From TheBestLinks.com
Donald Rumsfeld
Donald Henry Rumsfeld (born July 9, 1932) is the current Secretary of Defense of the United States, since 2001, under President George W. Bush. His current term of office is as the 21st Secretary of Defense, and he is the oldest person to have held that position. He served as the 13th Secretary of Defense from 1975 to 1977, making him also the youngest person to have held the position, under President Gerald Ford. Rumsfeld has also had a long career in private industry and public service.
Rumsfeld has been married to his wife Joyce since 1954. They have three children and five grandchildren.
Life
Born in Chicago, Illinois, of German descent, Donald Rumsfeld attended Princeton University on scholarship (AB, 1954) and served in the United States Navy (1954-57) as a Naval aviator. He went to Washington, DC, in 1957, during the Eisenhower Administration, to serve as Administrative Assistant to a Congressman from Ohio. After a stint with an investment banking firm, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Illinois in 1962, at the age of 30, and was re-elected in 1964, 1966, and 1968.
Rumsfeld resigned from Congress in 1969 during his fourth term to serve in the Nixon Administration as Director of the United States Office of Economic Opportunity, Assistant to the President, and a member of the President's Cabinet (1969-1970); Counselor to the President, Director of the Economic Stabilization Program; and member of the President's Cabinet (1971-1972).
In 1973, he left Washington, DC, to serve as U.S. ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Brussels, Belgium (1973-1974).
In August 1974, he was called back to Washington, DC, to serve in the Ford Administration successively as Chairman of the transition to the Presidency of Gerald R. Ford (1974); White House Chief of Staff member of the President's Cabinet (1974-1975); and the 13th U.S. Secretary of Defense (1975-1977).
In 1976, Rumsfeld was responsible for transferring George H.W. Bush from envoy to China into the position of Director of the CIA. This was reportedly an attempt to scuttle Bush's presidential ambitions, and led to a certain animosity between the two.
In 1977, Rumsfeld was awarded the nation's highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
From 1977 to 1985 Rumsfeld served as Chief Executive Officer, President, and then Chairman of G.D. Searle & Co., a worldwide pharmaceutical company. It was under Rumsfeld that Searle got FDA approval for the controversial artificial sweetener, aspartame. During his tenure at Searle, Rumsfeld reduced the number of employees in the company by around 60%. The financial turnaround of the company earned him awards as the Outstanding Chief Executive Officer in the Pharmaceutical Industry from the Wall Street Transcript (1980) and Financial World (1981). Rumsfeld is believed to have earned around US$12 million from the sale of Searle to Monsanto.
From 1985 to 1990 he was in private business. During his business career, Rumsfeld continued public service in a variety of posts, including:
- Member of the President's General Advisory Committee on Arms Control - Reagan Administration (1982 - 1986);
- President Reagan's Special Envoy on the Law of the Sea Treaty (1982 - 1983);
- Senior Advisor to President Reagan's Panel on Strategic Systems (1983 - 1984);
- Member of the U.S. Joint Advisory Commission on U.S./Japan Relations - Reagan Administration (1983 - 1984);
- President Reagan's Special Envoy to the Middle East (1983 - 1984);
- Member of the National Commission on the Public Service (1987 - 1990);
- Member of the National Economic Commission (1988 - 1989);
- Member of the Board of Visitors of the National Defense University (1988 - 1992);
- Member of the Commission on U.S./Japan Relations (1989 - 1991);
- FCC's High Definition Television Advisory Committee (1992 - 1993);
- Chairman, Commission on the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States (1998 - 1999);
- Member of the U.S. Trade Deficit Review Commission (1999 - 2000); and
- Chairman of the U.S. Commission to Assess National Security Space Management and Organization (2000).
Rumsfeld served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of General Instrument Corporation from 1990 to 1993. A leader in broadband transmission, distribution, and access control technologies for cable, satellite and terrestrial broadcasting applications, the company pioneered the development of the first all-digital high definition television (HDTV) technology. After taking the company public and returning it to profitability, Rumsfeld returned to private business in late 1993. Until being sworn in as the 21st Secretary of Defense, Rumsfeld served as Chairman of Gilead Sciences, Inc. He was also chair of the RAND Corporation.
During his period as Reagan's Special Envoy to the Middle East, Rumsfeld was the main conduit for crucial American military intelligence, hardware and strategic advice to Saddam Hussein, then fighting Iran in the Iran-Iraq war. During this period, US policy supported Iraq, believing it to be a useful buffer against Iran's new religious government, although the United States had originally been hesitant to work with a Soviet client state. When he visited on December 19-20, 1983, he and Saddam Hussein had a 90 minute discussion which covered Syria's occupation of Lebanon, preventing Syrian and Iranian expansion, preventing arms sales to Iran by foreign countries, increasing Iraqi oil production via a possible new oil pipeline across Jordan. Not mentioned was Iraqi production and use of chemical weapons. The Iranian government had cited several Iraqi air and ground chemical weapons attacks in the preceding two months, and the Iranian news agency had reported the use of chemical weapons as early as 1981. The US State Department first condemned the use of chemical weapons in the war on March 5, 1984, two days before the ICRC confirmed Iranian allegations.
Rumsfeld's civic activities included service as a member of the National Academy of Public Administration and a member of the boards of trustees of the Gerald R. Ford Foundation, the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowships, the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and the National Park Foundation. He was also a member of the U.S./Russia Business Forum and Chairman of the Congressional Leadership's National Security Advisory Group.
Rumsfeld was a founder and active member of the Project for the New American Century, whose goal is to "promote American global leadership" and which in September 2000 proposed to invade Iraq.
As Secretary of Defense under George W. Bush, Rumsfeld was frequently in the public eye as he headed the defense department during the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. A remark that led to particular debate was his characterization of the bombing of Bagdad as Shock and Awe. His insistence on leading the war with few troops got him respect for the fast victory but harsh criticism when US troops could not prevent the looting and suffered more and more losses after the "end of major combat" as proclaimed by George W. Bush. Rumsfeld's actions have been characterized by his aggressive personality, outspoken opinions, and unique sense of humor. His press conferences were frequent, and the Secretary has developed a strong love-hate relationship with many American reporters.
Due to the stance of the German and French governments against a war in Iraq, Rumsfeld labeled these countries in an offhand remark as part of "Old Europe" (implying that those European countries which supported the war effort were part of a newer, modern Europe). The label gained instant popularity by a wide variety of commentators and met harsh criticism. In separate remarks, he named the countries which would not be willing to support the war effort at all as Cuba, Libya and Germany, which was again perceived as an offense by many.
The BBC Radio 4 current affairs program Broadcasting House had been so taken by Rumsfeld's various remarks that it once held a regular slot called "The Donald Rumsfeld Soundbite of the Week" in which they played his most amusing comment from that week. Rumsfeld himself is said to have found the slot "hilarious." Rumsfeld's penchant for talking with his hands also made him the butt of jokes, including a series (http://www.poe-news.com/features.php?feat=31845) portraying him as a martial arts master.
External link
Biographies
Articles
- The Saddam in Rumsfeld's Closet, Jeremy Scahill (http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=2177)
- Crude Vision: How Oil Interests Obscured US Government Focus On Chemical Weapons Use by Saddam Hussein (http://www.ips-dc.org/crudevision/index.htm), Institute for Policy Studies, March 24, 2003
- Close-Up: Young Rumsfeld (http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2003/11/mann.htm), James Mann, The Atlantic Monthly, November 2003
- 'This is war' Rumsfeld told Bush, (http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040223-012306-4708r.htm) Washington Times, February 23, 2004
- Conspiracy theory about Rumsfeld (http://www.mabus.biz/who/rumsfeld)
- Donald Rumsfeld caught lying about weapons of mass destruction (http://www.moveon.org/censure/caughtonvideo/)
Quotations and humor
bg:Доналд Ръмсфелд
da:Donald Rumsfeld
de:Donald Rumsfeld
fr:Donald Rumsfeld
ms:Donald Rumsfeld
nl:Donald Rumsfeld
ja:ドナルド・ラムズフェルド
Related links
Top visited
0 of
0 links
[no links posted yet]
>> place link >>
Discussion
Last posted
0 of
0 messages
[no messages posted yet]
>> post message >>
Watch
You can
add this article to your own "watchlist" and receive e-mail notification about all changes in this page.
