OPINION:
When terrorists attacked the Department of Defense on Sept. 11, 2001, an unexpected figure could be seen scurrying through the wreckage trying to help the wounded. Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, who narrowly escaped the attack himself, was many things — controversial, strong-willed, brilliant, funny, brash, sharptongued — but he wasn’t a coward. He was a man who stood his post and did his duty.
He was also my friend of 17 years.
I first came to know him at one of the lowest moments of his life — as the Iraq War was descending into chaos and a prison abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib prison became headlines around the world. Rumsfeld, a Navy veteran, was an unapologetic defender of our military. But he did not for a moment defend the actions of what turned out to be a small number of military personnel. Democrats and a fair number of Republicans on Capitol Hill held him directly responsible for the abuse and called on him to resign. What they didn’t know was that he had offered to resign, to take full responsibility for the abuse and leave the Bush administration with the stain affixed to him forever. But the president wouldn’t let him go.
I had just been hired as a chief speechwriter and we were working on what he wanted to say in his testimony to Congress. Then, his assistant came into his spacious office at the Pentagon and told him the president wanted a word with him. He excused himself and went into a small private study where he took the call. Minutes later, he came back without comment. I learned later President Bush had just called him to tell him that he had read his letter of resignation and rejected it. He asked him to stay on the job and try to make things right.
Rumsfeld could have told his many critics and accusers that piece of information. But he didn’t. Instead he sat through hearings and press conference and endless meetings, saying nothing while people yelled at him for not having the “courage” to take responsibility and leave. That was Washington for you. When you are up, they cheer and when you’re down, they pounce. Rumsfeld loved the old Truman line, “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.” But he added what he called the Rumsfeld corollary, “make it a small dog.”
But Iraq — a mess he was given to manage while his colleagues washed their hands of it once the going got tough — was only one part of Don Rumsfeld’s story.
SEE ALSO: Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld dies at 88
He was not born to wealth. He was a man of modest means, a bright boy who won an ROTC scholarship to Princeton. He served in the Navy like his dad had. He flew planes and taught other Naval Airmen how to fly them. For the rest of his life, he would joke that he was just a “broken down ex-aviator” and that the planes he flew could only be found in museums.
As a young congressman, he challenged the old guard of his party and elevated a man named Gerald R. Ford to the leadership of the GOP. Later serving as Ford’s chief of staff and then defense secretary, he found himself in the odd position of agreeing with Ford’s rival, Ronald Reagan, on the need for a massive defense buildup to challenge the Soviet Union. This set the stage for the fall of the Soviet Union and our victory in the Cold War.
When he left the Ford administration, he had holes in his shoes and almost nothing in his bank account. So he went into business in the private sector and made his fortune, tripling the earnings of a company he led called G.D. Searle. But he didn’t forget about his country — and was aghast at what he saw in the feckless and failed leadership of Jimmy Carter. In 1988, he made a brief run for president, only to see his rival, George H.W. Bush, awkwardly take on Ronald Reagan’s mantle.
Called back to public service as George W. Bush’s secretary of Defense, he went to war against terrorists across the globe and oversaw the quick toppling of regimes in Kabul and Baghdad that had harbored America’s enemies. He called out America’s NATO allies on the need to modernize and shoulder more of our collective defense burden. He was one of the first men in America to recognize the challenge and dangers posed by China — a stance he’d had for decades. When he was secretary of Defense, the second time around under George W. Bush, I joined him on a trip to Beijing. He told me he knew we were being bugged so we spent a great deal of time talking about China’s human rights abuses and what a shame it was that their people couldn’t live in freedom.
Through it all he loved his country, loved his family, loved freedom, and remained faithful to them all. His was a life well lived and a legacy to remember. RIP
• Matt Latimer was chief speechwriter to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, served as White House speechwriter for President George W. Bush and is founding partner of Javelin.
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