Rumsfeld's abrasive style sparks conflict
By Dave Moniz, USA TODAY
URL:http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2002-12-09-1a-cover_x.htm
On the eve of a threatened invasion of Iraq, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has emerged as the most powerful Pentagon boss since Robert McNamara and, some would argue, one of the most influential Cabinet members in history.
Rumsfeld is poised to lead U.S. forces in their largest war in a decade.
By Max Montecinos, Reuters
During two years in office, the 70-year-old former Navy fighter pilot has become the public face of the U.S. war on terrorism, challenged the armed forces over how to fight 21st century wars and asserted ironclad control over an institution the Bush White House believes was governed loosely during the Clinton administration.
The Rumsfeld file
Age: 70, born July 9, 1932, in Chicago.
Education: Princeton University, bachelor's degree, 1954.
Military service: U.S. Navy pilot and flight instructor, 1954-57; Ready Reserve, 1957-75; Standby Reserve, 1975-89; entered Retired Reserve with the rank of captain, 1989.
Career highlights: Congressman from Illinois, 1962-69; held several posts in Nixon's administration, 1969-74; chief of staff for President Ford, 1974-75; secretary of Defense, 1975-77; chief executive officer and chairman, G.D. Searle and Co., 1977-85; consultant and investor, 1985-90; chief executive officer and chairman, General Instrument Corp., 1990-93; various business and political posts, including national chairman of GOP Sen. Bob Dole's presidential campaign, 1994-97; chairman of Gilead Sciences, a pharmaceutical company, 1997-2001.
Family: Married Joyce Pierson in 1954; they have two daughters and a son.
Nickname: Rummy.
Pursuits: Eagle Scout. Wrestled and played football at Princeton. All-Navy wrestling champion. Enjoys playing squash.
The surest sign that Rumsfeld is not your typical Washington bureaucrat: He is the first secretary of Defense to be regularly satirized on TV's Saturday Night Live.
But Rumsfeld's popularity and rock star fame belie a sometimes troubled relationship with the armed forces and fears that his take-no-prisoners style is alienating some of America's closest allies. Though Rumsfeld has disputed news reports that he is often at odds with top generals, his strained relationship with the military and many Defense Department civilians is widely known at the Pentagon.
Says one senior officer who asked to remain anonymous: "I think the public would be shocked to learn that the secretary is nothing like the person they see on TV. They think of him as glib and witty. He's just not that way."
The kindest thing that many subordinates will say about Rumsfeld's management style is that he is difficult to work for. Some describe him as abusive toward employees and frequently dismissive of senior military officers' advice on everything from which generals to promote to how many troops are needed to fight a war.
Military officers and defense analysts say that not since the Vietnam War have relations between a Defense secretary and the armed forces been strained so badly. And with a conflict against Iraq looming, some worry that Rumsfeld's domineering style could hinder the war effort and a postwar occupation that might require tens of thousands of U.S. troops and billions of dollars.
Rumsfeld, who left Monday on a five-day trip to the Persian Gulf and the Horn of Africa, is poised to lead the United States into its biggest war in a decade. The worry is that he would ignore crucial advice from top commanders or that commanders would censor themselves, reasoning that it would be risky to disagree with him.
Some of that concern has diminished in recent weeks, after Rumsfeld abandoned his original notion of a relatively small ground force of 75,000 troops to attack Iraq and approved plans for an invasion that would use up to 250,000.
But Rumsfeld's initial insistence that a modest strike force could do the job led some senior officers to wonder if he would accept unnecessary risk to prove a point about his vision of modern warfare.
'At a critical juncture'
"I think he is probably at a critical juncture," says Paul Van Riper, a retired Marine Corps lieutenant general. "I am amazed at how widespread some of the sentiment about Rumsfeld is. The difficulties that people in the Pentagon are having with the secretary are being transmitted far and wide to troops in the field."
The areas of dispute are far ranging. Some seem trivial: Rumsfeld's habit of barraging military officers with terse memos about everything from English grammar to proper use of the phrase "commander in chief." Some are far more serious: His ongoing feud with Army leaders and their fear that he will try to cut 20% of the service's combat troops during a global war on terrorism.
Rumsfeld declined to be interviewed for this story. Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke dismisses much of the criticism as institutional resistance to change and the grumbling of midlevel civilians and military officers.
"I don't put much stock in it. Whether you like or dislike the guy, you could not have had the kinds of changes we've had unless you have senior civilians and the military working together," she says.
Even those who are critical of Rumsfeld's management style say there is much to admire: Since Sept. 11, Rumsfeld has not taken a day off. His weekly television appearances project a fierce determination to give no quarter to global terrorists. And some believe that the friction with the military is a sure sign that he is shaking up an institution badly in need of fresh ideas.
Rumsfeld's less-is-more military strategy in Afghanistan, where a small U.S. ground force, high-tech bombers and Afghan rebels routed the Taliban, was a model of unconventional thinking. Although some analysts have criticized the Pentagon for failing to seal escape routes for Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders during the battle at Tora Bora last December, Rumsfeld's stewardship of the war has been widely praised.
"He is pressing the military and pushing them and that is what he is supposed to be doing. There are a number of areas where many of his instincts are ones I agree with," says Eliot Cohen, a professor of strategic studies at Johns Hopkins University and author of Supreme Command, a book on the relationship between civilian and military leaders. "That it is causing some friction seems to be true, too."
Rumsfeld's tenure at the Pentagon has been defined by several turns of fate. Handed the chore of reforming and modernizing the military by President Bush after the 2000 election, Rumsfeld at first stumbled in a job he had held from 1975 to 1977, during the Ford administration.
In August 2001, after more than six months of floundering in his attempt to implement a new vision for a 21st century fighting force, Rumsfeld was rumored to be leaving the Pentagon. He had alienated Congress and the top military brass with his penchant for secrecy and a work style that some in the administration saw as counterproductive.
Rumsfeld and a handful of civilian advisers — including Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and senior adviser Steve Cambone — crafted their new vision largely without the military's input. They frequently ignored the experience of the Pentagon's most senior officers and began drawing comparisons to McNamara and his civilian "whiz kid" advisers in the 1960s.
But those difficulties were largely forgotten on Sept. 11.
The terrorist attacks in New York and Washington brought an unwanted war and, many believe, saved Rumsfeld from becoming a historical footnote.
On the morning of the attack, the secretary raced outside the burning Pentagon and began assisting victims. His leadership style galvanized the troops. After Sept. 11, it was not unusual to spot civilian employees hanging cartoon-like posters of Rumsfeld wielding a machine gun as he led the fight in the war on terrorism. Rumsfeld refused to shut down the Pentagon despite catastrophic damage and became, in a single day, an embodiment of American resolve.
A former all-Navy wrestling champion, Rumsfeld's endurance has become the stuff of legend. Clarke notes that Rumsfeld recently returned to Washington on an overnight flight after a lengthy overseas trip and walked directly into the Pentagon briefing room to speak to reporters. On a typical day, he rises at 5 a.m., reads for an hour to 90 minutes and then arrives at the Pentagon for a 12-hour day. At home, he reads for several more hours before turning in.
"He is the energizer dragon," says Ralph Peters, a retired Army officer and author of numerous books about the modern U.S. military and terrorism.
But Rumsfeld's drive and keen intellect mask something else, Peters says. He can be a bully when it comes to debating ideas. And that alienates commanders who feel he is too quick to reject their advice and experience.
"He is a superb public face for the war on terrorism," Peters says. "But if he would just occasionally take the professional views of his military officers into account, he would be a lot better off."
Rumsfeld's habit of relying on a few civilian advisers has irritated senior military officers.
Among Rumsfeld's unofficial brain trust is Newt Gingrich, the former Republican congressman and speaker of the House of Representatives. The secretary routinely forwards e-mails from Gingrich to top Pentagon officers on a variety of subjects, including arcane details of ground combat and military weapons.
The reliance on outsiders, Peters says, has created a perception that Rumsfeld does not trust senior military officers. "How on Earth can anyone assume that Newt Gingrich understands the face of modern warfare better than the generals?" Peters asks.
A low point
Rumsfeld's relationship with the Army, the largest military branch, reached a low point this spring.
Many in that service believe that Rumsfeld publicly humiliated its top commander, Gen. Eric Shinseki, a Vietnam War hero who has tried to reshape the Army from its tank-heavy, Cold War incarnation into a leaner, more nimble force. Earlier this year, Rumsfeld's office leaked news that the secretary had already selected Shinseki's successor 15 months before the general was due to retire.
Senior Pentagon officers say that Rumsfeld views Shinseki — who has occasionally challenged Rumsfeld's thinking on tactics and strategy and is not afraid to confront him — as an obstacle.
Rumsfeld also criticized the service's top civilian, Secretary of the Army Tom White, during arguments over the future size of the Army and key weapons programs.
A public battle over the Crusader self-propelled howitzer, a weapons program that Rumsfeld terminated this spring, resulted in an unusual moment of political theater in Washington. White, a retired Army general who attempted to save the Crusader, was forced to stand beside Rumsfeld during a press appearance and support the decision a day after Rumsfeld's office leaked stories to the media that White would be fired for insubordination.
One senior officer described White as looking like an American prisoner of war in Hanoi during his appearance with the Defense secretary. The next day, a Pentagon source says, Rumsfeld called White to tell him he hadn't seemed very sincere on TV.
Rumsfeld later apologized to White, who remains on the job, but such callous displays of power have baffled some of Rumsfeld's supporters who view his candor and energy as great assets in leading the military through a confrontation with Iraq.
One senior military officer who says he admires Rumsfeld's intellect and energy says his interpersonal skills have a negative effect on the rank-and-file military.
"It goes back to what the military calls 'command climate,' " the officer says. "Does he have a command climate where senior military people can tell him the truth about dangers he is about to walk into?"
Some underlings 'don't do well'
Clarke, the top public affairs officer at the Pentagon, acknowledges that Rumsfeld's management style is extraordinarily direct. Some subordinates, Clarke says, "don't do well under the intensity."
One who does, apparently, is Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. A senior Pentagon official describes Myers' relationship with Rumsfeld as solid and mutually respectful.
Others have struggled.
Even the secretaries of the Army, Navy and Air Force — civilian officials courted by Rumsfeld to serve as his "board of directors" at the Pentagon — now feel alienated. According to two Pentagon sources who would speak only if their names were withheld, all three are keenly disappointed that they have been unable to forge a relationship with Rumsfeld or break into his tight circle of advisers.
"They believe they were recruited under false pretenses and are constantly second-guessed by the gnomes downstairs," a senior Pentagon official says.
The three secretaries — Gordon England of the Navy, James Roche of the Air Force and the Army's White — have not criticized Rumsfeld publicly. But the three recently sent Rumsfeld a letter critical of his decision to review every promotion recommendation the secretaries make for top generals and admirals.
Even Rumsfeld's harshest critics grudgingly admit that he has effected some important changes in the military in his two years on the job. The Pentagon's annual budget now realistically reflects the services' year-to-year expenses. Rumsfeld has prodded the military to examine its rigid personnel system. He routinely forces war planners to think creatively. That includes Gen. Tommy Franks, head of U.S. Central Command, which ran the war in Afghanistan and would run a war in Iraq.
During the war in Afghanistan, Rumsfeld's prodding paid off: The Navy temporarily converted the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk into a floating commando base and is now planning to build such a ship for future commando raids.
Changing the war plans
Clarke says one of Rumsfeld's most important legacies will be the change in the way regional military commanders plan for war. "It's no longer 'take a (war plans) binder off a shelf once a year and update it,' " she says.
In his office, Clarke says, the secretary keeps a long list of the many things that could go wrong during a war with Iraq. Any officer who assumes that a war there might be easy, Clarke says, is quickly dissuaded.
The public seems to approve of the job Rumsfeld is doing, sometimes in unusual ways. Recently, People magazine named him "Sexiest Cabinet Member." One female People staff member appearing on NBC's Today show referred to Rumsfeld as "the Beltway babe.'
Richard Kohn, a University of North Carolina history professor and authority on military culture, describes the secretary as "a rock star." Kohn says that Rumsfeld, now at the peak of his popularity, "doesn't care about his critics."
"He is in the most powerful position of any Cabinet member in recent memory," Kohn says, describing the rewards Rumsfeld has reaped from his unrelenting focus on the war on terrorism and his news conferences, often telecast live on cable TV.
The danger, Kohn says, is that the Don Rumsfeld Show doesn't always play well to foreign audiences. Fears of American imperialism are one price of his forceful personality, some argue.
"For all that I respect and value him, he should not be the primary spokesman for the war on terrorism," Kohn says. "He sends the impression of belligerent, arrogant unilateralism."
Cohen, the Johns Hopkins professor, is less harsh. Cohen views Rumsfeld's performance in the context of an institution that is virtually impossible to govern.
Writing in the scholarly journal Foreign Affairs, Cohen argues that the U.S. military is so vast that even the most capable managers have difficulty taming it, even in the best of times.
"A civilian leadership attempting to redirect a military that is obviously successful — and America has been winning wars for more than a decade — is destined to have a rough time of it," Cohen writes.
Van Riper, the retired Marine Corps general, gives Rumsfeld great credit for "holding the military accountable" for how it fights wars and pays its bills. "The real question is, can he undo the ill will?" Van Riper says. "It's a lot easier to create than to reverse." |
