Following a series of attacks in which the radical Islamist group “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant,” seized major cities in Iraq and threatened the country’s capital of Baghdad, President Obama aknowledged in an address Friday that the situation demanded U.S. assistance for the Iraqi government.
In light of the situation, we are reminded of our 2013 interview with former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who oversaw military operations for the Bush Administration for much of the Iraq War.
Original interview posted May 16, 2013:
Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld published his memoir, “Known and Unknown” in 2011. His latest book, “Rumsfeld’s Rules” suggests he still has lessons to share after a lifetime in politics and business.
The book is a collection of advice that he started collecting through a habit taught to him by his schoolteacher mother. He has about 300 or so in the book.
“If I didn’t know a word she’d say, ‘Well write it down and look it up,'” he says. “Then I started writing down various other thoughts and rules and anecdotes.”
The anecdotes Rumsfeld recounts are pulled from his time in office with the Bush, Reagan and Nixon administrations.
Here are three of many Rumsfeld Rules you can find in the book, and the stories behind them:
It’s easier to get into something than it is to get out.
“I thought of that when I was President Reagan’s Middle East envoy and we had 241 Marines killed in Beirut, at the airport. And I concluded then that the United States has to be careful about putting ground forces in because we’re such a big target. And I also, over the years, came to the conclusion over the years that the United States really wasn’t* organized, trained and equipped to do nation-building.”
Rumsfeld says this was on his mind as the United States entered Afghanistan and Iraq, but there was “mission creep.”
“When you do something, then someone wants you to do something else and then something else and over time, the mission, historically, creeps into something else that was initiated at the outset.”
But in the end, “it’s not easy for countries to evolve and grow, but I think that both of those countries are a whale of a lot better off today than they were before.”
“I’ve been mistaken so many times, I don’t even blush for it anymore.” – Napoleon
“You see things that don’t turn out the way you hoped.”
Monitor progress through metrics.
“I think that history over time will probably be a better judge than you or I, but I’ve been struck by the amount of criticism that the Bush administration has received and President Bush personally and the attempts to assign blame to him and I think it’s probably not going to sort out that way.”
He says President Bush’s decision to enter Iraq is “something that over time will be better understood.”
AUDIO EXTRA: Kai Ryssdal asks Donald Rumsfeld about a reputation for not tolerating dissent.
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