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Robert McNamara
McNamara was born in San Francisco where his father was sales manager of a wholesale shoe firm. He became an Eagle Scout, and graduated in 1937 from the University of California, Berkeley with a Bachelor of Arts in economics with minors in mathematics and philosophy, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa in his sophomore year, and earned a varsity letter in crew. He was a member of the UC Berkeley Golden Bear Battallion, Army ROTC. He then earned a master's degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration in 1939.
After earning his MBA, McNamara worked a year for the accounting firm of Price Waterhouse in San Francisco. In August 1940 he returned to Harvard to teach in the Business School and became the highest paid Assistant Professor at the time. Following his involvement there in a program to teach the analytical approaches used in business to officers of the Army Air Forces (AAF), he entered the Army as a captain in early 1943, serving most of the war with the AAF's Office of Statistical Control. One major responsibility was the analysis of U.S. bombers' efficiency and effectiveness, especially the B-29 forces commanded by Major General Curtis LeMay in China and the Marianas Islands. Contrary to some reports, McNamara did not help plan the March 9, 1945 fire bombing of Tokyo, but he informed Washington of its success, as the Japanese placed the toll at some 83,000 people. (Rich Frank: Downfall, Random House, 1999.) He left active duty in 1946 with the rank of lieutenant colonel and with a Legion of Merit.
Secretary of Defense President Kennedy and McNamara, 1962 Enlarge President Kennedy and McNamara, 1962
President-elect John F. Kennedy first offered the post of secretary of defense to former secretary Robert A. Lovett. Lovett declined but recommended McNamara; Kennedy had him approached by Sargent Shriver (regarding either the Treasury or the Defense cabinet post), less than five weeks after becoming president at Ford. At first McNamara turned down the Treasury position, but eventually after discussions with his family, McNamara accepted Kennedy's invitation to serve as Secretary of Defense.
Although not especially knowledgeable about defense matters, McNamara immersed himself in the subject, learned quickly, and soon began to apply an "active role" management philosophy, in his own words "providing aggressive leadership questioning, suggesting alternatives, proposing objectives and stimulating progress." He rejected radical organizational changes, such as those proposed by a group Kennedy appointed, headed by Sen. W. Stuart Symington, which would have abolished the military departments, replaced the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) with a single chief of staff, and established three functional unified commands. McNamara accepted the need for separate services but argued that "at the end we must have one defense policy, not three conflicting defense policies. And it is the job of the Secretary and his staff to make sure that this is the case." United States Civil Defense booklet,Fallout Protection commissioned by McNamara.
Initially the basic policies outlined by President Kennedy in a message to Congress on March 28, 1961 guided McNamara in the reorientation of the defense program. Kennedy rejected the concept of first-strike attack and emphasized the need for adequate strategic arms and defense to deter nuclear attack on the United States and its allies. U.S. arms, he maintained, must constantly be under civilian command and control, and the nation's defense posture had to be "designed to reduce the danger of irrational or unpremeditated general war." The primary mission of U.S. overseas forces, in cooperation with allies, was "to prevent the steady erosion of the Free World through limited wars." Kennedy and McNamara rejected massive retaliation for a posture of flexible response. The United States wanted choices in an emergency other than "inglorious retreat or unlimited retaliation," as the president put it. Out of a major review of the military challenges confronting the United States initiated by McNamara in 1961 came a decision to increase the nation's limited warfare capabilities. These moves were significant because McNamara was abandoning Eisenhower's policy of massive retaliation in favor of a flexible response strategy that relied on increased U.S. capacity to conduct limited, non-nuclear warfare.
He also created the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Defense Supply Agency.
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