Promise and Power: The Life and Times of Robert McNamara

Little Brown & Co, 1993. Hardcover. Like New. 6x1x9. Hardcover and dust jacket. Good binding and cover. Light wear. Faint foxing to top edge. Clean, unmarked pages. <br> "Robert Strange McNamara, one of the most recognizable and controversial figures of the Vietnam War, served as the Secretary of Defense under both John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. His policies changed the way that the military operated and also shaped the strategy of the Vietnam War. After serving in the military, McNamara began working for the Ford Motor Company helping to reorganize, modernize and expand the company introducing safety features like the seat belt and dished steering wheel and adding the popular Ford Falcon and a completely redesigned Lincoln Continental to Ford's lineup. In 1960 Ford Motor Company made him the first non family member ever to serve as president of the company. Shortly after becoming the CEO, President John F. Kennedy asked McNamara to become his Secretary of Defense. McNamara served as the Secretary of Defense from 1961-1968. During his tenure he applied his business and management strategies to reorganize the military command and streamline their equipment development and procurement system in an effort to develop the most cost effective and efficient weapons and materials for the military. He required the Air Force to use the Navy's F-4 Phantom and the A-7 combat air craft in a cost cutting effort to save the taxpayers the money of developing the Air Force a combat aircraft program of their own. Along the same reasoning, he developed a plan for a new fighter the F-111, a multipurpose tactical fighter usable by all of the service branches. The F-111 met with much criticism and the Navy eventually abandoned its use, however the Air Force used it successfully for over 20 years. He supported the Vietnam War and its escalation and he applied statistical analysis and metrics as a way to measure the effectiveness of the troops fighting the war. He switched to using enemy body counts instead of territory or land based objectives to measure the American's success in the war. Unfortunately this body count metric led to a war of attrition, a policy of inflicting massive casualties on the enemy until they have no choice but to surrender; not an effective strategy for winning the Vietnam War. He began voicing doubts about the war as early as 1965 and eventually resigned his position in 1968 due to his disillusionment with the war. After leaving the Pentagon, he took over as President of the World Bank. During his tenure, he invested their assets and expanded their programs available to help developing countries around the world. After his retirement from the World Bank in 1981, McNamara lectured and advocated reducing the amounts of nuclear weapons in the world's arsenals." - Texas Tech University