Former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara Dies

foxnews.com ^ | 07/06/09 | Staff

[DFG]

Former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara has died.

McNamara, 93, died at home in his sleep Monday morning, his wife Diana told The Associated Press. She said he had been in failing health for some time.

Known as a policymaker with a fixation for statistical analysis, McNamara was president of the Ford Motor Co. when President John F. Kennedy asked him to head the Pentagon in 1961.

McNamara worked for seven years as the defense secretary in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, longer than any other person in that post. He headed the war department during the build-up of forces in Vietnam.

He is considered the architect of the concept of "mutual assured destruction," a key feature of the nuclear arms race during the Cold War.

[cherry]

I am not smart enough to know war strategy and whether McNamara was as bad as many said he was....however, what angered me was in his later years he was Monday Quarterbacking and second guessing and actually condemning things he himself had advocated.....

but God bless his soul....he was imperfect, like the rest of us....

[cherry]

when I see or hear about the young men and some young women that are dying in the Middle East, it makes me very sad.....we're losing our finest....

and then I think of how many we lost in Viet Nam......just unbelievable....

God bless your dad, and his family.....

[cherry]

"The Republic will survive because of the brave whose fight purifies the nation of the abomination of the few."

I hope you are right......I just hope you are right....

[muawiyah]

Atom bombs come in different varieties. We only built two different kinds, and we only built 4 before the war was over.

No doubt we could have built more kinds and more of them much faster if we hadn't been spending so many of our resources knocking stuff down the old ways.

Bet you thought we had stacks and stacks of atom bombs didn't you. Take a look at the figures on production some day ~ basically, when we had less than a handful of them we ended up using them all.

[guns_for_liberty]

“Atom bombs come in different varieties. We only built two different kinds, and we only built 4 before the war was over.”

What I remember, we built one plutonium bomb and two Uranium 238 bombs. I thought we only built a total of three before the war was over, the one we exploded at Los Alamos and the two that we dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so thanks for letting me know we actually had four.

” No doubt we could have built more kinds and more of them much faster if we hadn’t been spending so many of our resources knocking stuff down the old ways.”

From the history I’ve read, the physics needed to develop the bomb and the gathering of fissionable material moved at approximately the same speed. It is doubtful that anything could have sped up the production of our first atomic bombs. You also have to remember that when the Manhattan project was started, it was by no means certain that an atomic bomb could be built, so until it was, we had to continue to “knock...stuff down the old ways.”

“Bet you thought we had stacks and stacks of atom bombs didn’t you.”

I thought we had three. Thanks for letting me know we actually had four.

[muawiyah]

After Alamagordo there were two completed and one on the way. It was supposedly finished up before the other two were used.

We had a thread on this a couple of years back and folks dug up all the information that's ever been released about our atom bomb production.

It took quite some time before we had as many as a dozen.

[Tammy8]

I think others have recommended these, but they are good ones:

Dereliction of Duty H.R. McMasters
On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War by Harry G. Summers Jr.

To better understand the war and especially the soldiers:
We Were Soldiers Once and Young Harold Moore Joseph Gallowoway
Stolen Valor B.G. Burkett

I have heard good things about this book- but not yet read it, it explains events that led up to the war:
Triumph Forsaken: The Vietnam War 1954-1965 Mark Moyer.

I have read many books about the Vietnam War over the years; many have a definate liberal agenda and yet you can learn things even from some of them. At least it gives an understanding of the “talking points” of the left.

My favorite books were written by the soldiers that fought there, but of course they could not see the whole picture, just their part in it- but they do highlight problems they had with leadership, equipment- things like that.

I took a class about revolutions in history and that may have been the title of the text- memory fails me, but we studied the Vietnamese Revolution at the end of WWII, Vietnam had political upheaval that explains the mindset of the people and politics of Vietnam that we were dealing with. It helps to know something about their revolution.

I have learned much of what I know from talking to the men that fought there, many are not that willing to talk about it but when they are people need to listen. My hubby was talking yesterday after it came up in this thread about the flaws in the M16 rifle when it was first issued- it jammed badly and likely cost many of our soldiers their life. Hubby had an M14 (the one replaced) and said he was really happy he wasn’t issued the M16. Of course new things will have issues, but the flaws with the M16 were known before they were handed out to those fighting and to me that is unacceptable. These are all things that shaped the war.

I hope others will add their reading recommendations to this thread.

[BOBTHENAILER]

Now we suffer the treason and lies of Obama who disarms for the KGB assassin, who dismantles missile defense for the Rat Boy Holocaust Denier, who kills the F-22 for the Butchers of Tiananmen.

This one, and your subsequent essays on this subject are dead solid perfect. McNamara and his elite ilk and their naive policies were responsible for the death of many, many a man far better than them.

[Poe White Trash]

In the _Fog of War_ documentary, McNamara says:

“Lemay [General Curtis E. Lemay] said if we had lost the war we would have all been prosecuted as war criminals and I think he’s right. He, and I’d say I, were behaving as war criminals. That Lemay recognized that what he was doing would be thought immoral, if his side had lost, but what makes it immoral if you lose or if you win?”

This “war criminal” statement also comes up in Rhodes’ _Dark Sun_, where Rhodes claims that LeMay made this argument in an unpublished public speech at a military academy (forget which one, and can’t find the book in my “stack”).

However, I’ve read _Mission with LeMay_ and _Iron Eagle_ and can find no confirmation that LeMay ever said anything like this.

There’s a new LeMay biography out — anyone know if anything is in there about this?

[CharlesThe Hammer]

McNamara was the epitome of Eastern Ivy League elitists, who after continuously reading press releases in which they praised themselves as “the best and the brightest”, proceeded to destroy the American military in Vietnam. Further, McNamara and his buddies were so arrogant, so full of hubris, that they put our entire culture in FUBAR status. The Obama entourage is now on track to renew McNamara’s legacy. No tears falling here.

[SunkenCiv]

McNamara was president of the Ford Motor Co. when President John F. Kennedy asked him to head the Pentagon in 1961.

[cherry]

" he possessed an excess of cleverness combined with a dearth of wisdom."

your quote struck me so hard that I searched this thread twice to find it again....its a great insight and I hope you don't mind but I'm going to email that statement to friends and relatives....its absolutely so descriptive of what is going on today, isn't it..

[Route797]

Thanks for the compliment! Like you said, that idea does seem appropriate for what’s going on today.

[knife6375]

“I’m guessing he won’t have very many Vietnam veterans crying at his funeral.”

Tears will be shed for brothers lost.