McNamara

It appears that Old Man McNamara has passed. I’m not sure it’s correct to say he has a “mixed” legacy; he was a terrible wartime Secretary of Defense, and the fact that he apparently felt the war was pointless from the beginning doesn’t really win him any points. Had war been avoided he might be remembered as a fine SecDef, but the war poisoned the reforms he tried to enact at the Pentagon. While I value “Fog of War” as a historical document, I still think that Morris let McNamara get away with far too much at too low of a price. Someday, someone will write a fabulous book comparing and contrasting Robert McNamara with Don Rumsfeld.

. . . update (davenoon): Meantime, this old post from the much-missed Jon Swift will have to do…