1998 Keeper of the Flame Award: Donald Rumsfeld

In the company of roughly 350 fellow policy practitioners — top legislators and congressional staff, executive branch officials (past and present), senior military officers, corporate leaders, diplomats and other admirers — former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld last night was honored by the Center for Security Policy for his lifetime of service to the Nation. For his service spanning more than three decades and marked by distinction in both the private and public sectors, the Secretary received the Center’s prestigious “Keeper of the Flame” award for 1998.

Secretary Rumsfeld’s most recent contribution, and the focus of much of the evening’s acclaim, was made in his capacity as Chairman of the congressionally chartered Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States. This blue-ribbon, bipartisan panel recently unanimously concluded that the U.S. now was faced with the prospect of “little or no warning” of emerging missile dangers.

The following were among the highlights of Secretary Rumsfeld’s forceful remarks:

• “It is not an accident that there are some 25 or 30 countries that have or are seeking and developing ballistic missiles. They are attractive. They are cheap. They are versatile. They can be launched from land and sea. They are versatile in the sense that they can carry chemical, biological, or nuclear warheads.”

• “They are particularly attractive because they will arrive at their destination. There is no defense.”

• “I am from Chicago, and those of us from Chicago here recall that wonderful statement by Al Capone when he said, ‘You get a lot more with a kind word and a gun than you do with a kind word alone.'”

• “You can substitute the word ‘ballistic missile’ and put in the name of some regional Al Capone, and it is every bit as appropriate today.”

• “We [the Commission] concluded unanimously that the emerging capabilities are broader, more mature, and evolving more rapidly than had been reported, and that the intelligence community’s ability to provide timely warning had been eroding….There are two important reasons for this. One is deception and denial, and the fact that the countries of the world are very successfully keeping us from knowing what they are doing. They do a great deal underground. Because of espionage, they have learned a great deal about our sources, and methods, and they are quite successful….Second is foreign assistance and trade among these countries that assist them in their development programs.”

• “Leaders have to create an environment that is hospitable to the truth. Whether it amounts to bad news or good news, not an environment that forces subordinates to trim, to hedge, to duck, and to fudge….If we know anything from history, it is that weakness is provocative. Weakness invites others into adventures they otherwise would avoid.”

• “In short, we are in a circumstance that is new and the policies and approaches that were appropriate when we could rely on extended warning no longer apply.”

The black tie award dinner at the Four Seasons Hotel also marked the Center for Security Policy’s celebration of its tenth anniversary. Among those commemorating the establishment in July 1988 of this unique “policy network” — built upon a large and influential Board of Advisors supported by a small but industrious core staff — and paying tribute to Secretary Rumsfeld were:

• Senators Thad Cochran of Mississippi (who introduced Secretary Rumsfeld) andJon Kyl of Arizona (the recipient of the 1994 “Keeper of the Flame” award who expressed his appreciation for “ammunition” provided by the Center to him and others who serve in the “front lines” of the security policy battlefield).

• Former Attorney General Edwin Meese, Honorary Chairman of the Center’s 10^thAnniversary Gala, who read excerpts of congratulatory messages for Mr. Rumsfeld written by President Gerald Ford, House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, Steve Forbes, and former Senate Majority Leader Robert Dole. (Messrs. Gingrich, Weinberger and Forbes received the Keeper of the Flame award in 1996, 1990 and 1993, respectively.)

• New York Times columnist, author and pundit William Safire who provided highly entertaining congratulatory toasts to the Center on its birthday, to Sophia Casey(the widow of William J. Casey and Honorary Chairman of the Center’s 10^thAnniversary Dinner) and Bernadette Casey Smith (Mr. Casey’s daughter), and to Secretary Rumsfeld and his wife, Joyce Rumsfeld.

Other notables present during the evening’s festivities were: former Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger; former Secretary of State Al Haig; the Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps, General Terrence Dake; former Senator Malcolm Wallop of Wyoming; Representatives Phil Crane of Illinois and Dana Rohrabacher of California; former Secretary of the Navy Will Ball; Kevin Klose, director of the International Broadcasting Bureau; Dr. Edwin Feulner, president of the Heritage Foundation; and Mrs. Julie Finley. Secretary Rumsfeld paid a personal tribute to two members of the Center’s Board of Advisors who served as Commissioners on the Missile Threat Assessment panel: former Science Advisor to the President William Grahamand former Under Secretary of State William Schneider.