The death of Robert McNamara last week went pretty much unnoticed by the general public as all the media was focused on Michael Jackson's death. Obviously 99% of Americans know who was Michael Jackson but I would bet that less than 10% know who was McNamara. McNamara was Secretary of Defense under Kennedy and Johnson. He was considered the architect of the Vietnam War and many historians hold him responsible for the disaster of this war. To me there is a similarity between him and a more recent Dept. of Defense official.
I am talking about Paul Wolfowitz, the undersecretary of Defense under Bush. While Donald Rumsfeld was the Sec. of Defense, I think Wolfowitz had more influence on Bush to start the Iraq war. McNamara used the Gulf of Tonkin incident to escalate the war. The information on that incident is questionable. Wolfowitz used weapons of mass destruction and link to al qaeda to get support for the Iraq war. Those information turned out to be false. McNamara underestimated the support the Viet Congs had. Wolfowitz underestimated the support for the insurgents. McNamara argues for Vietnam war with the Dominoes Theory. Wolfowitz argues for spreading democracy to the Middle East.
One last thing: When it appeared that these men had failed, they were both given the job of president of World Bank. I wonder who thinks that people who fight bad wars would be good at loaning money?
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