In 1984 Donald Rumsfeld hugged Saddam Hussein in Baghdad and with a big toothy grin, shook his hand vigorously. 19 years later, on Rumsfeld’s watch, Saddam was pulled from a hole in Tikrit and arrested. The Donald’s legacy will be forever tied to Saddam Hussein in one way or another.
President Bush said the following about Donald Rumsfeld the day he ‘retired’ as Sec. of Defense: “This man knows how to lead, and he did. The country’s better off for it,” The president called Rumsfeld “one of America’s most skilled, energetic and dedicated public servants.”
Excuse me if I don’t buy what the President was selling. Rumsfeld was the main architect of the occupation of Iraq, also known as the Iraq War. I will not be the one to judge Bush’s Secretary of Defense. History and his God will do that. The President tried to paint a rosy picture today of Rumsfeld’s role in the Iraq war. Rumsfeld virtually had no plan after the invasion of Iraq, and our troops payed a heavy price for his lack of foresight. Rumsfeld was asked what the worst day of his time in office under Bush43 was. His response: the day he saw the pictures from Abu Ghraib. Not the hundreds of deaths of American soldiers, that the exposure of torture, that he was aware of, finally saw the ugly light of day.
Up to the bitter end of his reign, Rumsfeld was still chirping about the importance of ‘winning” in Iraq. Speaking to a gathering of employees 10 days before he left office, Rumsfeld defended his record on Iraq and Afghanistan and warned of “dire consequences were we to fail” in the war.
Yet, he still thinks the press didn’t give him his due, give him a fair shake. He shed a tear or two today at his final public appearance. There are still millions of tears to be shed by mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, husbands and wives of soldiers who will be forced to clean up Donald’s mess and deal with his inadequacies as the top military leader, our Secretary of Offense, as it were. Perhaps his God will deal with Rummy on a different level. I do not see that happening here on terra firma. Here, his legacy is nothing to be proud of..not now, and not in the near future.
Robert McNamara came to grips with his legacy, years after the Vietnam War was over. He wrote a book about his involvement with sending over 58,000 American soldiers to their deaths. He was interviewed for the documentary “Fog of War” and spilled his guts, even insinuating he could be a “war criminal”. Some how, I just don’t see Donald Rumsfeld ever coming clean like that. I think he will go to his grave denying he did anything wrong with regard to the Iraq War.
I hope I am wrong, but I wouldn’t bet on it.I knew the day would come when this delusional, arrogant man’s book would hit the shelves. I will not read it as I am sure it will give me nightmare’s of the Iraq war, the outright lies that led us into that war and that we lost over 4,400 soldiers for nothing but those lies, all over again.
That he tries to rewrite history and cleanse his soul simply boggles my mind..but then I consider the source and it all makes sense, as his ilk never owns their mistakes. They blame others or they just deny, deny, deny.
