Robert McNamara dies

[Torplexed]

Robert S. McNamara died in his sleep at his home in Washington early this morning, family members said.

McNamara, who served as secretary of defense during the Vietnam War under presidents Kennedy and Johnson, was 93.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/06/AR2009070601197.html?hpid=topnews

[OneToughHerring]

Oh, him. From what I know later on in his life he regretted a lot of the things he did and was a part of, in WW2 and in the Vietnam war, the bombing campaings etc.

[Max2147]

The Fog of War is a great documentary about McNamara. The whole thing is on Youtube, and it's extremely interesting.

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgjF3dvhyoA

McNamara's 11 lessons from the film:


Empathize with your enemy
Rationality will not save us
There's something beyond one's self
Maximize efficiency
Proportionality should be a guideline in war
Get the data
Belief and seeing are often both wrong
Be prepared to reexamine your reasoning
In order to do good, you may have to engage in evil
Never say never
You can't change human nature

[Tchocky]

Aye, a fantastic film.

[SteamWake]

This guy was the architect of the Vietnam war. Un utter quagmire if there ever was one.

He was an abject failure.

He was also an east coast elitist democrat.:|\\

[CastleBravo]

A few months after McNamara told Lyndon Johnson that the war was unwinnable, McNamara did his part to make Vietnam America's greatest class war with his brainchild, Project 100,000. At the same time, McNamara knew but remained silent about the highly toxic effects of Agent Orange. What the former Secretary of Defense omits in his book and during his talk show interviews bears review, particularly since there is the danger that the next generation will study McNamara's self-serving version in America's schools.

In 1966, McNamara initiated the "Moron Corps," as they were piteously nicknamed by other soldiers. Billed as a Great Society program, McNamara's Project 100,000 lowered military enlistment requirements to recruit 100,000 men per year with marginal minds and bodies. Recruiters swept through urban ghettos and southern hill country, taking some youths with I.Q.s below what is considered legally retarded.
In all, 354,000 volunteered for Project 100,000. The minimum passing score on the armed forces qualification test had been 31 out of 100. Under McNamara's Project 100,000, those who scored as low as 10 were taken if they lived in a designated "poverty area." In 1969, out of 120 Marine Corps volunteers from Oakland, California, nearly 90 percent scored under 31; more than 70 percent were black or Mexican. Overall, 41 percent of Project 100,000 volunteers were black, compared to 12 percent of the rest of the armed forces. Touted as providing "rehabilitation," remedial education, and an escape from poverty, the program offered a one-way ticket to Vietnam, where these men fought and died in disproportionate numbers. The much-advertised skills were seldom taught.

Certainly not some one to be admired.

[Oberon]

My sum total knowledge of McNamara comes from the film Thirteen Days, looks like he had a lot to regret in his time though.

[Max2147]

McNamara made a lot of mistakes, especially regarding Vietnam. That's impossible to deny.

However, he should be given credit for being a man about it later and admitting that he messed up.

[CastleBravo]

Wasn't he a GM /Ford executive? Certainly holding back the unions.

[Max2147]

Wasn't he a GM /Ford executive? Certainly holding back the unions.
He was an exec at Ford, and very briefly President of Ford before he got tapped to be SecDef. He ran the World Bank for about a dozen years after he quit as SecDef.

[kiwi_2005]

Vietnam probably the worse war the allies took on, my uncle served in that war grim stories hes told me over the years turned a lot of good soldiers into mercenary killers with a hatred for the Vietcong so bad that killing woman and children didn't even flinch an eyelid, he would chop of the ears of a dead Vietcong and hang it round his neck. Other times him and his buddies would get stoned out of there heads while on night duty and then one of them would freak out so they would then go on a wild shooting spree one time some viet farmers were happily picking rice and they decided to just kill them for fun. He even admitted later after the war he was nothing but a killer with no emotion what so ever. Something went wrong in that war that turned (some not all) good soldiers into murderers to much anti communist propoganda drummed into their heads. Hard to beat an enemy on their own ground.

[Sailor Steve]

One of the things I remember McNamara for was his attempt to micromanage the war. We heard stories that he planned bombing raids personally from his desk in Washington, and was the major proponent of the US 'no-fly zones' in North Vietnam. Our pilots had very careful slots planned out for them, and they were not allowed to wander from these designated corridors, which made it easy for the enemy to know exactly where they'd be at any given time.

None of us who were there thought too much of the man.

[SteamWake]

One of the things I remember McNamara for was his attempt to micromanage the war. We heard stories that he planned bombing raids personally from his desk in Washington, and was the major proponent of the US 'no-fly zones' in North Vietnam. Our pilots had very careful slots planned out for them, and they were not allowed to wander from these designated corridors, which made it easy for the enemy to know exactly where they'd be at any given time.

None of us who were there thought too much of the man.

War by quota I believe was attributed to him. :oops:

[JSF]

Good riddance