Post by dgriffin on Jul 7, 2009 18:40:12 GMT -5
I was hoping someone more knowledgeable than I would begin a discussion on McNamara. I'm no historian and I won't attempt an overall assessment of his life.
I can only report my sense of a surreal aura around the man. I can identify with him as a business person, a believer and a fan of statistics, a patriot who felt he was doing his best for his country and a man who got going when the going got tough.
On the other hand, he killed a lot of people, on both sides. He perpetuated a war that no one to this day can adequately explain, to me at least, refusing to acknowledge all the signs that we couldn't win this one, and probably shouldn't be in it, while each week ordering up more young men and sending them to their deaths, only years later admitting he was "wrong, terribly wrong''. (Notably, he said "we" were wrong, not "I."
In his personal history are echoes of the stalwart soldier, fighting on for his country. But there is also the sound of boots drumming on bloody pavement, accompanied by the terrible smell of burning flesh and the chorus of voices weeping, too late, "we were just following orders."
I can only report my sense of a surreal aura around the man. I can identify with him as a business person, a believer and a fan of statistics, a patriot who felt he was doing his best for his country and a man who got going when the going got tough.
On the other hand, he killed a lot of people, on both sides. He perpetuated a war that no one to this day can adequately explain, to me at least, refusing to acknowledge all the signs that we couldn't win this one, and probably shouldn't be in it, while each week ordering up more young men and sending them to their deaths, only years later admitting he was "wrong, terribly wrong''. (Notably, he said "we" were wrong, not "I."
In his personal history are echoes of the stalwart soldier, fighting on for his country. But there is also the sound of boots drumming on bloody pavement, accompanied by the terrible smell of burning flesh and the chorus of voices weeping, too late, "we were just following orders."