Rumsfeld: I Don’t Think Obama Will Listen to New SecDef

Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld predicted that President Obama would not listen to new Defense Secretary Ashton Carter on Tuesday’s “On the Record” on the Fox News Channel.

“He’s a good man, and in my view he was a good appointment. I see him as a highly skilled technical person for the department. I’m not part of the Obama White House, But I have trouble believing that the people in the White House, with all the czars and the different factions in there that — I mean he is going to be the Secretary of Defense for this president, and this president was elected, so he probably will do a very good job down in the department. How successful he’ll be dealing–getting the president or the key people, Valerie Jarrett and the other people that are so influential in the department to alter their behavior, or their advice, or their views, I don’t think that’s going to happen” Rumsfeld stated of incoming Defense Secretary Ashton Carter.

Rumsfeld said that ISIS’ rampage “brings back to mind the period before World War II where people said ‘I didn’t know,’ or ‘I was just following orders,’ or ‘it’s random.’ But when you kill, systematically kill Jews and kill Christians and say that’s what you’re doing it’s not random, it’s purposeful. And it seems to me a lot of the country is still in a state of denial about it and the only way you can deal with something like that is to put it up on the table, call it what it is, deal with it. And any idea that you can defend everywhere at every moment of the day or night against every conceivable technique is simply wrong. If you try to defend everywhere, you defend nowhere. The only way you can deal with it is to go after those people.”

He also summarized the situation in Ukraine as “free play” for Vladimir Putin, and Europe’s handling of the problem as “impotent.” He declared the world is “letting things happen there that–rather than dissuading further adventuresome behavior by Russians, it encourages it.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett