Rumsfeld a forceful, divisive Pentagon chief

WASHINGTON, Nov 8: Donald Rumsfeld, a forceful presence as US defense secretary, designed and executed the Iraq war, and his legacy will be defined by a conflict costly to the United States in lives and money.

Rumsfeld, President George W Bush's Pentagon chief since 2001, directed invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. He sought to modernise the US military. He created the Guantanamo Bay jail for foreign terrorism suspects. He presided over the Defense Department during the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal.

Rumsfeld, an alternatively charming and caustic 74-year-old multimillionaire, wielded a level of influence as defense secretary rivaled perhaps only by Robert McNamara, who served presidents John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson in the Vietnam War era. Both men headed the Pentagon during unpopular wars.

Rumsfeld inspired passionate reactions at home and aboard uncommon for a mere Cabinet secretary.

Admirers viewed Rumsfeld as a dedicated patriot who reinvigorated a military weakened by insufficient funding in the 1990s, devised innovative war plans that toppled the Taliban leaders of Afghanistan and President Saddam Hussein in Iraq, and remained vigilant against threats to US security.

Detractors painted him as a reckless warmonger who botched the Iraq occupation planning, sent too few troops, failed to anticipate a bloody insurgency, put soldiers into combat without enough armor, damaged the all-volunteer military and sullied America's reputation by sanctioning detainee abuse.

But as he wrote in ''Rumsfeld's Rules,'' his compilation of truisms dating back to the 1970s: ''If you are not criticised, you may not be doing much.'' Another quote from ''Rumsfeld's Rules'' may be equally apt: ''It is easier to get into something than to get out of it.'' The Iraq war has cost far more than foreseen in financial and human terms. More than three years into the war, US troops continue to fight insurgents. More than 2,800 US troops and tens of thousands of Iraqis have died.

The Iraq war has cost the United States hundreds of billions of dollars.

ALIENATED ALLIES

Rumsfeld alienated some US allies in Europe, maintained icy relations with US lawmakers, battled with Cabinet rivals including former Secretary of State Colin Powell and intimidated some senior US military officers.

He also took aim at war critics, In August, he gave a speech recalling those who sought to appease the Nazis before World War Two and asked, ''Can folks really continue to think that free countries can negotiate a separate peace with terrorists?'' Many Democrats and a growing number of fellow Republicans had called for him to be replaced.

This spring, a small group of retired generals demanded his resignation, accusing him of strategic blunders in Iraq and disregarding military advice. As he had before, Bush kept Rumsfeld despite howls for his ouster. In 2004, Bush twice refused to accept Rumsfeld's offer to resign amid the Abu Ghraib scandal.

Rumsfeld, one of the longest-serving defense secretaries, held the job twice. In 1975, President Gerald Ford, for whom he also served as White House chief of staff, made him at age 43 the youngest Pentagon chief. In 2001, Bush made him the oldest.

Rumsfeld carried out a unique war plan in the Afghanistan invasion in 2001 that followed the September 11 attacks, using lots of air power and a small number of troops to oust the Taliban leaders who had harbored Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. Bin Laden, however, remained a fugitive, and Afghanistan remains violent and chaotic.

US forces led an invasion of Iraq in March 2003. More than 3-1/2 years later, the United States still has about 140,000 troops in Iraq, with violence surging, the US death toll mounting and concern rising about all-out civil war.

Rumsfeld, born in Chicago on July 9, 1932, is a former college wrestler, Navy aviator, congressman from Illinois and corporate executive who held a variety of jobs in the Nixon and Ford administrations.

REUTERS