375: Donald Rumsfeld in the Movies with William Cooper

00:00:01:08 – 00:00:20:12
Dan LeFebvre
Since we’re talking about Donald Rumsfeld in three different movies today, let’s start with a twist on the historical letter grade that we usually do. So this time the grade is not for the entire movie, but just how the movie portrays Rumsfeld. And our first movie today is 2018, vice, which you and I have talked about before. It’s episode 335.

00:00:20:12 – 00:00:31:14
Dan LeFebvre
If anyone wants to queue that up to listen to after this. But in vice, Donald Rumsfeld is played by Steve Carell. What letter grade does vice get for how Rumsfeld is brought to the screen?

00:00:31:16 – 00:00:35:17
William Cooper
I would say a D minus.

00:00:35:20 – 00:00:51:28
William Cooper
I think vice is a good movie and an entertaining movie. I love Steve Carell and Christian Bale’s awesome. In terms of accuracy, I thought it was just really,

00:00:52:00 – 00:00:54:14
Dan LeFebvre
Hard, just not.

00:00:54:15 – 00:01:04:11
William Cooper
Even approaching, one element of accuracy. Just kind of way out there on that particular character.

00:01:04:14 – 00:01:07:14
Dan LeFebvre
Donald Rumsfeld was a real person, and that’s it.

00:01:07:16 – 00:01:22:06
William Cooper
It’s about right. Yeah. No, it was, again, good movie, great actors. The whole crew involved in that movie. You know, very talented people. Accuracy wise, it was not very good.

00:01:22:08 – 00:01:35:12
Dan LeFebvre
Well, after vice, we’ll chat a little bit about Rumsfeld in 2008, w about George W Bush and that movie. Donald Rumsfeld is played by Scott Glenn. What letter grade does he get for his portrayal of Rumsfeld?

00:01:35:14 – 00:01:37:18
William Cooper
C minus.

00:01:37:20 – 00:01:38:24
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, a little better.

00:01:38:27 – 00:02:10:18
William Cooper
A little bit better. A little bit more. At least not whole cloth in that one. I felt like, but still really not at the aim there was not again, I didn’t feel like the aim or the ultimate product was about accuracy. I think it was more about entertainment. And it in some ways was really the both movies were about the focal point, Cheney advised.

00:02:10:18 – 00:02:21:29
William Cooper
And and Bush and W so it’s understandable that maybe Rumsfeld was used to add some flourish as opposed to be accurate.

00:02:22:01 – 00:02:46:25
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I’m really curious about the next one, because finally, we’re going to wrap up our discussion today with 2013, The Unknown Known. And that’s actually documentary interviewing Donald Rumsfeld himself. So there’s not an actor portraying him. But for that one, let’s shift back to the overall letter grade for how accurate the documentary is, because I know we all like to think that documentaries are entirely accurate, but I think we’ve all seen documentaries that can stretch the truth a little bit.

00:02:46:27 – 00:02:57:21
Dan LeFebvre
The example I like to give is Ancient Aliens, that some claim to be a documentary, but that’s a topic for another day. So, what does the unknown known get for its historical letter grade?

00:02:57:24 – 00:03:24:08
William Cooper
I’d say a minus, maybe even an a I I’m a huge fan of our old Morris. The predecessor documentary that he did about Robert McNamara is one of the most powerful films of any, any genre, in my opinion, is unbelievably powerful, movie. And I felt like the Rumsfeld movie was a follow on sequel to that.

00:03:24:08 – 00:03:49:04
William Cooper
In a way, I thought it was great. I thought it was well done. I will say documentaries can be extremely misleading. So I the higher grade is not simply because it’s a documentary. I actually thought it was a really good production and not misleading and not unfair. And in fundamental ways. And of course, you got a lot of raw material that was stripped from the historical record.

00:03:49:06 – 00:04:09:16
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I’m glad you pointed that out, because, yeah, sometimes people think, movie is entertainment, documentary is truth. And I know that’s what it’s supposed to be, but that’s not always what especially is talking about something political to where, you know, politicians tend to stretch the truth sometimes too.

00:04:09:18 – 00:04:32:22
William Cooper
Absolutely. Documentaries can even be worse because people are can be lulled into the so false confidence that something is true because it’s the documentary and then through omission, it can tell a totally different story, or amplifying the things that maybe weren’t as big of a deal. But I thought the the Rumsfeld documentary was really good, and I learned a lot.

00:04:32:22 – 00:04:48:29
William Cooper
I’d already knew a lot about Rumsfeld by that point in time is something somebody I’ve always been really fascinated by and interested in, and I actually learned a fair amount and was surprised about it. And, it was fascinating.

00:04:49:01 – 00:05:09:19
Dan LeFebvre
Now it’s good. Well, with the letter grades done, let’s start digging into a little more detail starting with 2018. Vice. That movie tells a little bit about Donald Rumsfeld before his political career. For example, it mentions that he was the former captain of the Princeton wrestling team. He was an elite Navy jet pilot before becoming a congressman.

00:05:09:21 – 00:05:21:26
Dan LeFebvre
But as you mentioned before, vice is more about Dick Cheney. So we don’t get a lot about Rumsfeld himself. So can you fill in some more history that we don’t see in the movie about who Donald Rumsfeld was before he was in politics?

00:05:21:28 – 00:05:51:18
William Cooper
Yeah, I think the movie takes some snapshots of Rumsfeld that are accurate. He was a wrestler, and that was a big part of his upbringing. And a lot of people think that his background as a wrestler sort of embodies his approach to politics and business being very aggressive and, confrontational. Even so, they got that right. He was, entered politics in his 20s, so there’s not a ton before politics entered politics in his 20s.

00:05:51:18 – 00:06:15:21
William Cooper
He was 29 when he was elected to Congress for the first time in district, just outside of Chicago, was in Congress for a number of years, worked for Nixon for a number of years. Was prudent. It’s it’s it’s a question about whether it was luck or prudence or a mix of the two. But he was in Nixon’s administration and in kind of a lower tier post.

00:06:15:23 – 00:06:45:29
William Cooper
And then right before Watergate exploded, he left to be the NATO ambassador in Brussels. So what everything was going for of the floor came out from underneath the Nixon administration. Rumsfeld had just gotten to Brussels and and was focused on other things. And his reputation, I think, was, preserved in some ways. There’s no evidence he was involved in the Watergate scandal or that he was in the machinations with Nixon and others.

00:06:46:01 – 00:07:09:01
William Cooper
But I think for anybody who was actually there on the ground in the administration, it was a tough time, and Rumsfeld was able to get out of it. He came back when Ford took over because Ford was a big fan of Rumsfeld. They were good friends from their time in Congress. And then shortly after Rumsfeld arrived to help Ford, he brought Cheney and who he’d met during the Nixon administration as one of his deputies.

00:07:09:09 – 00:07:30:29
William Cooper
So that’s how that all worked together. Then Nixon became, excuse me. Rumsfeld was, Ford’s chief of staff. Cheney was his deputy. And then Rumsfeld went and became secretary of defense for the first time, and Cheney was elevated to be chief of staff before it. And that’s how the two of them really got started.

00:07:31:01 – 00:07:39:22
Dan LeFebvre
That’s the kind of thing that I mean, the timing of that is very coincidental, but sometimes coincidences actually do happen too.

00:07:39:22 – 00:08:05:08
William Cooper
So yeah, they did, and I think, Rumsfeld was pretty astute. I mean, my view of Rumsfeld is a mixed picture of positives and negatives. The novel really tries to paint that full picture of somebody who’s not just, oh, good or evil, but a mixture of things. And one of Rumsfeld’s strengths, politically at least, he’s had a good nose for this.

00:08:05:08 – 00:08:27:25
William Cooper
Earlier on in his career. The good news for controversy and when to avoid it. As he got older and came back into politics, some might argue he ran to the controversies. But at least early on in his career, he really tried to avoid them and had a pretty good instinct for it. And that that was the the prime example of that getting out of Washington at the right time.

00:08:27:27 – 00:08:48:26
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if we go back to the movie after Rumsfeld is elected to Congress, the movie’s dialog suggests that Rumsfeld was a little different than other congressmen. And there’s a line of dialog from the movie I want to quote here. It says, quote, most congressmen use their power like an ax best and brightest. Rumsfeld, on the other hand, use his like a master of the butterfly knife.

00:08:49:02 – 00:08:58:21
Dan LeFebvre
And like any master, if you got in his way, he would cut you. Does vice do a good job explaining how Rumsfeld wielded his political power?

00:08:58:23 – 00:09:23:13
William Cooper
I think it’s really simplistic. Again, entertaining, good movie, but very simplistic. And it exaggerated. I don’t think that there were a lot of people who disagreed with Rumsfeld, but I don’t think he, you know, in the Ford administration, in Congress and in the 60s and 70s, I don’t think he was stabbing people in the back, left and right.

00:09:23:13 – 00:09:53:11
William Cooper
One of his chief rivals politically during that time was Henry Kissinger, especially with Ford. Rumsfeld and Kissinger were two really strong voices, and they had some disagreements. Rumsfeld was much stronger on the Cold War, wanted to take a much harder stance against Russia than Kissinger did. Kissinger’s philosophy was more, strategic co-existence with Russia, where Rumsfeld really wanted to be more confrontational.

00:09:53:13 – 00:10:19:15
William Cooper
And they, after they left government, ended up being very good friends. Rumsfeld writes in his biography that he and Kissinger had been very close for quite some time and, and really good friends. So there were rivalries and there were certainly a lot of political maneuvering going on, like you would expect from a politician. But I don’t think he was stabbing people in the back or doing, you know, really, underhanded sort of deceitful thing.

00:10:19:16 – 00:10:22:14
William Cooper
I think that was more of an exaggeration.

00:10:22:16 – 00:10:44:06
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah. I mean, that makes it politicians will disagree. That’s kind of part of their job. But, you know, the stabbing in the back part, that’s mentioned in the movie or it doesn’t say specifically stabbing in the back, but it gives that impression. And so yeah, that’s I’m glad you clarified that though, because that was definitely the impression I got was basically my way or the highway.

00:10:44:09 – 00:11:06:10
William Cooper
Well, it certainly intellectually was could be like that. He could be my way of the highway in the sense a very strong views and wasn’t prone to compromise intellectually with what he wanted. He’s very deferential to the president, very deferential to the chain of command. So if the president gave him an order, he would follow it.

00:11:06:12 – 00:11:32:27
William Cooper
And he I think he would do so in a straightforward way. But he was very opinionated and very confident in his views and very, very and one of his biggest flaws of them all was not listening to the critics, not listening to other people. And I think that was one of the reasons he made such a big mistake with the Iraq War, was not listening to other, other opinions.

00:11:33:00 – 00:11:58:20
William Cooper
So in some sense he was very strong minded and he was my way or the highway, but I don’t think he was doing things that were, you know, extreme. I don’t think he was he was, you know, blackmailing his opponents or lying to the president or committing crimes to get things done. So I think there was some exaggeration in the movie, even though he was a very strong personality.

00:11:58:23 – 00:12:26:03
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Well, you mentioned friends and throughout the entirety of vice, it’s not Kissinger, but it’s pretty clear that Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney have a very close working relationship. It’s Rumsfeld who seems to give Cheney his big break in politics, working under him during the Nixon presidency. Then later in the movie, when Cheney becomes vice president, the impression I got was that it was Cheney who convinced President Bush to appoint Rumsfeld as the secretary of defense.

00:12:26:05 – 00:12:31:09
Dan LeFebvre
How much of that really happened? And can you unravel the working relationship that Cheney and Rumsfeld had?

00:12:31:11 – 00:12:56:16
William Cooper
Yeah, that’s pretty accurate and broad strokes. They Rumsfeld and Cheney, were always very close. The, agreed on a lot of things. There were some differences between them. Dick Cheney was a little bit more conservative, the Rumsfeld a little bit more hawkish in certain ways and foreign policy. But in general, they got along very well, really close allies.

00:12:56:19 – 00:13:25:19
William Cooper
And absolutely true that Cheney played a big part in Rumsfeld getting the job as secretary of defense under George W Bush. And it was interesting because Rumsfeld was a political rival of George W Bush, his father. So during the Ford administration, Rumsfeld and Herbert Walker Bush were rivals, didn’t get along well. Rumsfeld didn’t respect Bush’s intellect. Bush thought rummy was kind of, his nicknames.

00:13:25:19 – 00:13:55:23
William Cooper
Rummy. That’s what everybody calls him, throughout his career. So I sometimes do, too. But but Bush thought that that Rumsfeld was, you know, always jockeying for Ford’s attention in ways that, you know, weren’t really fair. Not again, not deeply mysterious or anything, but not fair. So they were real rivals. And Cheney convinced Bush to hire Rumsfeld as the right person for the job as secretary of defense, even though they had that history.

00:13:55:25 – 00:13:59:28
William Cooper
And even though Bush’s father wasn’t a big fan of Rumsfeld.

00:14:00:00 – 00:14:11:22
Dan LeFebvre
Was did the younger Bush not really have much of a, a beef with Rumsfeld then? They were not opponents necessarily, I guess. Then I was just his father, right?

00:14:11:24 – 00:14:27:04
William Cooper
Correct. Correct. So younger Bush and Rumsfeld never had any issues, didn’t know each other well prior to Rumsfeld joining the administration. But the younger Bush was certainly aware that Rumsfeld and his father had this rivalry.

00:14:27:07 – 00:14:35:29
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, okay. Before we move on to the next movie, is there anything about Donald Rumsfeld from the movie vice that we didn’t get a chance to talk about that you would like to mention?

00:14:36:01 – 00:14:57:19
William Cooper
I think I think he did a good job teeing it up. And, you know, I’ll just reiterate it. I thought the performance was great. And it made sense within the context of the film on the discrete question of accuracy, which is not the main question for movies all the time. I thought it was a low grade, but I did like the movie.

00:14:57:21 – 00:15:29:17
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, well, you know, for entertainment, it is entertainment. It’s not documentary. Right? Well, shifting gears to a different movie, we’re going to 2008, which is a biopic about George W Bush, and there’s a scene in that movie I wanted to ask you about with Dick Cheney, who was Bush’s VP at the time. And while Bush is having lunch, Cheney brings something for Bush to sign that will allow the US to use, as the movie puts it, interrogation techniques against unlawful enemy combatants with maximal effective persuasion.

00:15:29:20 – 00:15:54:22
Dan LeFebvre
Cheney goes on to say, it’s not torture, but it includes authorization for U.S. citizens if they’re aiding and abetting terrorist organizations. Now, we don’t see Rumsfeld in that part of the movie, but the impression that I got from the movie is that Cheney was the one behind some controversial things. And since we already talked about Cheney and Rumsfeld having a very close relationship, there’s kind of an implied involvement for Rumsfeld as well in the movie.

00:15:54:22 – 00:16:04:06
Dan LeFebvre
Two do we know how much influence Cheney or even Rumsfeld had over Bush’s policies in general?

00:16:04:08 – 00:16:09:10
William Cooper
And for policies, do you mean that interrogation or the policies in general?

00:16:09:12 – 00:16:27:26
Dan LeFebvre
Well, the scene was about the interrogation, I guess specifically, but I guess I would assume that because that that was something that’s would be seen as more controversial, like if he wasn’t already influencing policies and such, I guess I would just assume that they wouldn’t start with something very controversial.

00:16:27:28 – 00:16:57:28
William Cooper
That’s a good, good point. Yeah, I think that’s right. And Cheney and Rumsfeld were very influential with Bush, Cheney in particular. So Rumsfeld was over at the Pentagon running the Defense Department, and Cheney was much closer to Bush, much, much closer confidant to Bush. Although Bush and Rumsfeld had a good, strong relationship, it deteriorated some at the end.

00:16:57:28 – 00:17:31:09
William Cooper
But it was a good, strong relationship for many years. And they held great sway over Bush. But it wasn’t the simple caricature of the movies. I think Bush really respected Cheney and really respected Rumsfeld, and he gave their opinions a lot of weight. Now, it wasn’t static either. I think it changed over time. So the key initiative for both Cheney and Rumsfeld, their biggest initiative was the Iraq war.

00:17:31:11 – 00:18:11:06
William Cooper
And they really drove I think both of them maybe Cheney the most. But but Rumsfeld, certainly, as well, really drove the push for regime change in Iraq and played a big role in convincing Bush to do it. Others in the administration were more ambivalent. Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and others weren’t as hawkish as Cheney and Rumsfeld, but over time, in large part because the Iraq War didn’t go well and didn’t go the way Cheney and Rumsfeld actually suggested it would, I think Bush lost trust in them.

00:18:11:09 – 00:18:36:10
William Cooper
Cheney gave a speech. It’s it’s a scene in the novel. He gave a speech in Tennessee where he says verbatim in quotes, Saddam Hussein definitely has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt that was in the lead up to the war. And he said that to the whole world, the whole world was watching, he said. There is no doubt.

00:18:36:12 – 00:19:00:03
William Cooper
And he certainly was saying things like that to the president. And Rumsfeld was saying things like that, the president as well. And when it turns out Saddam Hussein doesn’t have weapons of mass destruction, the erosion of trust is inevitable. And I think it really did happen. And by the time Bush was in the latter part of his second term, Rumsfeld had left the Pentagon.

00:19:00:03 – 00:19:25:11
William Cooper
He resigned, and Bush and Cheney’s relationship had frayed dramatically. So there’s a huge difference between year one of the Bush administration, where Cheney and Rumsfeld hold great sway, and year eight of the administration, where Rumsfeld’s God Cheney holds little sway. And there was a, you know, sort of a gradual decrease. It wasn’t linear, but a gradual decrease over time.

00:19:25:14 – 00:19:29:25
William Cooper
In between those, polar ends of the continuum.

00:19:29:28 – 00:19:53:21
Dan LeFebvre
Would some of that be what you were talking about before, where, intellectually at least having, you know, my way or the highway type approach to it where, well, but you also mentioned that Rumsfeld was very big on, on following command. So, that like the chain of command. So would that my way or the highway mentality still work for the president?

00:19:53:23 – 00:20:27:14
William Cooper
So. So Rumsfeld, very forceful interviews. If Colin Powell, his co-equal in the administration as secretary of state in the first term, disagreed with him, Rumsfeld would charge ahead and give little weight to the disagreement. He was very, very confident in his own opinion and his own opinion about what was true, his own opinion about what to do. But when the president of the United States would say, here’s what we’re going to do, here’s my decision.

00:20:27:17 – 00:20:54:18
William Cooper
Even if it went against what Rumsfeld wanted, Rumsfeld would follow that order. He respected the chain of command. And when he was secretary of defense, the only person above him was the president. That’s who you reported to. So the whole world, it was my way or the highway with the exception of the president. And certainly Rumsfeld had people at the Department of Defense and Cheney and others that he got along with well and respected their opinion.

00:20:54:18 – 00:21:09:14
William Cooper
So it wasn’t like he was disregarding every opinion that anyone ever gave. But in general, he was very, very convinced he was right. And the people that disagreed with them were wrong. But he would respect the chain of command. At the same time.

00:21:09:17 – 00:21:32:01
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you might have already answered my next question, but in the movie, if we’re to believe that movie’s version of history, Cheney and Rumsfeld were basically the reason why Bush went to war with Iraq over the WMDs of weapons of mass destruction, then at the end of the movie, we find out that they what they thought were WMDs turned out to be photos of watering holes for cattle.

00:21:32:03 – 00:21:44:13
Dan LeFebvre
So can you fill in a little more historical context around that situation? And then I’m assuming, based on what you said before, the movie is correct, to suggest that Rumsfeld and Cheney were incorrect about the WMDs in Iraq.

00:21:44:15 – 00:22:11:06
William Cooper
Yeah. Cheney, Rumsfeld were driving the driving force behind the invasion. I think they were the two leading figures behind it. And, one of the things that they talked about was that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. I don’t think Rumsfeld ever said it as categorically as Cheney or Cheney did say it unequivocally, even though there was disagreement in the intelligence community at the time, he still said it.

00:22:11:13 – 00:22:40:11
William Cooper
He still said there’s no doubt Saddam has weapons of mass destruction. So they were very vocal and they were leading the push for regime change. They also talked about other issues as well. Wasn’t just WMD, so they talked about the threat that Saddam posed in other ways to the United States and its allies. They also talked about the need to transform Iraq into a democracy, which in retrospect, was much more difficult than they assumed.

00:22:40:14 – 00:22:59:03
William Cooper
But that was one of the things they talked about. It. If I could turn into democracy, that could change the region, that could be a model for other countries in the region to move towards democracy as well. So it was a mixture of of things. But WMD were were very high on the list and that resonated with the American people.

00:22:59:03 – 00:23:26:19
William Cooper
So it was something that they focused on in terms of trying to get public opinion in support of regime change. Over time, we learned, that Saddam Hussein never had weapons of mass destruction at the time. Now, you can always say, well, just because we didn’t find them doesn’t mean they didn’t exist. But there were obviously a lot of eyeballs in Iraq after the invasion for many, many years.

00:23:26:19 – 00:24:02:19
William Cooper
Nobody ever saw them. I think it’s safe to assume they didn’t have weapons of mass destruction, and they were wrong. And that’s a really striking thing to have happen again. Rumsfeld was a mix of positives and negatives, pluses and minuses. It was a bit of a smart man. He was very dedicated to his country. I think his intentions were in the right place and a lot of what he did, but it’s a huge mistake to go out to the public, to the world, to the president and say, we need to get rid of Saddam Hussein because of these weapons of mass destruction.

00:24:02:21 – 00:24:30:02
William Cooper
And for that to be wrong. So W embellished it a little bit, made it more of a Hollywood movie, you know, exaggerated way of unfolding, as you would expect in a movie. But it’s, it’s it’s a good, fair, important criticism because they said there were weapons of mass destruction. We went to war, which is the biggest decision a sovereign nation can make.

00:24:30:04 – 00:24:32:26
William Cooper
And it wasn’t true.

00:24:32:29 – 00:24:55:15
Dan LeFebvre
Looking back on it through a historical lens, do we know why they were so positive? And, you know, with that saying, without a doubt that he has them when they don’t know for sure, because obviously they didn’t, so they couldn’t have known for sure that they did. So why would they say that? I mean, was it just to try to go to war to.

00:24:55:22 – 00:25:03:16
Dan LeFebvre
I think I remember living through those times, and there was a lot of people who were like, oh, we just want their oil or something like that.

00:25:03:18 – 00:25:29:07
William Cooper
I don’t think it was that simplistic. I’ve never seen evidence that they did it just to put money in their pockets, and that that’s an incredible accusation. But we’re going to go destroy a country and have a huge number of casualties, just so that my stock in an oil company goes up when I’m already very rich. So, yeah, I don’t think Cheney and Rose were motivated by enriching themselves.

00:25:29:10 – 00:25:59:14
William Cooper
I think their motivations were complicated. They weren’t identical, either. And I think what you have really are two people that had very strong views about foreign policy, extraordinarily high confidence in themselves. Right? Cheney. Rob. So they’re very confident in their own judgment. And they wanted what they wanted. And Rumsfeld in particular, they wanted to show that the United States was strong and a force in the world and that there were consequences.

00:25:59:16 – 00:26:24:29
William Cooper
I think they thought that during the Clinton administration, there were a lot of lines drawn in the sand, and then Saddam and other people would cross those lines, but there’d be no consequence. And I think for for Rumsfeld, he thought it was really important to make a statement that if you’re a dictator, if you are doing things like Saddam’s doing shooting at our planes, tried to assassinate George H.W. Bush, he invaded Kuwait.

00:26:25:01 – 00:26:38:04
William Cooper
If you’re a dictator doing all of these things, there’s going to be consequences. And and I think Rumsfeld wanted to make that statement, thought it was really important to make that statement.

00:26:38:06 – 00:26:54:13
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Okay. Yeah. That makes that makes sense. I guess it’s just interesting that, you know, you he’s still. Well, I guess you said it was Cheney that was still. So, saying it publicly like that is well, I guess, as you also said, a mistake.

00:26:54:16 – 00:27:21:00
William Cooper
A big mistake, a huge mistake. I think both men, Cheney and Rumsfeld, got a lot of unfair criticism throughout their tenure for a variety of things. A lot of decisions they made were very difficult decisions, and there was a lot at stake. But they deserved the onslaught of criticism and the historical condemnation. They deserve it because they said they had weapons of mass destruction.

00:27:21:02 – 00:27:50:01
William Cooper
That was a huge basis for why we went to war and it wasn’t true. And that is a very, very major offense for a politician entrusted with the security of our country. Frankly, the United States military is entrusted with the security of the whole world and a lot of lives. If you’re going to go to war, the ultimate step that you can take of it wasn’t just a bombing campaign, wasn’t just discrete attacks with cruise missiles coming in.

00:27:50:01 – 00:28:13:29
William Cooper
It was a war, and they did it in large part on the basis of something that wasn’t true. And they exaggerated the position at the time. So they exaggerated what they actually thought. There was doubt. Cheney knew there was doubt. There was doubt exaggerated. And then they turned out to be wrong. That’s a big deal. Not something you can sweep under the rug.

00:28:14:02 – 00:28:30:24
William Cooper
Even if you’re a trying to be fair minded and recognizing their strengths and weaknesses. Lots of criticism. And w the movie highlights that in a way that has some flourish and resonance with people. And I think helps people understand that.

00:28:30:27 – 00:28:36:02
Dan LeFebvre
Did it actually turn out to be watering holes for cattle, like the movie shows, or is that just a Hollywood embellishment? That was.

00:28:36:02 – 00:29:03:21
William Cooper
Hollywood. Okay, there was a lot of there was a so had to to be a little more granular about it there. There was a ton of evidence that Saddam had used weapons of mass destruction. There’s a ton of evidence that he would do so again, there was a ton of evidence of infrastructure, of weapons, of mass destruction. And it was fair to say Saddam Hussein could get weapons of mass destruction.

00:29:03:21 – 00:29:31:11
William Cooper
He could use them again. They just didn’t qualify it. And so when they went in, they we there were all sorts of infrastructure and things related to weapons were discovered. It wasn’t like Saddam only had rifles and and a few tanks. I mean, he did have a lot of infrastructure in place. It just wasn’t operational. And that’s a fine distinction in a way.

00:29:31:14 – 00:29:42:06
William Cooper
But at the end of the day, to say there’s no doubt you had weapons of mass destruction, was, a big mistake.

00:29:42:09 – 00:29:46:18
Dan LeFebvre
Well, is there anything else about the movie that you wanted to point out before we move on to the next one?

00:29:46:20 – 00:30:03:01
William Cooper
No, just another one where I think that the, a lot of respect for for that movie, I think is really entertaining. And I think does make some interesting points. But ultimately, you know, if you’re trying to really understand what happened, that’s not the place to look.

00:30:03:03 – 00:30:23:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, our final movie to talk about today is the documentary called The Unknown Known. And at the beginning of that movie, Donald Rumsfeld himself mentions dictating some 20,000 memos in just the last six years at the Pentagon, and how there must have been millions of them over the course of his career. Then, of course, it goes on to use those memos as the basis of the documentary.

00:30:23:22 – 00:30:42:27
Dan LeFebvre
And in the documentary, when the filmmaker asks Rumsfeld if he knew that they would produce a vast archive from his memos, Rumsfeld laughs and says never crossed his mind. And that even he didn’t know what he was going to do next. So I have two questions about this. First, is it normal for a politician to have that many memos that are archived somewhere, presumably for the public to see?

00:30:42:27 – 00:30:54:06
Dan LeFebvre
Maybe. I don’t I don’t know the doc. We didn’t really point that out. But then and then also, do you get the impression that Rumsfeld was basically making it up as he went along? He kind of implied there.

00:30:54:09 – 00:31:27:05
William Cooper
So Rumsfeld, for on the first question, Rumsfeld wrote, these snow, they’re called snowflakes because they fell all over the federal government. And he it was before email, if there was email and if there was email at the time, Rumsfeld, would have been one of those people that sends, you know, hundreds and hundreds of that. But what he it highlights strength and and again, I think it’s important if you want to be accurate to there’s a podcast about how accurate is a movie compared to reality.

00:31:27:05 – 00:31:50:07
William Cooper
So I think accuracy is important if you want to be accurate about Rumsfeld, you need to recognize his strengths. And he was incredibly smart, man. Part of the big conundrum for me with Rumsfeld is how could somebody so smart be so wrong about Iraq and not just the weapons of mass destruction, but what he thought he could do with the country turning it into a democracy?

00:31:50:10 – 00:32:22:09
William Cooper
That was he was clearly wrong about that. But he was a very smart man, and he was extraordinarily hard worker. I mean, if you look at the things people say about Rumsfeld, he, you know, almost everybody that talks about him says he’s the hardest worker I’ve ever seen. One of his friends that he grew up with, guy named Janetta, who, has talked and in giving interviews about him, he said this is the most productive human being that’s maybe ever existed.

00:32:22:09 – 00:32:46:14
William Cooper
Like, he will he will wake up in the morning, and by the time he goes to bed, he will have done things that ten people couldn’t do. So he was just unbelievably, you know, feverish. And his work is productivity. And he didn’t just work all the time. He was really smart about it. He went when he left the Ford administration the first time he was secretary of defense, he took over JDS Searle.

00:32:46:16 – 00:33:16:09
William Cooper
He was the CEO of a pharmaceutical company. They made NutraSweet. He took it from this fledgling crappy old legacy corporation to a total juggernaut. And the stock went up like tenfold in just a few years. So he did prodigious with his work ethic, its ability to get things done, and the snowflakes, which were very, very accurate and very real, I think reflect that just the way he was able to get so much done.

00:33:16:12 – 00:33:37:10
William Cooper
The problem with being that productive is if you’re if the ships pointed in the wrong direction, it’s a big problem. And the Iraq Initiative, you put a lot of work into that. And we would have been better served if he had had other, focus of his energies during that time in terms of the archive. We put them on the web.

00:33:37:15 – 00:34:09:24
William Cooper
So rumsfeld.com, they’re all up there. It’s a great, great resource. You get all his memo or at least a huge percentage of his memos. I don’t know if it’s all of them, plus a lot of memos from other sources. So it’s all first hand. So if you want to actually dig into the the core of what was actually happening at that time and what people were saying, a lot of source material there that’s really, really valuable and interesting and is snowflakes were a big part of that.

00:34:09:27 – 00:34:18:29
Dan LeFebvre
So is more, work related memos, not necessarily like a journal or keeping a diary type, you know, just recordings and things like that. It was all for work purposes.

00:34:19:01 – 00:34:38:27
William Cooper
It’s memos, you know, from Donald Rumsfeld to Colin Powell, from Donald Rumsfeld to Dick Cheney, that sort of thing. And it’s actually and it’s the actual workings of government. Like, yeah, you can do orders from there. You can give your positions. So it’s it’s not it’s not a summary of something else. A lot of the time, a lot of time.

00:34:38:27 – 00:34:47:04
William Cooper
It’s the actual the memo is the events. And it’s, it’s really good history.

00:34:47:06 – 00:34:52:27
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like with his work ethic, his work memos basically are his diary, his journal.

00:34:52:29 – 00:35:15:09
William Cooper
Yeah, that’s a good point. Yes. When you work 16 hours a day or more, you’re. That is your. Yes. You’re. And, it’s funny. That’s a good way to think about it. Yeah. A lot of really busy people there. Their email inbox and outbox is their diary. But yeah, I think it’s a good point.

00:35:15:11 – 00:35:31:03
Dan LeFebvre
What about that? The line that he had in the documentary where he’s like, he didn’t even know what he was going to do next, was were there did you ever get the impression, I guess, that he was making things up as he went? Or. I mean, you said he was very smart. So I would assume that he was have a little forethought.

00:35:31:05 – 00:35:54:14
William Cooper
He had a lot of forethought. He knew what he was doing. And he was aware of of his legacy in this future. I mean, by the time he was in the Bush administration, he was in his late 60s. He was born in 1933. So he was in his late 60s when it started. And and into his 70s as he served as secretary of defense for the second time.

00:35:54:17 – 00:36:16:16
William Cooper
So he wasn’t positioning himself to go into the private sector or get this job or that job or or, you know, run for president someday. He did run for president unsuccessfully in the 80s. It was very brief. But so he wasn’t positioning himself in that sense. He wasn’t thinking about, his next move from a professional standpoint.

00:36:16:16 – 00:36:41:10
William Cooper
When he stopped serving as secretary of defense, he did what I’m sure he assumed he would do. He wrote books. He participated in conferences and think tanks, speeches and things like that. But, but yeah, he was a smart man who read history his whole life and was aware that in his way, he was making history and there was a part of him.

00:36:41:10 – 00:36:45:06
William Cooper
I’m sure that was quite cognizant of that.

00:36:45:09 – 00:37:17:11
Dan LeFebvre
The whole concept of the movie’s title, The Unknown, known as Rumsfeld, explains, it is basically the things that you think you know, but it turns out you did not. In the documentary, he uses the example of the attack on Pearl Harbor and says that happened because of a failure of imagination, that the attack could even happen. Then, of course, as we all know from history, it turns out that Rumsfeld himself must have failed to imagine what could have happened because the world was shaken on September 11th, 2001, and Rumsfeld case shaken quite literally because he was at the Pentagon when one of the hijacked planes crashed into it.

00:37:17:13 – 00:37:47:02
Dan LeFebvre
But then the reaction to that attack was the US going to war with Iraq because of supposed connections to Al-Qaeda, even though in the documentary, Rumsfeld himself says he doesn’t think the American people thought Saddam Hussein was connected to Al-Qaeda. But then the documentary shows a clip, a news clip from February 4th, 2003, when Rumsfeld was secretary of defense and a reporter asks him to respond to Saddam Hussein, saying Iraq does not have weapons of mass destruction, and they also have no relationship with Al-Qaeda.

00:37:47:04 – 00:38:11:11
Dan LeFebvre
And in that news clip, Rumsfeld’s response was, And Abraham Lincoln was short. Then he goes on to call Saddam Hussein the local liar, which to me is pretty obviously suggesting that he believes Iraq does have WMDs, as we’ve talked about, as well as a relationship with Al-Qaeda, even though in the documentary he claims to deny it. Do you think Rumsfeld was purposely manipulating his words so the U.S. could have a reason to go to war with Iraq?

00:38:11:11 – 00:38:14:19
Dan LeFebvre
Or did I misinterpret what he’s trying to say there?

00:38:14:21 – 00:38:20:04
William Cooper
I think what happened with Rumsfeld’s public statements.

00:38:20:06 – 00:38:49:24
William Cooper
My sense and in a. Read and followed this really closely, is that Rumsfeld really wanted to go to war with Iraq. He really wanted regime change. He wanted Saddam out of there, not for oil money, not for bloodlust, but because he thought it was good for the world to get rid of Saddam Hussein and try to make the middle East more of a democratic region.

00:38:49:26 – 00:39:20:10
William Cooper
So he was very convinced that that was the right thing to do, and his public statements would be exaggerated or embellished to help that happen. And one narrative that resonated with people, because when you’re going to war, and especially in democracy, you want public support. You don’t want 90% of the people against the war, and then you go to war that it’s really important to have public support, to have political support.

00:39:20:10 – 00:39:45:27
William Cooper
And if Congress behind you and our constituents behind you. So they were they were doing a marketing campaign for a year or two before the Iraq War. And one of the things Rumsfeld would do with respect to this, and also respect to connections, al-Qaida is exaggerate, embellish, wink, wink, nod, nod.

00:39:45:29 – 00:40:12:22
William Cooper
So he wouldn’t outright lie in some grand way. Yeah, we know for sure that Saddam Hussein is in the process of selling WMD to Al-Qaeda. He wouldn’t say that, but he would. He would move the discussion in that general direction. And there were some connections between Saddam Hussein and Al-Qaeda, but they were tenuous. They weren’t. They didn’t suggest that they were cahoots together.

00:40:12:25 – 00:40:39:12
William Cooper
But there were some connections between them. And then I also think Rumsfeld genuinely felt like Saddam Hussein. If he does get weapons of mass destruction very easily, if not likely, would sell them to terrorists. Right? He wants to cause problems to the West, to the United States. So the prospect of him selling them to terrorists, whether it’s al-Qaida or whether it’s another terrorist organization, is a very real threat.

00:40:39:14 – 00:40:46:26
William Cooper
So his views would be in his statements, would be consistent with that overriding impulse.

00:40:46:28 – 00:41:09:15
Dan LeFebvre
Was it almost like a means to an end, like if he has it in his mind that he has to get rid of Saddam Hussein? Almost. Not that you can say anything, you know, because obviously we talked about you not doing anything illegal or anything like that, but also trying to persuade people and trying to get people to follow along, then, yeah, maybe we can stretch the truth a little bit here and there.

00:41:09:15 – 00:41:14:23
Dan LeFebvre
Or do you know things like. Yeah, and Abraham Lincoln was short, you know, that kind of that kind of quick.

00:41:14:25 – 00:41:45:15
William Cooper
It’s a good way to put it. Then he wasn’t outright lying in a obvious way. He’s a smart guy. So he knew that if he lied, you know, in a really obvious way, he would get called out on it. Unlike our politics of today, outright lies back then were, harder to get away with. But but he wanted he knew what he wanted to do, and he was trying to say things that would achieve that goal.

00:41:45:18 – 00:42:09:16
William Cooper
And in that sense, he would exaggerate things and embellish things, but not outright lying. Or, you know, going forward in some fraudulent way with evidence, things of that nature. You didn’t he didn’t do that. He definitely was trying to be a good PR spokesman for what he wanted to get done.

00:42:09:18 – 00:42:26:18
Dan LeFebvre
You mentioned, him thinking that, you know, Saddam Hussein might sell WMDs to terrorists was part of his motivation. Then, part of his reason for wanting to get rid of Saddam Hussein, basically to not have another nine over 11.

00:42:26:21 – 00:43:05:21
William Cooper
Yes, I think that was part of it. I think he legitimately feared I think 9/11 hit him very hard. When you’re the secretary of defense and the largest attack in him in the country’s history on our on our shores occurs. You’re in charge. The Pentagon gets hit. He was in the Pentagon at the time. I think it had a very dramatic impact on him that a lot of civilians, particularly people looking back on it, decades later, it’s now over two decades later, don’t feel the same urgency and fear that he felt.

00:43:05:23 – 00:43:28:02
William Cooper
So I think it really did hit him very hard. And one of his concerns, I think it was a concern about Saddam Hussein, but I think it was also a concern about the region in general. Iran was a a bad actor with respect to the United States at that time. There were terrorists, al and other terrorists as well.

00:43:28:05 – 00:43:56:24
William Cooper
I think he had a just an overriding concern about terrorism and not wanting to have another 911. I think that drove him very strongly. And when that fed into the overall basis for for wanting to get rid of Saddam because he he saw a real scenario where Saddam could and Saddam was a terrible dictator. He had tortured his people, invaded his neighbors.

00:43:56:27 – 00:44:27:21
William Cooper
He was extremely dangerous person. And so Rumsfeld felt like he was a threat. How far fetched is it to think that that would actually happen if we had not gotten in and taken Saddam out? Would he have gotten WMD and gotten him to terrorist hands? It it’s very hard to assess that, but I think that that threat was a one of several factors that drove Rumsfeld to want regime change in Iraq.

00:44:27:24 – 00:44:53:15
Dan LeFebvre
Something else that Rumsfeld says in the documentary that kind of sounded like a contradiction to me is when he says the U.S. doesn’t assassinate the leaders of other countries. But then he immediately goes on to talk about Dore Farms, where the U.S. tried to kill Saddam Hussein. And that sounded like a contradiction, because on one hand, Rumsfeld says the U.S. doesn’t assassinate leaders, and then he instead calls the Dora Farms incident an act of war, implying it’s not assassinating leader if it’s war.

00:44:53:17 – 00:45:16:07
Dan LeFebvre
But then, just a minute or so later in the documentary, he says that the U.S. wanted to kill Saddam Hussein to avoid going to war with Iraq. So maybe it’s just me, but it sounds like Rumsfeld is trying not to use a specific word because the U.S. doesn’t assassinate world leaders. But apparently the U.S. does launch a war against one person that just happens to be the leader of the country, so they can avoid going to war with the entire country.

00:45:16:09 – 00:45:22:05
Dan LeFebvre
What really happened with the Dora Farms incident and what, if any, involvement did Rumsfeld have?

00:45:22:07 – 00:45:49:27
William Cooper
I actually don’t know the detailed history there. I do know that Rumsfeld was pretty darn good about not getting caught saying things, but occasionally he would, and I thought that I thought the documentary on that point. Yeah. It’s hard to reconcile those various statements. And so, yeah, I think it was just it wasn’t being consistent was the takeaway that I got.

00:45:49:29 – 00:46:16:12
Dan LeFebvre
All the movies that we talked about today are mostly about other people, about President Bush with Scott Glenn playing Rumsfeld, vice about Vice President Cheney, with Steve Carell playing Rumsfeld. Then, of course, there’s the documentary, too, but there hasn’t really been a biopic about Donald Rumsfeld himself yet. So let’s say you’re put in charge of directing it. Who would you cast as Donald Rumsfeld in your movie, and what period of Rumsfeld life would you want to focus on?

00:46:16:15 – 00:46:41:12
William Cooper
That’s a great question. Well, you’ve asked the author of a biographical fiction novel about himself. If it becomes a movie, I’ll be very happy based on my book. Although that’s that’s hard. But I haven’t thought about that. Who would play him? That’s a really good question. I’m. I’m not skillful at casting Josh Brolin. Seems like maybe he could play.

00:46:41:13 – 00:46:53:00
William Cooper
And Steve Carell did a good job. I would want him to take a different tact, but. But he did a good job, I don’t know, what do you think, Dan? Do you have any any. Oh, wow.

00:46:53:01 – 00:47:00:23
Dan LeFebvre
Who, throwing it back. I mean, that’s I didn’t even think about answering my own question there.

00:47:00:26 – 00:47:02:06
William Cooper
It’s a tough question.

00:47:02:08 – 00:47:12:21
Dan LeFebvre
Josh Brolin would be good. I mean, he was, but when he was George W Bush and W, so it would be interesting to see him playing a different character in that same time period.

00:47:12:24 – 00:47:34:14
William Cooper
Yeah, yeah, I’m trying to picture somebody playing Rumsfeld. You have to be on the shorter side. Rumsfeld was five seven. He’d have to be able to slick his hair back. Really? Well, because Rumsfeld did that, I feel like Brolin might be the best, but yeah, you’re right, he was. He was Bush. But maybe that would be a good thing.

00:47:34:14 – 00:47:37:18
William Cooper
Maybe that would keep the keep the same going.

00:47:37:21 – 00:47:43:14
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. There you go. And then you can have Christian Bale play, George W Bush in the movie. It’s a side character.

00:47:43:16 – 00:47:46:15
William Cooper
Hey.

00:47:46:17 – 00:47:48:21
William Cooper
I’m in. I’m watching that.

00:47:48:23 – 00:47:53:28
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Me too. We do have you back on to see what changes they made from from what actually happened.

00:47:54:01 – 00:47:56:07
William Cooper
Yeah.

00:47:56:10 – 00:48:13:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, this isn’t a political show. Obviously. We are talking about a political figure from recent history. So no doubt what Rumsfeld did in his career impacts our country today. What’s 1 or 2 of the biggest things that you think Donald Rumsfeld’s political career had on today?

00:48:13:23 – 00:48:48:15
William Cooper
Well, the Iraq war was very consequential. It essentially because it near universal agreement that it was a big mistake and did not go well. But the premise of the war with respect to WMD, but also the idea that we could go in there and transform Iraq into a democracy in retrospect, people recognize was was a real mistake and a real misunderstanding of what’s capable, what we’re capable of in the Middle East.

00:48:48:18 – 00:49:31:09
William Cooper
And so I think there’s been a profound bipartisan recognition from the Iraq War that the United States, despite all of our power, needs to be more restrained in foreign affairs. And it’s one thing to target militias with bombs. It’s one thing to go after nuclear facilities in certain countries and things of that nature. But the idea of a full scale mobilization around a smaller country that can’t really defend itself, like Iraq, I think is essentially off the table at this point.

00:49:31:12 – 00:49:55:04
William Cooper
It’s just not something that the United States has a stomach for. And I think that’s a response to Iraq. And we learned that lesson. It’s really hard. You’re going to going into the Middle East and bombing a country to smithereens, and then building up a democracy from the rubble is just not something that we can do. Even if even if it sounds like a noble goal.

00:49:55:06 – 00:50:30:25
William Cooper
So I think that’s really his legacy politically is just being a part of of that initiative, how it went and how it’s reshaped our politics. And then his personal legacy to me is one, that’s very fascinating. I touched on it earlier, and I really one of the main things I try to bring out about him in the novel is he’s a really complicated guy who was, on the one hand, really, really smart.

00:50:30:27 – 00:50:55:04
William Cooper
And he was famous for recognizing you mentioned it earlier in the documentary, Dan talking about tears of knowledge, right, and understanding the limits of our own knowledge. There’s no knowns. There’s known unknowns, there’s unknown unknowns. And he articulated that framework in a in a really smart way. And he was right about about the way he laid that out.

00:50:55:04 – 00:51:19:20
William Cooper
So he’s sort of this character, this person, this historical figure who on the one hand is famous for articulating a framework of understanding human knowledge and our limits. And then, on the other hand, the Iraq Initiative was one of the most notorious violations of the very framework he set in place because he went beyond what he knew. He thought Saddam had weapons of mass destruction.

00:51:19:23 – 00:51:40:18
William Cooper
He thought it was a no no. He was wrong. He didn’t have them. He thought that we could transform Iraq. And he couldn’t. We we couldn’t as a country. And so I think his legacy is going to be, you know, that complication of how does somebody so smart make such a big mistake?

00:51:40:21 – 00:52:03:18
Dan LeFebvre
To paraphrase or to borrow I should say, from another movie, with great power comes great responsibility. And, sometimes you know, that’s. Yeah, we learned the lesson, as you said. Well, well, this is a topic we could continue to talk about forever. But thank you so much for coming on to talk about Donald Rumsfeld in the movies. You do have a new novel that you’ve talked about a few times.

00:52:03:18 – 00:52:13:22
Dan LeFebvre
It’s called The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld, and there’s a link to it in the show notes for my listeners to get their own copy right now. But before I let you go, can you give my audience a peek into your new book?

00:52:13:24 – 00:52:49:24
William Cooper
Yeah, it’s, it’s an alternative history. So it’s the trial of Donald Rumsfeld, and it Rumsfeld in the novel, after the Iraq War, through a series of scandal and tragedy, becomes president of the United States. So it’s historical, it’s historical fiction novel and an alternative history. And then as president, really, you get to see Rumsfeld’s full personality and character on display, and he makes some really big mistakes and ends up on trial at the International Criminal Court at the International Criminal Court.

00:52:49:24 – 00:53:07:26
William Cooper
And that’s where the book gets its title, The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld. The actual trials around his activity in the Iraq war. And so if you like historical fiction, legal political thrillers, it’s worth checking out.

00:53:07:28 – 00:53:11:08
Dan LeFebvre
Fantastic. I’ll make sure I add a link to that in the show notes. Thanks again so much for your time.

00:53:11:08 – 00:53:18:29
William Cooper
Well, awesome. Thank you Dan, really appreciate it. Love the podcast. And really, thank you for letting me come on again.