset, has required that prisoners of all types be treated humanely. And that -- to the extent anyone was functioning within the proper rules of the department and the executive branch of the federal government, they were treated humanely. And to the extent that someone was not treated humanely or was alleged not to have, there's punishment by the military justice system, as it should have been." p>DoD News Briefing with Secretary Rumsfeld and President Karzai from Afghanistan, July 11, 2006
WE'RE KILLING A LOT OF PEOPLE IN AFGHANISTAN, BUT AREN'T WE STILL LOSING? (VIETNAM REDUX)
"Well I think if you look at the number of terrorists and Taliban and al Qaeda that are being killed every month, it would be hard for them to say that the Coalition forces and the Afghan security forces were losing."
****************************************DoD News Briefing with Secretary Rumsfeld and Minister Nazarov from Tajikistan, July 10, 2006
JOKE OF THE DAY: "We're not, as you know, interested in establishing bases around the world. Indeed we have been reducing bases in the world."
**************************Media Availability with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld en route to Tajikistan, July 9, 2006
THE INCREASING STRENGTH OF THE TALIBAN (OUR FORMER ALLIES) IN AFGHANISTAN IS ACTUALLY A GOOD THING
"So I think if we can be -- the Karzai government is concerned about it. They're attentive to it. And on the other hand, you look at the Taliban, every time they come together, you know, 20, 30, 40, 50, they get hit and they get hurt. And so the fact that you see a somewhat different method of operation during this period is correct, but it has not necessarily been disadvantageous because the more that are in one place, the easier they are to attack."
BUT WE NEED TO SEND MORE TROOPS
"We've made several assessments over the last several years. We've looked at it -- looking at the total, looking at the mix of Afghan -- correction -- army versus police, and what their respective roles might be. The actual numbers are going up, not only because the Afghan numbers are going up but because the NATO numbers are going up. So the numbers actually increase."
IT'S THE DRUGS
"I'm concerned about the role that narcotics are playing in this in this sense; you have -- when there's that much money involved, you have to worry that it's going to be attractive. And the demand out of Europe, Western Europe and Russia for these drugs is substantial. And I do worry that the funds that come from the sale of those products could conceivably end up adversely affecting the democratic process in the country. I also think any time there is that much money floating around and you have people like the Taliban, that it gives them an opportunity to fund their efforts in various ways."
SO WHAT CAN WE DO? JUST SAY NO?
"What it's going to take, like -- what can be done in the United States, what can be done anywhere. It's a demand problem. It isn't a supply problem. And the demand's enormous. And the -- to cope with it in a specific country requires a master plan. It requires a government -- a Karzai government, and it requires a public affairs element, it requires a(n) eradication effort, it requires a(n) attack on the processing portion, it requires crop substitution, it requires a criminal justice system so that you can protect people who are judging people who are engaged in that trade. You can protect prosecutors, you can protect witnesses, you can protect jurors who make decisions with respect to people engaged in that.
JUST LIKE IN ITALY, RIGHT RUMMY?
"We've seen in Italy, they've had to do certain things that are unusual. And it requires all of those things to be brought to bear on the problem in an organized, systematic and sustained way. Western Europe ought to have an enormous interest in the success in Afghanistan, and it's going to take a lot more effort on their part for the Karzai government to be successful."
**************************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on The Monica Crowley Show, July 8, 2006
HOW ABOUT NORTH KOREA, RUMMMY, DOES "ONE HAVE TO BELIEVE" IT IS A THREAT?
"Well, we know that they are the -- that they have announced that they have nuclear weapons. We know that they have ballistic missiles. We do not at the moment know whether or not they have developed the ability to mate a nuclear weapon with a ballistic missile. We also know that they are probably the world's leading proliferator of ballistic missile technology; that they counterfeit our money; that they are on the terrorist list; that they sell illicit drugs and one has to believe that they would be willing to sell fissile material if they believed they had a sufficient quantity. So they represent an immediate threat from a proliferation standpoint."
THEY DON'T INVADE OTHER COUNTRIES LIKE WE DO, BUT
". . . they're a worrisome country."
RUMMY'S HAVING TROUBLE UNDERSTANDING THE SUPREME COURT DECISION THAT HE CAN'T LEGALLY KIDNAP AND TORTURE PEOPLE, AND IMPRISON THEM INTERMINABLY WITHOUT CHARGES
"There's a good deal of confusion about what the court actually said, and I think people are still trying to figure it out. The -- our Justice Department is in the process of trying to come to some conclusions about it. The one thing we know they did say was that we can work with the Congress to fashion an approach that might very well fit the circumstance we're in."
WHEN WE INVADE COUNTRIES WE DON'T EXPECT THE CITIZENS (AKA TERRORISTS) TO RESIST
"I mean, this is not an army fighting an army under the laws of war. This is a world that's confronted by terrorist networks that are -- don't wear uniforms, and they don't carry their weapons publicly, and they kill innocent men, women and children. And their goal is to terrorize people and to alter free people's behavior. And the idea that we need to treat them as though they're stealing hubcaps off the streets of our cities and then have a jury trial and then send them to jail for a month is certainly not going to work. The people down in Guantanamo Bay are people that have been deeply involved in killing Americans and in threatening to kill people, and they're bad people. This fellow Hamdan was a -- one of the drivers and associates of Osama bin Laden."[AND HE FAILED TO USE TURN SIGNALS?]
WE GOT WHIPPED IN OUR OCCUPATION OF VIETNAM, RUMMY, IS IT HAPPENING AGAIN?
"There's no way we can lose this battle with the terrorists in Iraq or in Afghanistan. The only place you could lose it, if you lost your will here in Washington, D.C."
**************************************Radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on the Eileen Byrne Show, WLS Chicago, July 7, 2006
WHY ARE THE NORTH KOREANS TESTING MISSILES? THE SAME REASON WE DO
"We do know that they are one of the major proliferators in the world of ballistic missile technology, and as such, they may very well be engaged in some testing programs to help their marketing program. They also may be doing it just to threaten people and try to scare people and get attention."
THEY ARE TRYING TO GET US TO TALK TO THEM, BUT . . .
"They're going to fail because there isn't a chance in the world that the United States is going to go back into a bilateral discussion with North Korea on these matters."
NEWS: RUMMY THINKS BUSH WAS RIGHT NOT TO ATTACK NORTH KOREA
"I think the president's exactly right in this case that the diplomatic path is the correct one - and that a pre-emptive strike against that missile launch, while it was still on the stand was not appropriate, and that was the decision the president made and I certainly agree with it."
TORTURE HAS BEEN NATIONAL POLICY, OKAYED BY THE ATTORNEY GENERAL, AND LYNDIE ENGLAND IS IN PRISON, SO ALL'S WELL
"The fact of the matter is that of course some people on the midnight shift at Abu Ghraib did some things they clearly should not have done. And they've been punished by the Uniform Code of Military Justice for it, and they're serving terms in prison."
BUT THAT DARN CONGRESS WON'T LET IT GO
"I can't imagine, frankly, why the people want to go back over those things at this stage. The United States armed forces have been able to identify wrongdoing, investigate it and prosecute it successfully for many decades, and they're doing so today."
AND THE PRESS GETS ALL UPSET ABOUT A FEW THOUSAND DEAD PEOPLE
"It seems that an awful lot of people in that business tend to feel that the negative is more newsworthy, so it tends to get hyped. And the work that's being done over there -- the schools that are open, the hospitals that are open, the clinics that are functioning, and the good work that's being done by the coalition forces, and the good work that's being done by honorable Iraqi people and Afghan people -- tends to not be as noticeable as the violence."
THE SUPREME COURT HAS RULED THAT THE PEOPLE WE'VE KIDNAPPED AND CONFINED WITHOUT CHARGES DESERVE DUE PROCESS
"The government is -- the lawyers, the Department of Justice and everyone are trying to figure out exactly what should be done next. And I think you've elevated the issue well, that the fact of the matter is Geneva was designed to protect those people who behaved in a manner that was consistent with the laws of war. They wore uniforms. They carried their weapons openly, and they conducted themselves in a certain manner, and they were accorded certain rights as a result of that. To treat people who are terrorists and kill innocent men, women and children and don't carry their weapons publicly and don't wear uniforms and behave in a totally different way that's inconsistent with the laws of war -- to treat them identically and to accord them all of those same opportunities, it strikes me as unusual. And I don't know where it will all come out. And the people who are experts at the law are now working on it. And my guess is we'll end up working with the Congress in fashioning some legislation that very likely will solve the problem."
************************************DoD News Briefing with Secretary Rumsfeld and Minister Nelson from the Pentagon, June 28, 2006
WHAT ABOUT ALL THIS MONEY WE'RE SPENDING (THAT WE DON'T HAVE)?
"The cost of any conflict in history has been impossible to predict. The cost of September 11th has been estimated by various people, and it was enormous; hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars, billions of dollars. And the price to our country and to other countries of another September 11th would be potentially multiples of that."
BUT COMPARED TO WHAT BIG OIL, THE BIG BANKS AND BIG PHARMA ETC. ARE PULLING IN, IT'S ALMOST NOTHING
"What -- all in all, if you add everything up, the United States government today is spending about 3.7 or 3.8 percent of gross domestic product on defense. When I came to Washington in 1950, during the Eisenhower and the Kennedy era, we were spending 10 percent of GDP. When I was secretary of Defense 30 years ago, we were spending 5 or 6 percent of GDP. And today we're spending 3.7 or (3.)8 percent of gross domestic product."
AND THESE CORPORATIONS WOULDN'T BE RAKING IT IN WITHOUT US SPENDING HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS TO WORSEN OUR SECURITY
"So the benefit that the American people have from a security system that enables the kind of opportunity that we have and that other stakeholders in the global system have is what -- it undergirds those opportunities. And I think what we have to do is accept the reality that it is going to cost some money. I know people were up testifying recently that we're going to have to see that we get our equipment refurbished and reset so that we have the kinds of capabilities that will be necessary to contribute to peace and stability in the world."
********************************************************June 23, 2006: Rumsfeld has been on a short leash this month--no interviews--nothing new or interesting.
********************************************************Press Availability with Secretary Rumsfeld in Vietnam, June 5, 2006
WE'RE NOT SORE LOSERS IN VIETNAM
"I think it ought not to be surprising, it seems to me, that the United States is developing a very good relationship with Vietnam. Just as it ought not to have been surprising that we did so with countries that were engaged on the other side in previous conflicts, whether World War II or Korea."
*******************************************************Remarks by Secretary Rumsfeld at the International Institute for Strategic Studies Conference, Singapore, jUNE 3, 2006
CHINA, WHO HASN'T INVADED ANY COUNTRY, AND HAS A MILITARY AND NAVAL FORCES WHICH ARE A FRACTION OF OURS, NEEDS TO BE "MORE TRAMSPARENT"
"It isn’t that China ought not to be able to invest in whatever it wants to invest in; the only issue on transparency is China would benefit by demystifying to some extent the reasons why they are investing in what they are investing, in my view. On the other hand, they have a free choice to not do that, and of course, there is a consequence to that just as there is a consequence to almost every choice nations make."
BECAUSE RUMMY IS CONCERNED ABOUT CAPITAL INVESTMENT IN CHINA
"To the extent that the world looks at China and sees a behavior pattern that is mysterious and potentially threatening it tends to affect the willingness to invest. Money is a coward. Money isn’t attracted to places where it looks like it’s dangerous. And so, my guess is over time they’ll get more comfortable being part of the world and they will begin to -- in one way or another -- develop a comfort level that’s different than today and the world will gain more and more knowledge about them and what they’re doing and why they’re doing what they’re doing, and that will then have an effect on what they do in fact do."
********************************************************Press Availability with Secretary Rumsfeld and Adm. Keating from Peterson Air Force Base, May 31, 2006
RUMMY SAYS OUR OCCUPATION OF IRAQ IS UNNATURAL
"You know, there's a tension between -- with respect to the number of forces in a foreign country. It's unnatural to have foreign forces in a country. And to the extent you have too many and you are too intrusive, you can feed an insurgency and contribute to people supporting an insurgency. To the extent you have too few at any given time, the political process can't go forward, and the economic progress can't go forward."
WHY DO WE STILL HAVE A 500 BILLION DOLLAR MILITARY (CORPORATE WELFARE) PROGRAM WHEN THERE IS NO THREAT? DON'T ASK RUMMY.
"I think that most institutions and organizations that were fashioned for one purpose, the Cold War or World War II, had to change and evolve from World War II to the Cold War. And most institutions have to evolve and adjust and change to fit the 21st century, and the fact that we're faced not with nation-states contesting with big armies and big air forces and big navies, but we're faced with networks of violent extremists who are determined to end our free way of life, who are determined to overthrow moderate Muslim regimes in that part of the world."
HOW LONG WILL THIS IRAQ FIASCO LAST?
"I don't know -- history -- if you took all of the insurgencies one could think of in modern times and added them all together and dropped a plumb line through it and say, "How long have they lasted," well, they'd probably lasted, you know, at the short end, maybe five, six years; at the long end, 12, 15-plus. Maybe there's an average of eight, 10, 12, 13 -- I'm guessing at this -- that's -- don't take that to the bank."
********************************************************Department of Defense Town Hall Meeting with Secretary Rumsfeld and Gen. Pace, May 19, 2006
RUMMY'S SETTING US UP FOR ANOTHER 9/11
"It's been a long time since September 11th. There's a tendency for people -- the longer the time passes, that it kind of slips from people's minds. And one way to think about it is this: imagine another 9/11 in this country six months from now of a size or twice that size or three times that size, which is perfectly possible in this day and age."
SO HE ASKS A NONSENSICAL QUESTION
"But if, in one's mind -- if you project out six months and assume another September 11th of some size, the question we have to ask ourselves every day is, 'What ought we to be doing now to avoid that, to prevent that, to mitigate that, were it to actually occur?'"
TO MOTIVATE THE PENTAGON FAITHFUL
"And it's that incentive, that impetus, that sense of urgency that comes from that that I think motivates this institution, all of you here."
IN THE STRUGGLE WITHIN THE MUSLIM RELIGION (HE REALLY SAID THAT)
"But it does take all elements of national power to prevail against an enemy that is not a nation-state, to prevail in this struggle that's taking place within the Muslim religion between violent extremists -- a very small number percentage-wise -- and the overwhelming majority of Muslims who do not adhere to the extremists' views of the few."
SO THINK OF WAYS TO PREVENT ANOTHER 9/11 (LIKE LEAVE IRAQ? STOP SUPPORTING ISRAEL?)
"Every one of you volunteered to be a part of this department, and we're grateful to you for that. And we appreciate what you do. I would -- the only thing I would add would be to remind yourself of what could happen six months from now, and every day give a thought to what view in whatever you're doing, what you might do different or better or faster or harder to prevent that from happening."
********************************************************radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on the "Brian and the Judge Show", Fox News Radio, May 10
DO WE HAVE MILITARY FORCES IN IRAN, AS REPORTED?
"We do not have forces, as such, doing things."
********************************************************radio Interview with Secretary Rumsfeld on the Hugh Hewitt Show, May 9
WHY ARE WE IN IRAQ?
"We face today threats here at home - we lost 3,000 people in one day. The enemy is vicious. The enemy is determined. The enemy is not going to go away. They’re determined to end our freedom and our free way of life, and they find it fundamentally inconsistent with their extremist views."
CAN WE LOSE THE WAR?
"Oh, sure. There’s no way we can lose it on the battlefield. The only place we can lose it is if we lose our nerve and if we decide that it’s just too tough and we’re going to toss in the towel. The dire consequences for the world, for the region, for the Iraqi people, for the Afghan people, and for the American people are so serious that the thought of it is just unacceptable."
WHAT WOULD THE DEFEAT LOOK LIKE?
"Well, the first thing we would have, you’d have Iraq as a country with oil and water and a large population as a haven for terrorists, re-established as a caliphate, a home, a sanctuary for extremists to attempt to re-establish a caliphate throughout that region and to destabilize the Muslim regimes in that region that aren’t extreme, and to then spread that to Southeast Asia and the rest of the world. It would enable them to have weapons programs and gain access to powerful, lethal weapons that could put at risk many multiples of the people that were lost on September 11th. It would be a tragedy."
ARE WE WINNING OR LOSING THE "GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR?"
"Well I think we’re winning, and I say that for this reason. We’re winning in the sense that because of the Coalition that President Bush and his team have put together, 70 or 85 nations, the biggest in history coalition I think, the pressure that’s being put on terrorists is real. It’s harder for them to do everything they need to do. It’s harder for them to talk to each other. It’s harder for them to travel. It’s harder for them to raise money. It’s harder to recruit. It’s harder to retain. It’s harder to train. All the things they need to do to kill people and to threaten people and indeed, to use the proper word, to terrorize people and alter their behavior, are much more difficult today than they were. We’re fortunate that we’ve not hadanother terrorist attack in this country."
*******************************************************THE ALBANY TIMES UNION HAS AN OPINION OF RUMMY . . .
There are at least two general but nonetheless compelling reasons why Donald Rumsfeld should be required to resign immediately as secretary of defense. One is the stunning lack of competence he's demonstrated during the past five-and-a-half years. We've called for him to step down, on those grounds, three times in less than two years.
. . . "A LIAR"
But then there's the even more troubling matter of his utter lack of integrity. Mr. Rumsfeld's tenure at the Pentagon has been marked by a series of misstatements he made about Iraqi weapons capability before the U.S. invasion in March 2003. Worse, Mr. Rumsfeld denies making those statements. That makes him a liar.
********************************************************news briefing, May 9
RUMMY SAYS HE NEEDS MORE MONEY TO TRAIN IRAQIS SO WE CAN WITHDRAW--
"In addition, cuts and delays in providing funds for the Iraqi security forces will delay what has been truly significant progress in turning over greater responsibility and territory to Iraq's army and police. A slowdown in training and equipping the Iraqi security forces will have unacceptable harmful effects of postponing the day when our men and women in uniform can return home with the honor and appreciation they deserve."
BUT IN A RECENT NEWS REPORT--
WASHINGTON --The U.S. military has spent just 40 percent of the $7 billion appropriated in 2005 for the training of Iraqi and Afghanistan security forces, a top Pentagon priority that is lynchpin for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.
The slow pace of spending was outlined in a congressional report that also raised questions about whether the Pentagon needs the full $5.9 billion it has requested for training this year in an emergency spending bill that is pending in Congress.
The report comes as Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the Bush administration have complained about cuts in the funding for Iraqi forces that is included in the House-passed version of the bill.
THERE'S NO POWER PLAY GOING ON IN WASHINGTON (and there's no calories in beer)
"If you look at the debate and the articles in the newspaper and the comments that are being made, they are about theoretical conspiracies, they're about theoretical bureaucratic turf fights -- they're all off the mark."
LET'S PUT IT IN MEDICAL TERMS
"You know, there's a saying for people who miss the mark consistently, and they say that person has an instinct for the capillaries, as opposed to the more important arteries. And this debate really reflects that reality. It should be a bit embarrassing for people to see what's going on."
AND DIETARY TERMS
"I'm sure there are people in the middle who bulge out from time to time, but those things get worked out."
HOW ABOUT THOSE FIVE HUNDRED INNOCENT PEOPLE WE'VE HELD AND TORTURED IN GITMO FOR FIVE YEARS?
"We've simultaneously been going down a different track here, and that is to try to get the military commission process going in a way that, in fact, we would be able to take those individuals, where it would be appropriate -- and this is the president's decision, obviously, and he's the one who makes recommendations to the department to try some individual in a military commission."
BUT WE CAN'T GET OUR KANGAROO COURTS GOING BECAUSE LAWYERS GET IN THE WAY
"But regrettably, the court system in the United States has been used very skillfully by defense lawyers to the point where we've not been able to have military commissions try these people."
THE CIA MADE UP STORIES TO GET US INTO IRAQ--WHAT ABOUT IRAN?
"The intelligence community had views on Iraq. That information was available to the president, to me, it was the information that was available to Secretary Colin Powell and Condi Rice, when they and George Tenet worked on his presentation for the United Nations over a period of many days. It was the intelligence information that was available to the Congress of the United States. It was available to other countries that had exactly the same view that we all did. It turns out it was wrong -- that intelligence.
"Fair enough. It's a tough business. It's a difficult thing to be right all the time. And the information was not correct. Does that give one pause? You bet."
Q (Off mike) -- on Iran's capabilities and intent. That's what I'm asking --
SEC. RUMSFELD: "You bet. And you're dealing with a closed society there. And so, clearly, one has to be very careful."
Q Well, what are the policy implications that, if you've got Hayden going into the CIA -- if he's approved. And what improvements have to be made within the agency --
SEC. RUMSFELD: "That's their business. I'm not going to do a work plan for Mike Hayden over at the CIA, or for John Negroponte. I think they're doing fine. They're hard at it, and we're working closely together, and it's a very constructive set of relationships."
Q But you're the consumer. You're asked to go -- to plan military strikes based on intelligence that you may have pause about. That's why I'm asking.
SEC. RUMSFELD: "I -- I'm not going to get into that."
********************************************************fireworks in Atlanta, May 4
SEC. RUMSFELD: Ahh, yeah. Terrific. Thank you. I hope you do. Where am I? Here.
RAY MCGOVERN: I'm Ray McGovern, a 27-year veteran of the Central Intelligence Agency and co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. (Light laughter.) I would like to compliment you on your observation that lies are fundamentally destructive of the trust that government needs to govern. A colleague of mine, Paul Pillar, who is the top agency analyst on the Middle East and on counterterrorism accused you and your colleagues of an organized campaign of manipulation, quote, "I suppose by some definition" --
SEC. RUMSFELD: Could you get to your question, please?
MR. MCGOVERN: -- that's been called a lie. Atlanta, September 27th, 2002, Donald Rumsfeld said, and I quote, "There is bullet-proof evidence of links between al Qaeda and the government of President Saddam Hussein." Was that a lie, Mr. Rumsfeld, or was that manufactured somewhere else, because all of my CIA colleagues disputed that and so did the 9/11 commission. And so I would like to ask you to be up front with the American people. Why did you lie to get us into a war that was not necessary and that has caused these kinds of casualties?
AUDIENCE: (Booing.)
MR. MCGOVERN: Why?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Well, first of all, I haven't lied. I did not lie then -- (applause). Colin Powell didn't lie. He spent weeks and weeks with the Central Intelligence Agency people and prepared a presentation that I know he believed was accurate, and he presented that to the United Nations. The president spent weeks and weeks with the Central Intelligence people, and he went to the American people and made a presentation. I'm not in the intelligence business. They gave the world their honest opinions. It appears that there were not weapons of mass destruction there.
MR. MCGOVERN: You said you knew where they were.
SEC. RUMSFELD: I did not. I said I knew where suspect sites were, and we were --
MR. MCGOVERN: You said -- you said you knew where they were near Tikrit, near Baghdad and northeast, south and west of there. Those are your words.
SEC. RUMSFELD: My words -- my words were that -- no, no, no. Wait a minute, wait a minute. Let him stay one second -- just a second. (Referring to security removing Ray McGovern from the press conference.)
MR. MCGOVERN: This is America, huh?
Q Yeah. (Applause.)
SEC. RUMSFELD: You're getting plenty of play, sir. (Laughter.)
MR. MCGOVERN: I'd just like an honest answer.
SEC. RUMSFELD: I'm giving it to you.
MR. MCGOVERN: We're talking about lies and your allegation that there was bullet-proof evidence of ties between al Qaeda and Iraq. Was that a lie or were you misled?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Zarqawi was in Baghdad during the prewar period. That is a fact.
MR. MCGOVERN: Zarqawi -- he was in the north of Iraq in a place where Saddam Hussein had no rule. That's where he was.
SEC. RUMSFELD: He was also -- he was also in Baghdad.
MR. MCGOVERN: Yeah, when he needed to go to the hospital. Come on, these people aren't idiots, they know the story.
SEC. RUMSFELD: You are -- let me -- let me give you an example. It's easy for you to make a charge. But why do you think that the men and women in uniform, every day when they came out of Kuwait and went into Iraq, put on chemical weapon protective suits? Because they liked the style? (Laughter.) They honestly believed that there were chemical weapons. Saddam Hussein had used chemical weapons on his own people previously; he'd used them on his neighbor, the Iranians. And they believed he had those weapons. We believed he had those weapons.
MR. MCGOVERN: That's what we call a non sequitur. It doesn't matter what the troops believe --
MR. WHITE: I -- I think -- I think --
MR. MCGOVERN: -- it matters what you believe.
MR. WHITE: I think, Mr. Secretary, the debate is over. We have other questions, as a courtesy to the audience. (Applause.)
MR. MCGOVERN: Okay.
************here's the transcript from the DoD site from 2003:
MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: Finally, weapons of mass destruction. Key goal of the military campaign is finding those weapons of mass destruction. None have been found yet. There was a raid on the Answar Al-Islam Camp up in the north last night. A lot of people expected to find ricin there. None was found. How big of a problem is that? And is it curious to you that given how much control U.S. and coalition forces now have in the country, they haven't found any weapons of mass destruction?
SEC. RUMSFELD: Not at all. If you think -- let me take that, both pieces -- the area in the south and the west and the north that coalition forces control is substantial. It happens not to be the area where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed. We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat.
*************here's the Pentagon version of the Atlanta confrontation:
Rumsfeld was interrupted three times by protesters who stood up at their seats in the auditorium, held up yellow signs, and shouted at him before being escorted out. And during a question-and-answer session, a man who claimed to be a 27-year CIA veteran challenged the secretary on pre-war intelligence assessments that led to the determination that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. "Why did you lie to get us into a war that was not necessary, that has caused these kinds of casualties?" he asked.
"Well first of all, I haven't lied; I did not lie," Rumsfeld responded. "(Then-Secretary of State) Colin Powell didn't lie. He spent weeks and weeks with the Central Intelligence Agency and prepared a presentation that I know he believed was accurate. And he presented that to the United Nations.
"The president spent weeks and weeks with the Central Intelligence Agency, and he went to the American people and made the presentation," he continued. "They gave the world their honest opinion."
**************the MSM fulfills its role as government lackey:
After a speech by Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld on May 4, retired CIA analyst Ray McGovern questioned Rumsfeld over his previous claims about Iraq's purported weapons of mass destruction and ties to Al Qaeda. Rumsfeld gave misleading answers, which McGovern pointed out during the exchange. But in their coverage, NBC, CBS, and Fox News deceptively edited the exchange, excluding McGovern's rebuttals of Rumsfeld's claims without noting that they had done so.
*****************here's Rumsfeld on January 29, 2003:
"As the President pointed out, the Iraqi regime has not accounted for some 38,000 liters of botulism toxin, 500 tons of Sarin, mustard gas, VX nerve agent, upwards of 30,000 munitions capable of delivering chemical weapons, and a number of mobile biological labs designed to produce biological weapons while evading detection. His regime has the design for a nuclear weapon; it was working on several different methods of enriching uranium, and recently was discovered seeking significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
here's Rumsfeld on January 20, 2003:
"Saddam Hussein possesses chemical and biological weapons. He has used chemical weapons against foreign forces and his own people, in one case killing some 5,000 innocent civilians in a single day. . . His regime is paying a high price so that he can pursue weapons of mass destruction - giving up literally billions of dollars annually in oil revenues. He is determined. His regime has large, unaccounted for stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons - including VX, sarin, mustard gas, anthrax, botulism, and possibly smallpox - and he has an active program to acquire and develop nuclear weapons."
September 10, 2003
"And we were besieged with questions: "You haven't found any weapons of mass destruction yet. Why not?" And I said, very simply: Because all of our information is that they are in the -- more -- closer to Baghdad, in the area from Baghdad north, and we were not physically on the ground in that area at the present time.
"What we had, as Secretary Powell told the United Nations, is a long list of suspect sites. And they were sites that the inspectors had been in the process of looking at when they concluded that the inspection process really wasn't working, because of lack of cooperation on the part of Saddam Hussein's regime. And I said, "We know they're in that area." I should have said, "I believe we're in that area. Our intelligence tells us they're in that area," and that was our best judgment. And we were being pressed to find them while the war was still in its earliest, earliest days. And it seemed to me a somewhat unrealistic expectation."
**********************December 6, 2002
"In London, our discussions focused on how to achieve that goal of disarming Iraq’s weapons of mass terror, peacefully if at all possible, but by force if necessary. . . the time has come--once and for all--for Iraq to rid itself of weapons of mass destruction. . . The goal is disarmament--the elimination of Iraq’s programs to build chemical, biological and nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. . . .Let me repeat, we are trying to achieve the disarmament of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction--to eliminate this serious danger to the United States and to the world--if possible, by peaceful means. But, by one means or another, we will eliminate that threat."
******************
September 27, 2002
"They have amassed large clandestine stocks of biological weapons including anthrax and possibly smallpox. They have amassed large clandestine stockpiles of chemical weapons including VX and sarin and mustard gas. His regime has an active program to acquire and develop nuclear weapons."
*****************September 18, 2002
"We do know that the Iraqi regime currently has chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction, and we do know they're currently pursuing nuclear weapons . . . His regime has amassed large, clandestine stockpiles of chemical weapons--including VX, sarin, cyclosarin and mustard gas. His regime has an active program to acquire and develop nuclear weapons. . . . o They have the knowledge of how to produce nuclear weapons, and designs for at least two different nuclear devices.. . . o They have a team of scientists, technicians and engineers in place, as well as the infrastructure needed to build a weapon. . . . o Very likely all they need to complete a weapon is fissile material-and they are, at this moment, seeking that material-both from foreign sources and the capability to produce it indigenously."
**************other fireworks in Atlanta May 4
SEC RUMSFELD: . . . And we went in to meet him. It was Anwar Sadat. And he'd been an army officer. And he looked at us and said that he had no issue with the United States except Israel, and he wanted us to know that. And we probed, and it turns out he had been on an exchange, a military-to-military educational exchange program and spent some time --
GLORIA TATUM: (I/We ?) will not keep silent. This man deserves to be in prison for war crimes!
AUDIENCE: (Booing.)
MS. TATUM: (Off mike.)
AUDIENCE: (Booing.)
MS. TATUM: (Off mike) -- illegal war in Iraq! (Off mike) -- a nuclear war in Iran! You deserve to be in prison!
AUDIENCE: (Booing.)
MS. TATUM: And the world can't wait! We -- (off mike)!
Q Throw her out~!
MS. TATUM: (Off mike) --
Q I love you.
SEC. RUMSFELD: (Laughs, applause, cheers.) (Continued applause.) Good for you, Sergeant York. (Laughter, applause.)
MR. YORK (?): (Off mike.) (Laughter.)
SEC. RUMSFELD: I think we'll count her as undecided. (Laughter.) . . . And we're working with partners such as Japan and Australia on a regional missile defense basis to try to prevent --
MS. ROBERTS: (Shouting) Why should the Americans --
AUDIENCE: Oh! Come on! (Boos.)
MS. ROBERTS: -- (inaudible).
SEC. RUMSFELD: You know, that charge is frequently leveled against the president for one reason or another, and it is so wrong, and so unfair, and so destructive of a free system where people need to trust each other and government. And the idea that people in government are lying about something is fundamentally destructive of that trust and, at bedrock, untrue. . . . We may need to take a hard look at our existing security arrangements and institutions and examine whether they're sufficiently effective and agile to operate in a world that hostage-takers, suicide-bombers, terrorists --
HECKLER: How can you sit here and listen to this war criminal?
AUDIENCE: Oh! No!
HECKLER: You are a serial killer!
AUDIENCE MEMBERS: Sit down! Sit down!
HECKLER: This man needs to be impeached, along with George Bush. How can you sit here smiling and listen to this criminal?
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Booo!
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Get out of here!
HECKLER: You're a war criminal, Mr. Rumsfeld!
(Pause while heckler is removed by security.)
SEC. RUMSFELD: Like Peter said, just a few of his close, personal friends! (Laughter, applause.)
MR. WHITE: But, Mr. Secretary, he came from Chicago. (Laughter.)
SEC. RUMSFELD: Well -- (chuckles.)
***********memories of September 10, 2003
Heckler: Mr. Rumsfeld, you're fired! Your foreign policy is based on lies. The war in Iraq is unjust and illegal, and the occupation is immoral. There are U.S. soldiers dying in Iraq --
Heckler: Go home!
Heckler: -- every day! Still dying! Bring the troops home now.
Heckler: Tell us when the troops are coming home!
Hecklers: (Chanting.) Hey, Rumsfeld, what do you say? -- How many troops did you kill today?! Hey, Rumsfeld, what do you say? -- How many troops did you kill today?! Hey, Rumsfeld, what do you say? -- How many troops did you kill today?! (Hecklers escorted out of room.)
*******************and September 18, 2002 in Congress
AUDIENCE MEMBER [INTERRUPTS]: Yes, Mr. Rumsfeld, I think we need weapons inspections not war.
(APPLAUSE)
AUDIENCE MEMBER [INTERRUPTS]: Why are you obstructing the inspections? Is this really about oil? How many civilians will be killed? How many...
HUNTER: Secretary, would you suspend for a minute that we could ask the staff to see to it that our guests are escorted.
AUDIENCE MEMBERS [INTERRUPT]: Inspections not war. Inspections not war. Inspections not war. Inspections not war. Inspections not war.
***********************RUMMY WAS "WITHOUT AN EXPECTATION" ABOUT WAR CASUALTIES (IT WASN'T HIS ASS ON THE LINE)
Q Yes, Mr. Secretary, could you tell us about what you anticipate in terms of the number of wounded in the war in Iraq? And then secondly, tell us about the Wounded Warrior Program and those things that are going on to help the wounded men and women.
SEC. RUMSFELD: "I tell you, I have -- I'm 74 years old in a month or two, and I've seen a lot of people speculate about the cost of a war, the length of the war and the number of casualties in a war, and they've never been right. Therefore, I was without an expectation. And I recognize that no effort or no war plan survives first contact with the enemy because the enemy has a brain and they are constantly adjusting and adapting, and therefore our folks have to adjust and adapt and change their tactics and their techniques and procedures, and you don't know what the unknowables are.
"As the saying goes, there are no knowns. There are things you know you know. (Laughter.) You've heard this. (Laughter.) There are known unknowns, the things you know you don't know, but then there's that third category, and those are the unknown unknowns. And you can't know how much help is going to come in across those borders. You can't know how successful, for example, in the case of Iraq, the government will be in encompassing and bringing into the political process all of the elements. So there's just no way to answer those kinds of questions."
********************************************************interview in Baghdad 4/25
TODAY YOU HAD TO FLY IN IN SECRET AND WERE CONFINED TO THE GREEN ZONE--WHAT DOES THAT TELL YOU ABOUT SECURITY IN IRAQ? (after ten seconds of silence "I guess I don't think it says anything about it. . . I just don't see anything to your question."
*********************************************************interview 4/24 on the Pentagon Channel
WHY ARE WE IN IRAQ?
"We're there because it's important that we fight those terrorists and the violent extremists there rather than having to fight them back home, here in the United States.
OR MAYBE IT'S TO CONTAIN IRAN
"There's a lot of talk today about Iran, and concern about their nuclear program, concern about some of the things that have been said by the leadership in Iran. If one thinks about it, Iran borders Iraq and Iran borders Afghanistan. The last thing Iran wants is to have successful regimes, representative systems, free people in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is harmful to their view of the world, to their extreme view of the world.
"So those people who suggest that the cost is too great or it's taking too long and we should not stay the course, it seems to me have to think what it would do for Iran and how it would advance their cause. Their cause is a cause that's dangerous to the world.
"It seems to me that we need to put Iraq and Afghanistan in that context so that those people in our country who are deeply concerned about Iran, which is understandable, recognize that success in Afghanistan and success in Iraq is critical to containing the extreme impulses that we see emanating from Iran.
*******************************************************radio interview with Rusty Humphries, 4/18
Humphries is a typical Pentagon puppet--here's an example of the "questions" put to Rummy on these largely-scripted "interviews":
HUMPHRIES: I just saw you on TV a minute ago and I've got to ask you, why do you put up with it?
SECRETARY RUMSFELD: [Laughter].
HUMPHRIES: The stupid questions. You've got nothing to prove. You've got these generals, the critics; it's got to be driving you crazy.
--so we usually don't include this inanity in these reports--just Rummy's inanity
WHAT WENT WRONG IN IRAQ? CAN WE BLAME IT ON THE TURKS?
"We had the 4th Infantry Division that was due to come in from the north through Turkey, and the Turkish government at the last minute decided they didn't want us to bring that division through. Had that division - a very capable division - come in from the north it would have gone right into the Sunni Triangle, the area where Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist party was the strongest, and very likely would have captured or killed a good many of the people who are now conducting the insurgency. Instead, everything had to come in from the south for the most part. Therefore the Sunni area was left pretty much untouched, because Baghdad was between the south and the location where many of the Ba'athists were."
IT SEEMS THAT THESE "INSURGENTS" (AKA TERRORISTS) ARE PEOPLE WHO ARE OUR FORMER FRIENDS, IS THAT TRUE?
"That's true. The people that are causing the trouble over there are a mixture of foreign terrorists like Zarqawi who's a Jordanian, al-Qaida person; and then the Sunni insurgents, the Ba'athists who think they want to continue to run the country as they did for the last 30 years, filling up mass graves with hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women and children; and then some criminals who are just doing it for pay. So it's kind of a mixture of all of those things."
PEOPLE TALK ABOUT AN EXIT STRATEGY. CHURCHILL SAID HIS EXIT STRATEGY WAS VICTORY--IS VICTORY OUR EXIT STRATEGY?
"Yes, victory is what the goal is. On the other hand, that final victory, if you will, is more likely to be achieved by the Iraqi people and the Iraqi security forces over a period of years."
HOW MANY YEARS, RUMMY, AT TEN BILLION DOLLARS AND MANY LIVES PER MONTH?
"Insurgencies can last six, eight, ten, twelve years as they have in other countries and it's up to the local population, in this case the Iraqis, to manage their country and to suppress that insurgency over time, by making the environment inhospitable to them."
THE BAD GUYS WANT TO ESTABLISH A CALIPHATE OVER OUR OIL, RIGHT RUMMY?
"You have to remember that their goal is to take over that country, the terrorists and the enemy, because they want to establish a terrorist haven and a caliphate and take the money from oil and water in that country and use it against free people everywhere in the world, and kill innocent men, women and children like they're doing every day over there."
*******************************************************Rumsfeld is linked to torture at Gantanamo.Adios and goodby, Rummy.
*******************************************************interview with Rush Limbaugh, 4/17
TIP LINES ARE THE ANSWER IN IRAQ
"The problem is that you don't have a big Army, Navy or Air Force that you can go after. These are terrorists, these are insurgents, these are people that hide in the shadows; these are people that kill innocent men, women and children. They're not people that confront anybody in a formal way that you could go after. So what you have to do is create a presence, have a lot of tip lines so that calls can come in and people who are supportive of the country and the progress that's being made, can phone in to the Iraqi security forces or our forces and tell them where the bad people are, and then you have to just go root them out one or two at a time."
SO HOW'S PROGRESS IN IRAQ?
"Well, the progress has been good. We're now up to a quarter of a million Iraqi security forces and they're, as I say, taking over more and more bases and real estate all the time." [RUMMY SAID THERE WERE 237,000 A YEAR AGO]
WE TOLD THE IRAQIS WE DON'T WANT THEIR PICK FOR PRIME MINISTER, JAAFARI, BUT RUMMY SAYS:
"The insurgents do not want the government formed and there are elements in the country that are actively trying to prevent that."
HOW ABOUT THE CRITICISM OF YOU? IT COMES FROM THAT DUDE IN THE CAVE, RIGHT?
"I think we just have to accept it, that people have a right to say what they want to say and to have an acceptance of that and recognize that the terrorists, Zarqawi and bin Laden and Zawahiri, those people have media committees, they are actively out there trying to manipulate the press in the United States, they are very good at it, they're much better at managing those kinds of things than we are, and we have to recognize that we're not going to lose any battles in the global war on terror out in Iraq or Afghanistan."
IRAQ HAS TIES WITH 9/11, LONDON AND MADRID
"Our task in government, by golly, is to help protect the American people from people who killed 3,000 people here on September 11th, and killed people in London and Madrid and Bali and country after country around the world who have no problems beheading people and murdering innocent men, women and children."
WE'RE LUCKY TO HAVE LEADER BUSH
"We need people like President Bush who are serious people, who spend a great deal of time thinking through direction for our country, set us on that course, and then have the courage and the perseverance to stay on that course."
*******************************************************Interview with Talal Al-Haj, 4/13
WHEN CAN WE LEAVE IRAQ?
"Well, we'd like it to be as soon as possible, needless to say. And I think that's something we would discuss with the new Iraqi government and make sure that it was managed in a way that was appropriate from their standpoint and did not inject instability into the situation."
CAN YOU PUT IT IN CAPITALISTIC TERMS THAT WE CAN UNDERSTAND?
"A lot of people's lives have been invested in that country, a lot of money has been invested."
WE'RE STILL IN KOREA AND GERMANY AFTER FIFTY YEARS--HOW ABOUT IRAQ? HAVE YOU CONSIDERED COMMITTEES?
"We want to turn it over to the Iraqi people and have them manage their own affairs, but it's the kind of thing that would take conditions on the ground to enable that to happen. When the new government is formed we would set up some committees to start talking with them about what pieces of the responsibility they could continue to take over and at what pace."
A RECENT ZOGBY POLL FOUND THAT 29 PERCENT OF SOLDIERS IN IRAQ WANT TO LEAVE IMMEDIATELY . . .
"I would think 100 percent of our forces would prefer to be home. Their goal is to not be there, and that's perfectly understandable."
BUT WE DON'T CARE WHAT THEY THINK
"It seems to me that any President or any leadership that chases public opinion polls is not going to succeed."
ISN'T THERE A CIVIL WAR IN IRAQ?
"I'm not going to get into the debate as to semantics as to what is or is not a civil war. People can call whatever they want what's going on there."
AFTER THREE YEARS YOU DON'T EVEN CONTROL THE CAPITAL, RIGHT RUMMY?
"Baghdad is the place where the bulk of the violence is, and then in three others [PROVINCES]."
THE PRESIDENT HAS SAID THAT IT'S MOSTLY ORDINARY IRAQIS FIGHTING US
"Now, what does that mean? Some of it is criminal violence. Some of it's Zarqawi and al-Qaida violence. Some of it is insurgent and sectarian violence. And it is a mixture of things. And I think that if someone wants to put a label on that they can, but I think of it as terrorism myself."
HOW ABOUT THIS DEBATE ON TROOP LEVELS
"You can have not enough troops, in which case things can be disorderly, or you can have too many troops and be too intrusive. Too much of an occupying force create a dependent on the people of Iraq so that they're depending on us, and actually feed the insurgency because no country wants to have foreign forces in their country over a long period of time. So it's a balance. It's an art, not a science. No one knows for sure what the right number should be."
HOW ABOUT THAT TORTURE AT ABU GHRAIB? READY TO APOLOGIZE? OR DID IT ALL HAPPEN ON THE NIGHT SHIFT
"Oh, we've done that, and there's no question but that people in the United States military, in Abu Ghraib on that night shift mistreated Iraqi prisoners. They should not have done it. They have been court martialed. They are being punished. There are some people serving in prison. And it's something that should not have happened, it did happen, and we regret it deeply."
WE WANT TO STAY IN IRAQ A LONG TIME, RIGHT? LIKE KOREA AND GERMANY, RIGHT?
"We really don't. It's up to the Iraqi government. Whatever the Iraqi government decides at some point down the road when there's a permanent government that's been elected by the people under the new constitution, they can decide how we can be helpful."
OF COURSE IT WOULDN'T HAPPEN RIGHT AWAY
"It would be the kind of thing that would be down the road if they come to us and say they'd like to talk about that."
YOU'D DO WHATEVER THEY ASKED, BECAUSE THEY'RE A SOVEREIGN COUNTRY, RIGHT?
"I don't know that. We'd be happy to talk to them. I don't know if we'd be accommodating to what they want. But certainly it's their country and they're a sovereign nation and they're going to have to decide what they want and we wish them well."
DID YOU FORESEE SO MANY CASUALTIES IN THIS WAR?
"You know, everyone who has tried to estimate what the length of a war would be, what the cost of a war would be, and what the casualty figures would be have consistently been wrong historically."
DID YOU THINK ABOUT IT? DID YOU CARE?
"I made a conscious point of not predicting. I did not know. I do not know now. I know I don't know. I don't pretend to know. And I think people who think they know and have a high degree of certainty about how long it lasts or what the dollar cost will be or what the cost in human treasure will be, as I say, are almost always wrong and therefore listening to them is probably not worth one's time."
ANY COMMENT ON IRAN'S NUCLEAR PROGRAM?
"No."
HOW ABOUT THAT BAD UN REPORT ON GITMO?
"It was not a United Nations report. It was a couple of people from the United Nations who did not even go down there."
BUT WE DIDN'T LET THE UN GO THERE
"The answer, I'm told is, this is not a Department of Defense issue, it's a U.S. government issue . . . the official organization is the International Committee of the Red Cross . . .To let any other group go down there, and then you have to open the floodgates and let everyone go down there."
HOW ABOUT ALL THIS CRITICISM FROM GENERALS?
"That doesn't surprise me at all. In the middle of a war that people are going to disagree with this or have different opinions? We have different opinions inside this building all the time. We expect that."
ANYTHING IN IRAQ YOU WOULD LIKE TO HAVE DONE DIFFERENTLY?
"Well, we certainly would have liked to have the, we would like to have had the 4th Infantry Division be able to come in through Turkey, and it would have had an effect on the Sunni area, Saddam Hussein's stronghold, earlier in the conflict and probably would have had a beneficial effect in reducing the size of the insurgency." [SO--IT IS THE SUNNIS AND NOT TERRORISTS . . .]
*******************************************************click here for previous rummyquotes