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Gary North's REALITY CHECK
Issue 174 Sept. 9, 2002
REVISITING "RUMSFELD'S RULES" OF 1974
In 1977, the month after Jimmy Carter was inaugurated
as President, and one month after I lost my job as
Congressman Ron Paul's research assistant, because he had
lost the 1976 election by 268 votes out of about 180,000
cast, an article appeared in THE WASHINGTONIAN: "Rumsfeld's
Rules." This was a long list of unofficial rules that
should govern any senior advisor in the Washington
bureaucracy. In 1974, he had copyrighted these rules. Now
that he was out of office, he allowed a version of them to
be published.
Donald Rumsfeld had been the Secretary of Defense --
the youngest in history -- under President Ford.
Previously, he had advised President Nixon on Nixon's ill-
fated price controls program, while he was part of Nixon's
Office of Economic Stabilization. He left Washington in
1973, just as the Watergate scandal was breaking, to serve
as the U.S. Ambassador to NATO. Ford brought him back in
August, 1974, to serve as the chairman of his transition
team. On the day before Ford left office, he awarded
Rumsfeld the Medal of Freedom. To say that Rumsfeld is a
Washington insider is to say the obvious. He is arguably
the supreme Washington insider today.
Because the United States seems to be preparing to
start a war with Iraq, I think it is time to review a few
of Rumsfeld's rules. This war, if unsuccessful in reducing
the terrorist threat to the United States, will become an
expensive quagmire for the U.S. military and the U.S.
taxpayer. Afghanistan has already become such a quagmire.
Our troops are there for an indefinite stay. Our man in
Afghanistan, Karzai, was nearly assassinated last week, yet
we know little or nothing about who was behind the
assassination attempt. It came out of nowhere. To imagine
that this threat will go away is naive.
To imagine that an extended stay in Iraq will be any
less risky or less costly is also naive. Like B'rer Rabbit
in the Joel Chandler Harris story, President Bush is about
to smash the nation's collective fist into the tar baby of
the Middle East. We will not get out easily. B'rer Osama
will be the winner, as I hope to explain.
THE RULES' RECENT HISTORY
In January, 2001, when Rumsfeld once again took over
as Secretary of Defense, the Defense Department posted his
list of rules on its Website. If you search for
"Rumsfeld's Rules" on Google, the first link is to the
Defense Department's site.
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2001/p01262001_p028-01.html
You see this message underneath the section, "Press
Advisory."
"Rumsfeld's Rules Now Available on the Web."
When you click on this link, you are taken to a PDF file:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2001/rumsfeldsrules.pdf
There you read:
"Rumsfeld's Rules are no longer available from
the Department of Defense."
Allow me to suggest a reason for this disappearance.
These rules are an old-time Washington insider's insights
into how to operate as a Presidential advisor, and also how
to survive. Rumsfeld is a survivor. His list of posts
indicates a career of supreme partisan survivorship. He
may eventually become a member of the American Talleyrand
Society, joining the list with Elihu Root, Henry Stimson,
John Foster Dulles, and John J. McCloy.
http://www.defenselink.mil/bios/rumsfeld.html
But I don't think he will make it into this select
group. First, Democrat Presidents have avoided him like
the plague when they have been in office, unlike Root &
Co., who enjoyed bipartisan office-holding. Second, he is
now widely perceived as the man who has provided the
rationale for President Bush to invade Iraq. If that
adventure proceeds as announced and then turns sour, as the
Afghanistan adventure is now turning sour, Bush will lose
in 2004. Rumsfeld will then go into retirement as an also-
ran in the Talleyrand sweepstakes. He will be regarded as
a Republican partisan who served in high positions in three
losing Administrations -- Nixon's, Ford's, and Bush's.
(He was a relatively minor player in Reagan's, holding
seven forgettable positions, which indicates edge-of-the-
loop status.)
It's not that the Pentagon thought that by removing
the document from its site, this would somehow kill it.
The Web is too fecund for that. But something odd happened
to the document a year ago. According to a Website that
specializes in PDF, the most widely used document format
for the Internet, Rumsfeld's rules were updated on
September 11, 2001. Even more incredibly, the "Doc Info"
data file indicated that this document had been updated one
hour before the plane hit the Pentagon.
http://www.planetpdf.com/mainpage.asp?webpageid=2027#moreinfo
Sometime after September 11, the document was removed
from the Pentagon's site. The PDF Website has posted the
Feb. 20, 2001 version of "Rumsfeld's Rules."
http://www.planetpdf.com/planetpdf/pdfs/rumsfeldsrules.pdf
If the Iraq adventure turns out badly, which is
likely, Rumsfeld's rules will eventually come back to haunt
him. I begin with some early principles.
"BE TRUE TO THE PRESIDENT'S VIEWS"
- In the execution of Presidential decisions work
to be true to his views, in fact and tone.
- Know that the immediate staff and others in the
Administration will assume that your manner, tone
and tempo reflect the President's.
Rumsfeld is perceived, correctly, as the Iraq war's
defender and chief cabinet-level spokesman. There are
minor figures within the Administration who are also strong
promoters, but they do not have Rumsfeld's visibility or
his high office.
Today's Iraq warhawks are the heirs of the earlier
Iraq warhawks, who were the source of Bush, Senior's policy
of luring Saddam Hussein into attacking Kuwait. Someone
high in the State Department told our Ambassador to Iraq,
April Glaspie, to tell Saddam Hussein in July, 1990, that
Bush did not care if Iraq invaded Kuwait.
http://www.psych.upenn.edu/~fjgil/transcript.html
The spiritual and intellectual heirs of the policies
in the second half of 1990 are in power today. The policy
has not changed: eliminate Iraq as a power in the Middle
East. Prior to August, 1990, the U.S. was content to play
England's ancient game of the balance of power: Iran vs.
Iraq. This strategy eventually led Britain into to two
world wars and the loss of the Empire. It will not do any
better for us.
Iraq does not directly threaten the United States.
There is no evidence that it has weapons of mass
destruction, according to Scott Ritter, who was the head of
the United Nations' inspection team. Ritter wrote
recently:
I bear personal witness through seven years as a
chief weapons inspector in Iraq for the United
Nations to both the scope of Iraq's weapons of
mass destruction programs and the effectiveness
of the UN weapons inspectors in ultimately
eliminating them.
While we were never able to provide 100 percent
certainty regarding the disposition of Iraq's
proscribed weaponry, we did ascertain a 90-95
percent level of verified disarmament. This
figure takes into account the destruction or
dismantling of every major factory associated
with prohibited weapons manufacture, all
significant items of production equipment, and
the majority of the weapons and agent produced by
Iraq.
With the exception of mustard agent, all chemical
agent produced by Iraq prior to 1990 would have
degraded within five years (the jury is still out
regarding Iraq's VX nerve agent program -- while
inspectors have accounted for the laboratories,
production equipment and most of the agent
produced from 1990-91, major discrepancies in the
Iraqi accounting preclude any final disposition
at this time.)
The same holds true for biological agent, which
would have been neutralized through natural
processes within three years of manufacture.
Effective monitoring inspections, fully
implemented from 1994-1998 without any
significant obstruction from Iraq, never once
detected any evidence of retained proscribed
activity or effort by Iraq to reconstitute that
capability which had been eliminated through
inspections.
In direct contrast to these findings, the Bush
administration provides only speculation, failing
to detail any factually based information to
bolster its claims concerning Iraq's continued
possession of or ongoing efforts to acquire
weapons of mass destruction. To date no one has
held the Bush administration accountable for its
unwillingness -- or inability -- to provide such
evidence.
Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld notes that "the
absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."
http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0721-02.htm
I am convinced that President Bush is really the
brains behind his Iraq policy, which is why I think it will
fail to achieve its stated objective, namely, to reduce the
threat of terrorism in the United States. When it comes to
his policy on Iraq, this is a case of a son's desire to
settle an old score for his father, who is accurately
perceived as a man who did not eliminate his enemy when he
had the opportunity. Bush, Senior said that the
coalition's goals did not include the removal of Hussein,
only the removal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait. Bush, Junior
has countered with this argument: "Nuts to any coalition."
So, the American taxpayers, not Saudi Arabia, will foot the
economic bill for this one. Our ground troops will foot
the bill in blood.
As for any American-approved replacement ruler in
Iraq, he will have Karzai as a role model.
MR. PERSUASION
- In our system leadership is by consent, not
command. To lead, a President must persuade.
Recent public opinion polls reveal that almost two-
thirds of the American public does not think that the
President has clarified his position on why this war is
necessary. This is a political banana peel if the war goes
badly. It will justify a fickle public's reversal of
judgment.
Today, before the blood is flowing, two-thirds of the
public is willing to send the volunteer army -- not the
sons and daughters of the middle-class -- to war in Iraq.
Incredibly, only half think it's worth it if there will be
substantial American casualties. This indicates that well
over 10% of those polled think that we can topple Saddam
without suffering substantial casualties.
About 49% thinks we should invade even if there will
be substantial casualties for Iraqi civilians. Again, 49%
thinks that it's worth invading even if the war takes years
and we must occupy Iraq for years. But two-thirds thinks
the President should wait for the approval of our allies.
(There is no approval by our allies, other than Tony Blair,
who is facing criticism from within his own party)
http://www.pollingreport.com/iraq.htm
The Democrats are not saying mush about the war. It
is not a major election issue. It is not even a minor
election issue. This indicates that Bush will get his war.
But unless he clarifies why Americans must fight, the
public reserves the right to change its mind and blame him
for the blood. I think a bloody war followed by a bogged-
down recovery phase are a safe bet. At that point, the
Democrats will start criticizing Bush's handling of the
nation-building process. This will be an issue in 2004.
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BAD NEWS BEAR
- The price of being close to the President is
delivering bad news. You fail him if you don't
tell him the truth. Others won't do it.
The truth is this: there is no case for Iraq as being
in possession of weapons of mass destruction. Yet the
United States is about to launch an attack on Iraq on the
basis that someday, Iraq might have such weapons.
The State of Israel sent jets over Iraq in 1981 and
blew up a nuclear power plant. The justification was that
the plant could someday produce plutonium, which could be
used to build a nuclear weapon. But Israel did not send in
ground troops. We will have to.
You can find a strong defense of Israel's 1981 action
on a Website devoted to defending Jonathan Pollard, the
convicted American spy who gave Israel American military
secrets. The site reprints a 1995 article that identifies
Pollard as the original source of the information that Iraq
had an unconventional weapons program prior to the Gulf
War. We read:
"Shimon Peres, currently calling most of the
shots in the Rabin government, was, after all,
the man who bitterly attacked Begin for bombing
Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981. It is this
mind-set which is so troublesome when the vital
question of ensuring our safety arises. Among all
the doubts, Pollard emerges as a truly great
Jewish hero. He passed on information to try and
save Israel from its enemies -- information which
was Israel's due."
http://www.jonathanpollard.org/1995/092295.htm
Today, Bush is about to launch a war based on a
revived, unsupported version of Pollard's argument
regarding Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction.
This leads me to another of Rumsfeld's rules, which he
attributes to Simon Peres.
- If a problem has no solution, it may not be a
problem, but a fact, not to be solved, but to be
coped with over time.
President Bush knows that an American President has
only so much time. He may have only until January 20,
2005. His father ran out of time. Saddam Hussein is still
in power. A perceived family score must be settled.
MAKE THE OFFICE STRONGER
- Remember the public trust. Strive to preserve
and enhance the integrity of the office of the
Presidency. Pledge to leave it stronger than when
you came.
This desire to strengthen the office of President is
being enacted into law, day by day. The war against
terrorism is the justification domestically for an ongoing
reduction of our liberty. Mr. Rumsfeld fully understands
the nature of this process.
- "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost
all at once." (David Hume)
A shooting war will silence the political opposition
for as long as the war seems to be going well. Nothing
strengthens the Presidency more than a war, unless the war
becomes a stalemate or a defeat. But it's a big gamble to
start a war. It assumes that the war will be easy to win.
I predict that "bring the boys home by Ramadan" will not be
possible. As Rumsfeld said long ago,
- It is very difficult to spend "federal (the
taxpayers') dollars" so that the intended result
is achieved.
Fortunately, there is an alternative:
- Presidential leadership needn't always cost
money. Look for low- and no-cost options. They
can be surprisingly effective.
Therefore:
- If in doubt, don't.
- If still in doubt, do what's right.
My view: it is not a wise policy for the President of
the United States to follow Jonathan Pollard's recommended
military strategy -- an attack on Iraq -- based on Mr.
Pollard's assessment regarding Iraq's alleged possession of
weapons of mass destruction. It also isn't right. I
remind Mr. Rumsfeld:
- In politics, every day is filled with numerous
opportunities for serious error. Enjoy it.
Frankly, I would not enjoy it. But I know what he
meant. If you don't enjoy it, resign. He does not resign.
My advice:
- "The oil can is mightier than the sword."
(Senator Everett Dirksen, [R-IL])
What this country's foreign policy needs is more oil
cans and fewer oil embargoes.
THE MILITARY SIDE OF THINGS
- If you get the objectives right, a lieutenant
can write the strategy. (General George Marshall)
The objectives are not right -- not morally right, and
not strategically right for the United States. There are
no known weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Pollard is
in jail, because what he did was morally wrong. His
strategic analysis was equally flawed.
- "No plan survives contact with the enemy." (Old
military axiom)
This is an axiom, not a corollary. Someone in
Washington should pay closer attention to the fact that
Saddam Hussein is a secularist and therefore the sworn
enemy of Osama bin Laden and his radical co-religionists.
Removing Saddam Hussein will create a crisis of rule in
Iraq. So will a series of assassinated puppets. This will
be grist for Osama's mill.
- Look for what's missing. Many advisors can tell
a President how to improve what's proposed or
what's gone amiss. Few are able to see what isn't
there.
I'll tell you what's missing: a realization that war
with a terrorist group is not like war with a nation. The
head of state of a nation understands that the rule of tit-
for-tat governs warfare. This is why neither side used
chemical weapons in World War II. It is also why,
historically, nations at war do not resort to assassination
of the rival nation's head of state. Assassination
produces tit-for-tat.
The strategic problem comes with terrorists. First,
they tend to be martyrs. Second, their leaders are not
easily targeted, for they hide. They do not make public
appearances. Third, if the terrorist organization doesn't
claim responsibility for its act of terrorism, its leader
may escape tit-for-tat.
If Saddam Hussein is replaced by the United States,
assassination will become the wave of the future. His
successors will not survive. The Karzai attempt last week
was the first salvo. It will not be the last.
If the West's inability to deal with assassination
becomes obvious to Islamic terrorists, the likelihood of an
escalation of assassination increases dramatically.
AN ILLOGICAL RULE
- "The test of a first rate intelligence is the
ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at
the same time, and still retain the ability to
function." (F. Scott Fitzgerald)
This rule now governs Mr. Rumsfeld. This is the
nation's problem. He is still functioning.
THE ULTIMATE RULE OF RULES
- It is easier to get into something than to get
out of it.
This one is going to bite Bush and his advisors. It
is going to bite the Republican Party in 2004.
CONCLUSION
We are about to enter a new phase of the war on
terrorism. This phase will increase the confidence of
Islamic terrorists that the Great Satan is ready to remove
secular leaders in Islamic states. This message will also
get through to secular leaders of Islamic states. It will
place them in between the U.S. military and the Islamic
Koranists. It will produce a common enemy: the United
States, which is already viewed as a client state of Israel
by the Arabs.
As I began saying last September, "the action is the
reaction." To undermine secular leaders in Middle Eastern
Islamic states is a reaction that will strengthen the hand
of the radicals.
It is now time for the Commander-in-Chief to scrap
both the military analysis and the military response
recommended by Jonathan Pollard. The sooner that Mr.
Rumsfeld becomes convinced of this, the better.
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