Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Robert McNamara 1916-2009

silent_jay · 07-06-2009, 02:58 PM

Found a good interview in Esquire from 2002:

Quote:

Originally published in the January 2002 issue

My first memory is still very clear in my mind. It was November 11, 1918. I can even remember the street I lived on: 16 Clement Street in San Francisco. I can remember the streetcars coming down Geary on Armistice Day with people screaming on top of them. There weren't enough seats in the cars, so people climbed on top and were cheering, applauding. Joyous! Mostly because we'd just won World War I. But to many it was more than that because they believed we'd just won the War to End All Wars. That's what President Wilson called it.

I was on Guam in March of 1945 on temporary duty with the 20th Air Force. I was with General LeMay when we interrogated the B-29 crews that came back from a bombing mission. That night, that single night, we'd burned to death eighty thousand civilians in Tokyo. I've lived through a lot.

As president of Ford, I introduced the Falcon. That was one of my favorites. I also loved the Mustang.

When President Kennedy asked if I'd serve as secretary of defense, I told him I wasn't qualified. He said, "I don't believe there's any school for presidents, either."

One of the most serious days of my tenure as secretary of defense was Saturday, October 27, 1962, when we were trying to decide whether to attack Cuba or not because of the missiles there. Events were slipping out of control on both sides. We were this close to nuclear war and total disaster. I remember leaving the White House that night to go back to the Pentagon -- I didn't go home for twelve days, lived in the Pentagon -- it was a perfectly beautiful fall night, and I remember telling George Ball that I wasn't sure we'd ever see another Saturday night.

I hold my weight constant. Maybe it's because I enjoy healthful foods. I actually like broccoli.

I don't know much about the Muslim religion, but I do know two things. Number one: They have the same God we do. Number two: They have a phrase in the Koran that is synonymous with "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you." There's something to build on. That's the point.

After JFK was shot, I went to meet the plane that brought his body back from Texas. Then I went home and either Jackie or Bobby called and asked me to come to the hospital where they were carrying out the autopsy. We took his body back to the White House at about 5:00 a.m. There was a big argument among his associates about where he should be buried. Some said, "He should be buried in Massachusetts -- that was his home." I said, "He wasn't the president of Massachusetts. He was president of the United States. He ought to be buried in Washington." I went out to Arlington National Cemetery to find a place. It was a gray and rainy morning, and the cemetery was shrouded in a faint mist. I walked with the superintendent across the beautiful grounds studded with simple white tombstones. I stopped when we came to a spot just below the Custis-Lee Mansion. I could see the Lincoln Memorial in the distance. "This is the place," I said. I called Jackie and she came out to look at it. That's what she chose. Later in the day, I was introduced to a young park-service ranger who had escorted Kennedy on a visit to Arlington a few weeks earlier. I told him which spot I had chosen. "When President Kennedy was visiting a few weeks ago," the ranger said, "he stopped in that same spot. He looked out toward the monuments, and I heard him say that this was the most beautiful sight in Washington."

It's done. You can't bring JFK back to life. I don't think about who did it.

I was forty-four years old when I became secretary of defense. I wish I had the knowledge I do now back then.

Vietnam we saw as a function of the cold war. The CIA appraisal was, and Eisenhower's appraisal was, that the loss of Vietnam and Laos would trigger an extension of communist hegemony across much of southeast Asia. This would weaken the security of the West across the world. Therefore, it was necessary to prevent that. That's why we were in Vietnam. It was an incorrect appraisal.

One of the lessons of Vietnam was that we as a people, as a nation, must learn to empathize with others in the world -- particularly our opponents. Sympathy is not a synonym of empathy: Empathy means understanding; sympathy means agreeing or embracing. I don't think we as a nation have learned to empathize.

There is no contradiction between a soft heart and a hard head.

I married one of God's loveliest creatures. I met Marg when I was seventeen, and we married when I was twenty-four. She died twenty years ago. She was an absolutely gorgeous-looking girl. Very, very feminine. But she also was an athlete. She linked arms with a friend of mine and she bent over and threw him over her head. I'll never forget that.

My children are gradually teaching me to be more open. I tended to bottle things up. That is not good.

I've gone to the Vietnam Memorial. It brings me a feeling of sadness. But it also brings a feeling of respect and honor for the people who served their nation.

As the ancient Greek dramatist Aeschylus wrote, "The reward of suffering is experience."

Robert McNamara Interview - Robert McNamara Quotes - Esquire