RUMSFELD WINS THE PRIZE IN FORD'S UNTIDY RESHUFFLE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000100010137-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 19, 2007
• Sequence Number: 137
• Publication Date: November 8, 1975
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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r;i0vL1..,7R 1975
. _ f&.Id wins the prize in .
Ford's tidy reshuffle
the high'-ground' in .the White House
afforded him by his second position as
assistant- to.. the President for national
security affairs. felt it had no choice but
to argue its case more or less in public;
thus feelings were exacerbated and the
proprieties strainer
No sign exists of Mr. .Ford having
concerned himself 'with the substance of
either of these two important arguments,
Differences on substantial .matters of
policy there are w t n the Ford
Administration, a-p lenty, and some of
them played a part. in precipitating what
is being called "the Sunday afternoon
massacre" last weekend. What might
seem to be the obvious inl`e.-ence-that
President Ford in decidi1-?a whom to
dismiss, -whom. to keep and whom to
move 'was guided by the wish to resolve
those substantial differences-should,
however,. be avoided. The' indications
are otherwise; they suggest that Mr
Ford's guiding beacon was the pure,
unsullied light of partisan political
manoeuvre.
Even by that light, the questions that
beset Mr Ford last week were not of a
piece or all equally simple; his traffic
signs did not all point the same way.
Assume, for instance, as is almost
certainly true, that Mr Nelson Rocke-
feller's decision to take himself out of
contention for the Republican vice-
presidential nomination next year was
not spontaneous on his part, but was
extracted from him by the President,
then this can fairly be construed as a
move by Mr Ford to head off the rival
presidential candidacy of Mr Ronald
Reagan, a challenge lie is inordinately
nervous about. The same end is not at
all served, at least not in any direct way,
by getting rid of the secretary of defence,
Mr James Schlesinger, who was standing
out for a big defence -budget and. a
cautious approach td the strategic arms
limitation talks, while retaining as
secretary of state Mr Henry Kissinger,
who stands for detente, for conciliation
of the Soviet' negotiators and for' an
early =Salt: 2 agreement while -Mr
Brezhnev is still there to sign it. =
-As between Mr Schlesinger and Mr
Kissinger, Mr Ford . appears to have
been guided by the principle of being
visibly "presidential", that is, decisive
and commanding. The two men had
been fighting too much and the open,
brutal skirmishing between their officials
was making the whole Administration,
on its foreign-policy side, look excessively
shaggy. One recent public dispute was
about Mr Kissinger's promise, in con-
cluding the Sinai agreement, of favour-
able consideration -to a supply of
Pershing missiles to Israel. Another
concerned the attempt of Mr Schlesinger
and the defence department to insist on
an allowance being made in the Salt
agreement for the cruise missile that is
under development. In both cases the
defence department, aggrieved or frus-
trated by Mr Kissinger's possession of
any more than Richard U of England. 1
bothered-his head about-the charges
flung at each other by Henry Bolingbroke
and Thomas Mowbray. King Richard
saw. an opportunity.and and. seized it to
banish them both, one on rather harsher
terms thanthe other; a neat, convenient
solution, although to - be ::sure it went
wrong in that case, and ended in the
king's ruin.
President ` Ford dealt with the-!' Schlesinger-Kissinger matter by abruptly
dismissing Mr Schlesinger, while reliev-
ing Mr Kissinger of his valuable position
as head of the national security apparatus
in the White House-banishing him, in
effect, to the stare department. To see
this outcome, as some have, as. a single-
handed defeat of Mr Schlesinger by Mr
Kissinger is natural. given Mr Kissinger's
stupendous prestige, but it misconceives
what happened last weekend. Another
hand was at work, and while Mr
Schlesinger was defeated all right. the
victory belongs not to Mr Kissinger. but
elsewhere.
Because the dismissal of Mr
Schlesinger leaked out on Sunday. while
Mr Rockefeller's decision not to be a
candidate for the vice presidency next
to Irttle
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year did not . become known-.until.
Monday, it seemed for a moment that
the Schlesinger event preceded the
Rockefeller . event. Not so: Vice,
President Rockefeller resigned himself
to his face last week and promised; last'
week, to deliver his letter of self-efface-.,
ment to Mr Ford on Monday, November
3rd. Mr Ford's campaign managers and
advisers, such as they are, have- long
made no secret of their view that the
prospect of his- having vIr Rockefeller
as. his vice-presidential candidate would
hamper Mr Ford in is pursuit of the
Republican nomination. and-would help London. Both return toposts inWashing-
Mr Ronald Reagan, against Mr Ford, :;
ton; perhaps to await a call, too.
.
in some -1critical. primary- election Mr Rumsteld's problem. was some
campaigns what different from theirs, since he was
Against that; .Mr Rockefeller's fnends on hand in Washington: already; but,
were able to argue that when it came to for him...seekin the vice presidency'
the general election Mr Rockefeller V'wh.ile actually running-.the president's -
would be a decided help to his chief, offices would not have been seemly or,
particularly in New York. but also- i ' -practicable. As an article on page 63 of
some other populous states with big The Economist of October 4th explained,
cities. ivlr Ford's decision to wash his Mr Rurrisfeld faced a slightly complex.
hands- of New York's fiscal di f r":culties; 'problem of how to get back. into elective
to condemn the place and ix effect to
politics in his own state, Illinois, for
campaign- against it, invalidated- this some. years to come. To run for the vice
argument. It also put the vice president presiency as Mr Ford's partner would
in the painful and humiliating position . be the ideal solution to his difficulty.
of having to listen to his chief dis- True, if Mr Ford loses'Mr Rumsfeld
missing as trivial a probable event, the will lose too, but by then he will he
bankruptcy of New York, which Mr nationally known and well placed to try
Rockefeller, a loyal New Yorker, him- - for the presidency later. First, however,
self -called a "catastrophe". A potentate he needs a base outside the White House,
humiliated is a potentate enfeebled, and a place where he can 'occupy himself
so the pack closed in on Mr Rockefelfec conspicuously in the public service while
Luckily, thanks to his worldly position, waiting- for the call. What better place
he will not lack for stimulat rg pursuits .than the.. department of ' defence? And
after January; 1977. . ' .': thus. it turns out: Mr James Schlesinger
His withdrawal, which became known is removed from the defence department,
to the inner circle in the ,' rite House and ivir Rumsfeld takes his place.
last week, suddenly opened up the vice
presidential nomination as an opportunity
for other Republicans anxious to make
their way in national politics. One such
Republican was President Ford's chief
of staff, Mr Donald Rumsfeld, the able
former Congressman from Illinois who
held several high posts in the Nixon
Administration but stayed well clear of
the Watergate taint. There are others:
Mr George Bush, another former Con-
gressman (from Texas) at the head of
the American mission in Peking, and Mr
political events. President Ford in his
press conference on .Monday made
plain his belief that he, had personally
together this chapter: of-last weekend's.
said Mr'-Ford; "I fitted the pieces
together; and they fitted excellently ...
these are my guys that I wanted". That
is what he said, and he may believe it.
What . Mr- Ford intended, jotting
names on his pad in. solitude as he
would have the public suppose lie did,
was that the vice president would hand
him his letter of withdrawal on Monday
morning, to be made public that day as
it,.in fact, was, and that he would then
call a press conference at mid-week at
which he would announce Mr
Schlesinger's replacement . by Mr
Rumsfeld; Mr Kissinger's withdrawal
decided each move in the reshuffle with-
out help from anybody, and specifically
without any help from Mr Donald
Rumsfeld. "I did it totally.on my own",
from the White House staff and retention
of the state department; the replacement
of Mr William Colby at the Central
Intelligence Agency by Mr George
Bush; the retirement of ivir Rogers _
Morton; and the nomination of i`MIr.`-
Elliot Richardson to be his successor as
secretary of commerce.
Mr Schlesinger, the president intended
to announce at the sane time, was
either going to take the place of Mr
William Casey (who resigned some
weeks ago) at the Export-Import Bank,
or that of Mr Richardson at the embassy
in London, while Mr Colby was going
to be ambassador to Nato. A neat
reshuffle of persons and rearrangement
of responsibilities would thus have been
demonstrated to the public, with the
president crisply in charge. -
One or two things went wrong. Mr
Schlesinger and Mr Colby both refused
the proffered new positions. The news of
Mr Schlesinger's dismissal was not kept
secret till Wednesday, it was leaked to
Newsweek magazine within an hour or
two of Mr Schlesinger learning of it, and
the television networks quickly heard
about it. Mr Schlesinger did not leak it
and it looks unlikely that any of his staff
did; the only other likely source would
have been somebody in the White House
who did. not approve. of what was
happening. - -
While this was coming out Mr Ford.
and his press secretary were in Florida
looking after President Sadat of Egypt
and professing to know nothing of the
matter. The news, in short, got out
.untidily and in a sequence other than
what was planned- - . - ,
Nothing had. happened to make it
necessary that the. differences between
Mr Schlesinger. and Mr .Kissinger, or
.between the defence department and
the department of state, be, resolved
last weekend particularly. The dispute
about the place of the American-cruise
missile in the prospective Salt agreement
(see page 16) was indeed acrimonious,
but it had been papered over to some
extent and was no longer pressing. What
had really happened to Mr Schlesinger
was that he became more vulnerable,
partly because of his ill-advised attack
on the = Appropriations committee of
the House of Representatives on October
20th. Mr Schlesinger was defending the I
defence budget against congressional
cuts. He was also defending it against the
president's- budget office and this obliged
him to argue about the level of defence
expenditure with President Ford, with
whom he had a long talk on November
1st. Nothing was said at that meeting
about the president wanting ]vir
Schlesinger's resignation; they talked
about the defence budget, that was all.
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The chopper did not fall till next morning.
If there is one thing President Ford
can claim to know about, it is Congress,
and various reports have Mr Ford
irritated, on this and other occasions,
by what he believed to be Mr Schlesinger's
amateurish assessments of what Con-
gress would and would not do for defence.
Thus a version gained currency, and
has been assiduously circulated from
the White House, to the effect that Mr
Schlesinger was inept in his dealings with
Congress. While it is brie that the dis-
missed secretary of defence, a learned
man with a powerful mind and a rock-
like adherence to conclusions once
arrived at, had been known to talk to
other grown men like a schoolmaster to
the fifth form, there is not much truth
in the general idea that he cannot get
on with Congress. By and large the
congressional committees he has had
to deal with, though they may not like
being talked down to, respect his
The CIA draws a politician
Few people doubted that Mr William
Colby's days as director of Central
Intelligence were numbered. He was no
friend of Mr Henry Kissinger, the
national security-foreign policy strong
man. As a career professional in the
CIA, he had no independent base of
support-not even a congressional
cheering squad along the lines of the
one that rallied around Mr Schlesinger,
the departing defence secretary.
Mr Colby was widely considered to
have thrown his predecessor, Mr
Richard Helms, to the wo v- s, suggest-
ing that the justice department might
look into the question of v--heeler Mr
Helms had committed ne_ iiury in
testifying about the CLA'.- -aie i n Chile.
Morale in the intelligence cy in a
period of congressionai -invest gation
and intense public scrutiny is wobbly,
at best, and there have been repeated
indications, in public statements and
not so carefully concealed leaks, that
the Ford Administration nianned. a
major reorganisation of the CIA.
But the timing of Mr Colby's
departure and the identity of his suc-
cessor, Mr George Bush, come as major
surprises. The inquiries by the House of
Representatives and Senate into the CIA
and other parts of the intelligence com-
munity are far from complete, and it
is possible that the chairmen of the
respective investigating committees, Mr
Otis Pike and Mr Frank Church, will
take the firing of Mr Colby, who was
co-operative with them, as a provocation
to probe more aggressively. -
If Mr Colby's dismissal is, as widely
reported, meant to punish him for -his
candour with the investigators, it prob-
ably cones too late to reverse -the tide
(and could even stimulate further leaks
from inside). If, on the other hand, it is
meant to signal a new image for the
cloak-and-dagger agency, it probably
comes too soon. In any event, the CIA
will no longer have a recognised, know-
ledgeable spokesman. And there is a risk
that any legislation that emerges from the
congressional investigations will appear
to be imposed upon the agency without its
own suggestions being considered.
Mr Bush's arrival at CIA head-
t'Vashington, DC
quarters in Langley, ?Virginia, could
cause morale there to plunge. even fur-
ther. Although he has served as ambas-
sador to the United Nations and re-
cently as the American representative in
Peking, Mr Bush is a politician, a-man
who has more than once demonstrated
his desire to help rescue the Republican
party in time of trial (for example, by
taking over. the Republican National
Committee after Mr Richard Nixon's
re-election in 1972, as the Watergate
cover-up was unravelling)
For all his charm and gracefulness, he
is anything .but a professional in his
new field. His appointment conjures up
memories of the stewardship of Mr L.
Patrick Gray at the FBI in 1972 and
1973-a well-intentioned man whose
sense of- loyalty outweighed his quali-
fications and led him to destroy some
Watergate-related evidence.. The best
interpretation that can- be put on - Mr
Bush's nomination is that he would be
temporary--on the scene just long,
enough to help Mr Ford find a longer-
range CIA director to reorganise the
agency-but even that view is not very
reassuring to the beleaguered CIA.
-Although Mr Bush cannot really take -
charge until he returns from China and is
confirmed by the Senate, there is no sign
that the committees on Capitol Hill will
wait for, him before proceeding. The
Senate committee, rejecting pleas for
caution from the White House, declared
that it would release later in November
its still-secret report on CIA involvement
in assassination plots against foreign
leaders, and it scheduled four days of
open hearings into the "covert action"
side - of agency affairs. ' On Wednesday
Mr Ford asked Mr Colby . to stay on
for some weeks to help Congress with
these inquiries. When he learned of his dis-
missal from the president, Mr Colby
started preparing to clear out his desk
very promptly, but at the president's
urging he agreed to carry on until the job
is one Mr Bush can take over. -
One unanswered question is whether
Mr Colby, out of anger or resentment,
might now feel moved to become even
more co-operative with the congressional
investigators, in public or in private.
seriousness, his intelligence and his
honesty. Still, just for the moment, with
his flanks exposed towards the state
department, the president's office and
Congress, vulnerable he was and out
he went.
ment as an available perch for the
quick-thinking, able, ambitious Mr
Rumsfeld, but it would not much. appeal
to Mr Rumsfeld to have to defend his'
new department's point of view, and
to have to maintain his own communica-
tions with President Ford, with Mr -
Henry Kissinger sitting in charge - of
the White House office (that of the
national security staff) through which
Mr Rumsfeld's communications to the
president would routinely have to make
their way. Not, it must be supposed,
by - coincidence, the long-discussed
question of the advisability of having
the White House foreign policy office
run by the secretary of state, or by a
separate person concerned only - with
I
-
enl
reside
he
...., ..
..
-
set V 1116 t
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resolved. General Brent Scowcroft, Mr Kissinger's deputy, takes charge
of the national security council. - -
It is true;- and is being emphasised,
that General Scowcroft (an American
military staff off cer of the best type,.
which . is very good indeed) was Mr _
Kissinger's Irian and can be - counted
on to be loyal is him. That is not the
point. Once in full charge - of the
national securir council, staff, as he
now is. General Scowcroft will be-the
president's man, and he will be bound.
to make sure that the views of Mr
Rumsfeld's department get presented to
Mr Ford on an equality with those of
Mr Kissinger's department. -
- That should be good enough for Mr
Rumsfeld. He, for his part, leaves his
own conscientious young deputy, -Mr
Richard Cheney, to run the White House
staff in his place. Mr Cheney, too, will -
serve the president first and foremost,
as is right, but the arrangement is likely
to prove perfectly satisfactory from the
point of view of Mr Rumsfeld, whose
course in national politics is now
decidedly upward. -
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