Robert McNamara

MANIFESTO

Robert McNamara, the architect of "the country's most disastrous foreign venture," has died.

When it came to foreign policy, the erstwhile Ford president didn't have a clue. Even he admitted after the debacle that became Vietnam that "We were wrong. We were terribly wrong." Of course, the

mea culpa renewed the national debate about the war and prompted bitter criticism against its author. "Where was he when we needed him?" a Boston Globe editorial asked. A New York Times editorial referred to McNamara as offering the war's dead only a "prime-time apology and stale tears, three decades late."

Of course, a great number of us who've lived long enough to see our own generation try to win another guerilla war to demonstrate "the principles and traditions of our country" thought both experiences were exercises in futility. If anything, the Bushies made it look as if they were trying to win the Vietnam War by attacking Iraq—a ridiculous policy if ever there was one.

Coincidentally, Feckless Leader's Defense Secretary is starting to try to justify various decisions he made while in that post. However, one hardly expects Rummy ever to be apologetic.