Donald Rumsfeld is this generation’s Robert McNamara.
Over 12 years after overseeing and helping to design the 2003 invasion of Iraq – the former secretary of defense is now re-writing his own role in the invasion.
In an interview with The Times of London, Rumsfeld called the Bush administration’s approach to Iraq “unrealistic.”
He was referring specifically to the Bush administration’s goal of toppling a dictatorship and building a model democracy in the Middle East – and he said,
“I’m not one who thinks that our particular template of democracy is appropriate for other countries at every moment of their histories. The idea that we could fashion a democracy in Iraq seemed to me unrealistic. I was concerned about it when I first heard those words.”
The statement is stunning considering that Rumsfeld, along with George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz, was one of the biggest architects and cheerleaders of the invasion that destabilized the region and provided fertile ground for ISIS and other extremist groups to begin their current reign of terror in the region.