Robert Gates as the New Secretary of Defense
By Chad A. B. Wilson
Published December 6, 2006, 10:33 am in Military / Foreign policy.
I love it when academics get appointed to important government positions. It seems that lawyers have had a stranglehold on American politics for a long time, and they may not be the most qualified to discuss certain issues. Consider Condoleezza Rice. This woman has a PhD in Political Science, which she got when she was only 26! That's a feat difficult to match, especially considering that she got her B.A. at age 19. Man, what a woman.
Her career was focused on academica, too: she began as an Assistant Professor of Political Science and Stanford and eventually worked her way up to Provost, a position she held until Bush asked her to be his National Security Advisor. Now this doesn't mean that she wasn't involved in politics during her tenure at Stanford, for she was advisor to the first President Bush. But it means that she is an expert in a field, and H.W. Bush once introduced her to Gorbachev as the woman who "tells me everything I know about the Soviet Union."
I like it that she was so invovled in academia, quite possibly because of my own dreams of political ability and/or election/appointment. (I, too, am an Assistant Professor at an academic institution.) But I think it's good policy for advisors to establish themselves as experts in their field.
Robert Gates, the Academic
Robert Gates is another academic, although he has followed a different track than Rice has. If you're wondering who this guy is, well, he is Bush's new nomination for the U.S. Secretary of Defense to replace Donanld Rumsfeld. (Part of me wants to put the adjective "embattled" before Donald Rumsfeld, but that may be a bit too strong of a term. No doubt the guy would have had to go even if he had not resigned so willingly, but I don't think it's fair to call his tenure "embattled.") Many of you are probably not familiar with Gates, so let me give you a brief history on the guy who will more than likely be confirmed by the Senate before the end of the year.
He has a Ph.D. in Soviet history from Georgetown, which he received at the very respectable age of 31. But that was after serving in Vietnam for two years and working for the CIA while getting his Ph.D. He left the CIA for the National Security Council from 1974 to 1979. Then he came back to the CIA and worked his way up to the Director of Central Intelligence from 1991 to 1993. Since he left the CIA, he had done a myriad of things, most of them in academia. So Gates's track was different. He worked in "industry" for a long time and then left to go back to academia. Still, he's an expert in history and obviously in international affairs, as well.
His academic work has been with various institutions, but primarily with Texas A&M, where is still the President. So his work isn't exactly academic. I don't want to belittle Presidents and Deans, but they don't do a lot of teaching or research. In fact, I would argue that they're administrators or business people primarily. The main concern of a University President, for example, is fundraising, necessary, yes, but not exactly academic in nature. Anyway, all of that is really beside the point because it will help him in his new role as Secretary of Defense, especially if he follows the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group (which I hopefully talk about next time, if I can get my hands on an actual copy of it before then).
Accolades for Gates
I think Gates is a good choice because of his experience in the CIA and his expertise in political affairs. Also because he seems like a straight shooter. According to reports about the Senate hearings, he made a lot of good statements such as "I am under no illusion why I am sitting before you today — the war in Iraq." I like that. The guy knows what he's doing, and he knows what the people and Congress want right now: straight answers.
Or this nugget: when asked about whether the United States is winning the war in Iraq, he said "No, sir." That's as clearcut as it can get. I love that answer, in fact, because it shows that he speaks his mind, and he isn't just a Bush mouthpiece. Bush said in an interview on October 25, "Absolutely, we're winning." There's a discrepancy there, and I like that.
Now that's not where the comment ends, though. Gates came back to say that he was referring to the situation in Iraq as a whole. He didn't mean that the troops themselves are losing, for they win all of their battles: "Our military wins the battles that we fight....Where we’re having our challenges, frankly, are in the areas of stabilization and political developments and so on." Now he does go back on his statement, sure. Perhaps he said it in haste without really thinking about the implications, and then he had to go back and clarify what he meant. But I even like his clarification. He admits that there are problems, and he's willing to address those problems.
Another plus for Gates is that he's willing to listen to others, including his generals and recommendations from the Iraq Study Group. He says that he's sympathetic to both diplomacy with other nations around Iraq and to sending in more U.S. troops. I'm glad he's not just going his own way, even though he is willing to say what he thinks.
But Wait a Minute: the CI-freakin-A?
So I think Gates is a good choice, but he does have some strikes against him. The primary one is his general involvement with the CIA. That seems like a good background for the post, but it's also a sticky job. Presidents have come out of that position (see George H.W. Bush, for example), sure, but it poses interesting questions when one was in the CIA for nearly two decades. The most publicized scandal he was probably involved in was the Iran-Contra affair, where money for selling arms to Iran was clandestinely funneled to the Contras, who were waging a rebel uprising against the elected Sandanista government. This is what got Oliver North into trouble, if you remember. The panels investigating the affair eventually said that Gates probably had knowledge of what was going on, but that there was no evidence that he actually did anything worthy of indictment.
But that seems like only one example. Now I don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist (I don't trust those guys!), but isn't that the CIA's entire purpose for existing? They're invovled in that kind of stuff all the time, aren't they? And sometimes, well, they get caught at it. So Gates as a retired CIA man brings up some intersting points about what he has done in the past.
But it also makes him appropriate for the position! He has the leadership skills and the knowledge to do what it takes to be a competent Secretary of Defense. Nothing about his background tells me otherwise.
So until something new comes up, I'm backing Robert Gates.
Comments & Trackbacks
By Ronald G. White
· http://ronaldgwhite62 December 6, 2006, 2:26 pm. PermaLink
Gates was ask by a member of the confirmation committee if we were winning the war in Iraq and Gates said "NO". Its about time someone told the truth. However, after about two or three other questions by members,Senator John McCain said "did I understand you to say NO on are we winning the war in Iraq". What part of the word "NO" did Senator McCain not understand? Our next President??????
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