Rummy Rules


| Fri Jun. 3, 2005 2:00 AM EDT

When we last left our hero, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, I sarcastically conjectured that poor Rummy had been "dropped from the loop" at the Pentagon. Reviewing situation after situation in which he pleaded ignorance -- he hadn't been able to view the Abu Ghraib photos until they were in the media, never received critical Pentagon reports, and missed major news stories about crucial defense issues that were already public property -- I posited (tongue firmly in cheek) that underlings at the Department of Defense were apparently keeping materials from the SECDEF and so leaving him to twist in the wind at press events as well as in front of congressional panels.

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Q Mr. Secretary, the Church Report obviously is out? And your overall reaction to the report as you've seen it?

SEC. RUMSFELD: I have not read the report, and I think I'll leave it there. And I have been quite busy this morning, and I wasn't able to see any of the testimony. So I'm afraid I'll just have to ?

Q Mr. Secretary ?

SEC. RUMSFELD: We'll make this the last question.

Later that day, Rumsfeld appeared before the House Armed Services Committee where he was no less evasive with Republican Congressman and Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter of California, who got into it with the know-nothing SECDEF, even adopting Rummy's trademark "folks," as they argued about an undefined topic:

CONGRESSMAN HUNTER: Did you get the question?

SECRETARY RUMSFELD: I did get the question. My problem is that number one, it's not something I've read, it's not something I've been briefed on? I'm afraid I've responded as fully as I'm currently capable of doing. Thank you very much, folks.

CONGRESSMAN HUNTER: I appreciate it, folks.

Obviously, not even a feed-the-beast militarist like Hunter can avoid Rummy's pique when the SECDEF's rules are violated.

As the nation's stand-up non-sequitur-in-chief, the Pentagon head has just finished a great month in the spotlight -- from his attack on Amnesty International's recent comment that the U.S. prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba "has become the gulag of our times" ("reprehensible" and "outlandish") to his unbridled jingoism and curious definition of "liberation" ("[N]o force in the world has done more to liberate people that they have never met than the men and women of the United States military?"), he's managed to exceed the wildest dreams of his detractors.


After a gracious greeting, Stephanopolous called attention to an ABC News poll that showed 53% of Americans felt the war in Iraq was not "worth fighting." Only 28% felt the war had made the U.S. stronger in the world, he added, while 41% who believed it had weakened the country. Then he asked Rumsfeld, "What do you say to those Americans?" Essentially ignoring the question, Rumsfeld promptly replied, "Well, I haven't seen the poll. I've seen polls that say very much the opposite of that." He, of course, didn't mention what polls those were -- though it's conceivable they were taken by the White House in an alternate universe. Stephanopolous next drew attention to a Washington Post story about sagging U.S. military manpower and quoted General Richard Cody, the vice-chairman of the Army, as saying that the sad state of affairs keeps him awake at night. "Does it keep you up at night, as well?" Stephanopolous asked the SECDEF.

"No. It doesn't keep me up at night," answered Rummy, who, in high style, launched into a confusing response in which he admitted that just a couple of years into what look to be exceedingly long occupations, the U.S. has already deployed 40% of its National Guard and Reserve forces in Iraq and Afghanistan -- a fact that might indeed have left a lesser Pentagon-head sleepless -- and he even managed to turn to some of those soldiers under his command into inanimate objects. ("?[W]e've only used in Iraq and Afghanistan something like 40% of the Guard and Reserve. It's not like everything's been used up.")

Letting him off the hook, Stephanopolous then turned to a report in the Washington Post that the U.S. had again misled its allies, telling them that North Korea was selling nuclear materials to Libya, when, in fact, "according to U.S. intelligence? it was [U.S. ally in the war on terror] Pakistan that was buying the materials from North Korea and selling it to Libya." Put on the spot, Rummy fell back on one of his classic defenses, claiming that he -- in fact, the whole Pentagon -- had been of the loop:

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: ...The Post goes on to say, "Pakistan's role as both the buyer and the seller was concealed to cover up the part played by Washington's partner in the hunt for al Qaeda leaders." Is that true?

SEC. RUMSFELD: I have no idea. I've never heard anything like that and it wouldn't be the Department of Defense that would be involved anyway. It would be intelligence agencies.

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: But this is something you'd be aware of --




SEC. RUMSFELD: I do not personally -- and the implication that the United States misled allies, I would -- which is the essence of what -

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: Post headline.

SEC. RUMSFELD: -- yes, of what you're saying, I'm not in a position to comment on because I just have no knowledge of it.

It would only get better as the interview continued.

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: ?When you were last on the program, you said that you weren't aware of any U.S. military operations in Iran, ongoing military operations. Since then, it's been reported that Iran has protested to the United States about U.S. overflights on their territory and that that protest was forwarded to the Pentagon. What was the Pentagon's response?

SEC. RUMSFELD: I have no idea. I don't know about the protest. I have seen -- there are various --

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: You don't know about the protest?



MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: Have you ever authorized any U.S. military overflights of Iran since you've been Defense Secretary?


MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: You don't believe you have?

SEC. RUMSFELD: Yes, and I can't recall any.

While the rules of Rummy-style (still being established) prohibited our Secretary of Defense from recalling specifics when it comes to significant news about an Axis-of-Evil power with nuclear ambitions, they evidently in no way prohibit him, as happened only days later, from unequivocally denying obscure allegations that the U.S. was to "begin monitoring Argentine airspace as a preventive measure to avoid [drug] trafficking and terrorist movement." As adamant on this matter as he had, on Iran, been foggy, the SECDEF insisted that such talk was "inaccurate" because, "had there been anything like that, I would have heard something of it, and I've never heard of anything like that. So, you can disabuse yourself of that concern."

Evil, nuclear Iran: "I don't think I have, but I don't know. I'd have to check." Argentina: "I would have heard something of it." Who can deny that, only now, after years in power, is the man truly hitting his stride.

The Donald even felt free to chastise the reporter who broached the subject in regard to Argentina. ("You don't believe everything you read in the newspaper do you?") Since then, Rumsfeld has launched his own Rummy-rules war on the media, lamenting to the New York Times about the free press in America and how it hampers propaganda efforts. ("It's an awkward thing for our government because we have a free press here and you can't say?you can't speak to one audience without having it affect your own audience.") At the same time, he made a special attempt to denigrate reporters in general. And just recently, right-wing radio host Laura Ingram asked him about the "mainstream media constantly fluffing up these stories about Koran mishandling" and whether he was "frustrated by the media coverage." The SECDEF replied "There's no question but that it's harmful to the country and it's harmful to the men and women in uniform and the job they're trying to do."

Under developing Rummy rules, America's free press may just have to go -- but the overseas one has clearly got to go first. Of late, Rummy has saved his strongest venom for Arab television outlets "like Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiyah and some of the others," announcing that spreading "lie[s] is what they do." He then painted Al-Jazeera as nothing short of a terrorist TV network ("Terrorist acts on television. Now, how does Al-Jazeera get there? Obviously, they have advance notice.")

In recent months, it should be noted that, while Rummy was sticking to already elaborated Rummy rules in most situations, he also took some daring steps to expand the Rummy repertoire -- not just spouting off against the press, but launching a one-man media boycott of sorts. Already on strike at the Pentagon, when it came to basic information, he proactively and in measured stages stopped reading the press. Way back in February, the SECDEF already couldn't be bothered to read published reports about North Korean declarations that the country possessed nuclear weapons. Then, in March, he told Stephanopolous that the Washington Post front page was on his do-not-read list. As it turned out, he was only warming up. Later that month, he placed the New York Times on the list as well. ("I didn't read the article.") And most recently, he made sure not to have read a word in Vanity Fair or anywhere else concerning the revelation that the FBI's former number-two man, Mark Felt, was the Watergate informant known as "Deep Throat" ("?I have not followed what's been -- I've not read these articles.")

In the distant month of January 2005, Rummy had admitted to reading Newsweek; but recently, in the midst of the magazine's Koran-in-the-toilet flap (where the government deftly shifted the national discussion from U.S. abuses and their effects upon world opinion to an indictment of that magazine's reportage), he invoked Rummy rules in a new way. He remarked threateningly in regard to the now-retracted article: "?[T]he only other thing I'd say about it is, people lost their lives. People are dead. And that's unfortunate. And people need to be very careful about what they say?" As the architect of wars that have killed an estimated 100,000-plus people, he invoked Rummy rules to retain for himself alone the sacrosanct right to say whatever you want without a care in the world.

While attacking the press, Rummy lauded historians for their "perspective" -- but mostly for not being reporters. He even took to offering his own historical assessments: "[M]y recollection is looking at four or five insurgencies in the last century? they ended up ending." How astute. Rumsfeld has even taken to playing instant historian in summing up the Abu Ghraib torture scandal: "I think when some perspective is put on it you'll see some people were not treated properly and people were punished for it?"

The SECDEF lives enveloped in a reality based solely on Rummy rules and he wants us all to have the pleasure of joining him. There's just one caveat -- we must suspend disbelief and live by the credo: "In Rummy We Trust."

And trust we must or else none of it makes sense. Sometimes Rummy can't read. Other times he seems to refuse to do so. He's at war with the press and members of Congress who dare to question him. He seems to have taken up his boss's attitudes toward the media with a passion. He's happy -- in fact, delighted -- to alter history to suit his needs. He's remarkably uninformed, except on Argentina, and astonishingly forgetful when it comes to alleged U.S. military actions against Axis-of-Evil hot-spots with grave global implications.

His statements often fly bravely in the face of reality, not to speak of credulity. For instance, while terrorist attacks around the world have spiked so high (from 175 in 2003 to 651 in 2004) that the Department of State was forced to stop issuing its "Patterns of Global Terrorism" statistical report (which it had published every year from 1980 onward), Rummy contends that the U.S. is "doing pretty well" in the global war on terror. But when questioned about Osama bin Laden -- the man his boss declared was "Wanted, Dead or Alive" way back in September 2001 -- Rummy explained the administration's progress on that front this way, "I don't think -- When you're hunting for someone and you haven't found them, you haven't found them." Sage words from a wizened old pro.

Rummy's double-talk; non-answers, and general evasiveness can leave you scratching your head. Is it total incompetence or gross malfeasance? Could he really be out of the loop on so many critical issues? Or is he instituting Rummy rules in Washington, rules so bizarre yet so consistent as to ensure, in the Bush administration's endless face-off with the press, that Rummy always rules?

Don Rumsfeld is fond of misquoting Mark Twain's axiom that "A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." The great anti-war and anti-imperialist author no doubt turns over in his grave each time the SECDEF mangles his words to suit his needs, but Sam Clemens would no doubt appreciate the stark irony of the Donald daring to call out others as liars.

If Twain were alive today, perhaps he might pen "Donald Rumsfeld's Soliloquy" -- like the 1905 "King Leopold's Soliloquy" that he wrote concerning the rule of an imperial power-broker who made his own grim rules in Belgium's Congo colony. But barring a resurrection (or the growth of a spine by the American media), the Secretary of Defense is likely to go on, uncontested, writing his own rules, answering to no one, and creating a reality where, indeed, only Rummy rules.


Copyright 2005 Nick Turse
