Name | Robert Gates |
---|---|
Office | 22nd United States Secretary of Defense |
President | George W. BushBarack Obama |
Deputy | Gordon EnglandWilliam Lynn |
Term start | December 18, 2006 |
Term end | July 1, 2011 |
Predecessor | Donald Rumsfeld |
Successor | Leon Panetta |
Office2 | 22nd President of Texas A&M; University |
Term start2 | August 1, 2002 |
Term end2 | December 16, 2006 |
Predecessor2 | Ray M. Bowen |
Successor2 | Eddie J. Davis |
Office3 | 15th Director of Central Intelligence |
Term start3 | November 6, 1991 |
Term end3 | January 20, 1993 |
President3 | George H. W. Bush |
Deputy3 | Richard KerrBill Studeman |
Predecessor3 | William Webster |
Successor3 | James Woolsey |
Office4 | Deputy National Security Advisor |
President4 | George H. W. Bush |
Term start4 | March 20, 1989 |
Term end4 | November 6, 1991 |
Predecessor4 | John Negroponte |
Successor4 | Jonathan Howe |
Office5 | 16th Deputy Director of Central Intelligence |
President5 | Ronald ReaganGeorge H. W. Bush |
Term start5 | April 18, 1986 |
Term end5 | March 20, 1989 |
Predecessor5 | John McMahon |
Successor5 | Richard Kerr |
Birth date | September 25, 1943 |
Birth place | Wichita, Kansas |
Party | Republican Party |
Spouse | Becky Gates |
Alma mater | College of William and MaryIndiana University, BloomingtonGeorgetown University |
Signature | Robert Gates Signature 2.svg |
Branch | United States Air Force |
Serviceyears | 1967–1969 |
Rank | Second Lieutenant |
Gates accepted the nomination for Secretary of Defense on November 8, 2006, replacing Donald Rumsfeld. He was confirmed with bipartisan support. In a 2007 profile written by former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, Time named Gates one of the year's most influential people. In 2008, Gates was named one of America's Best Leaders by U.S. News & World Report. He continued to serve as Secretary of Defense in President Barack Obama's administration. Gates announced in August 2010 that he planned to retire in 2011, and President Barack Obama announced in April 2011 that he would be replaced by CIA director Leon Panetta. “He’ll be remembered for making us aware of the danger of over-reliance on military intervention as an instrument of American foreign policy,” said former Senator David L. Boren. Gates was presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian award, by President Obama during his retirement ceremony.
Gates then received a scholarship to attend the College of William and Mary, graduating in 1965 with a B.A. in history. At William & Mary, Gates was an active member and president of the Alpha Phi Omega (national service fraternity) chapter and the Young Republicans; he was also the business manager for the William and Mary Review, a literary and art magazine. At his William & Mary graduation ceremony, Gates received the Algernon Sydney Sullivan Award naming him the graduate who "has made the greatest contribution to his fellow man."
Gates then pursued an M.A. in history from Indiana University in 1966. Finally, he completed his doctorate in Russian and Soviet history, while working for the CIA, from Georgetown University in 1974. The title of his Georgetown doctoral dissertation is "Soviet Sinology: An Untapped Source for Kremlin Views and Disputes Relating to Contemporary Events in China" and is available from University Microfilms International as document number 7421652. He received an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from both William & Mary (1998) and the University of Oklahoma (2011).
He married his wife Becky on January 7, 1967. They have two children.
Gates left the CIA in 1974 to serve on the staff of the National Security Council. He returned to the CIA in late 1979, serving briefly as the director of the Strategic Evaluation Center, Office of Strategic Research. He was named the Director of the DCI/DDCI Executive Staff in 1981, Deputy Director for Intelligence in 1982, and Deputy Director of Central Intelligence from April 18, 1986 to March 20, 1989.
Gates was Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs from March until August 1989, and was Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Adviser from August 1989 until November 1991.
Gates was nominated (for the second time, see below) for the position of Director of Central Intelligence by President George H. W. Bush on May 14, 1991, confirmed by the Senate on November 5, and sworn in on November 6, becoming the only career officer in the CIA's history (as of 2005) to rise from entry-level employee to Director.
During a Senate committee hearing on his nomination, former division chief Melvin Goodman testified that the agency was the most corrupt and slanted during the tenure of William Casey with Gates serving as Deputy. According to Goodman, Gates was part of an agency leadership that proliferated false information and ignored 'reality'. National Intelligence Council chairman Harold P. Ford testified that during his tenure, Gates had transgressed professional boundaries.
Deputy Directors during his tenure were Richard J. Kerr (from November 6, 1991 until March 2, 1992) and Adm. William O. Studeman (from April 9, 1992 through the remainder of Gates' tenure). He served until 1993.
Gates was nominated to become the Director of Central Intelligence (head of the CIA) in early 1987. He withdrew his name after it became clear the Senate would reject the nomination due to controversy about his role in the Iran-Contra affair.
Gates was an early subject of Independent Counsel's investigation, but the investigation of Gates intensified in the spring of 1991 as part of a larger inquiry into the Iran/contra activities of CIA officials. This investigation received an additional impetus in May 1991, when President George H.W. Bush nominated Gates to be Director of Central Intelligence (DCI). The chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) requested, in a letter to the Independent Counsel on May 15, 1991, any information that would "significantly bear on the fitness" of Gates for the CIA post.
Gates consistently testified that he first heard on October 1, 1986, from Charles E. Allen, the national intelligence officer who was closest to the Iran initiative, that proceeds from the Iran arms sales may have been diverted to support the Contras. Other evidence proves, however, that Gates received a report on the diversion during the summer of 1986 from DDI Richard Kerr. The issue was whether the Independent Counsel could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Gates was deliberately not telling the truth when he later claimed not to have remembered any reference to the diversion before meeting with Allen in October.
Grand jury secrecy rules hampered Independent Counsel's response. Nevertheless, in order to answer questions about Gates' prior testimony, Independent Counsel accelerated his investigation of Gates in the summer of 1991. This investigation was substantially completed by September 3, 1991, at which time Independent Counsel determined that Gates' Iran-Contra activities and testimony did not warrant prosecution.
Independent Counsel made this decision subject to developments that could have warranted reopening his inquiry, including testimony by Clair E. George, the CIA's former deputy director for operations. At the time Independent Counsel reached this decision, the possibility remained that George could have provided information warranting reconsideration of Gates' status in the investigation. George refused to cooperate with Independent Counsel and was indicted on September 19, 1991. George subpoenaed Gates to testify as a defense witness at George's first trial in the summer of 1994, but Gates was never called.
The final report of the Independent Counsel for Iran-Contra Scandal, issued on August 4, 1993, said that Gates "was close to many figures who played significant roles in the Iran/contra affair and was in a position to have known of their activities. The evidence developed by Independent Counsel did not warrant indictment..."
In 1996, Gates' autobiography, From the Shadows: The Ultimate Insider's Story of Five Presidents and How They Won the Cold War, was published. Gates has also written numerous articles on government and foreign policy and has been a frequent contributor to the op-ed page of The New York Times.
Gates returned to Texas A&M; on April 21, 2009, as the speaker for the annual Aggie Muster ceremony. He is one of only 6 speakers not to be a graduate of Texas A&M; University since Dwight D. Eisenhower spoke in 1946.
In January 2004, Gates co-chaired a Council on Foreign Relations task force on U.S. relations towards Iran. Among the task force's primary recommendation was to directly engage Iran on a diplomatic level regarding Iranian nuclear technology. Key points included a negotiated position that would allow Iran to develop its nuclear program in exchange for a commitment from Iran to use the program only for peaceful means.
At the time of his nomination by President George W. Bush to the position of Secretary of Defense, Gates was also a member of the Iraq Study Group, also called the Baker Commission, which was expected to issue its report in November 2006, following the mid-term election on November 7. He was replaced by former Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger.
Gates committed to remain as President of Texas A&M; University through the summer of 2008; President George W. Bush offered the position of United States Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to John Negroponte, who accepted.
Gates said in a 2005 discussion with the university's Academy for Future International Leaders that he had tentatively decided to accept the DNI position out of a sense of duty and had written an email that would be sent to students during the press conference to announce his decision, explaining that he was leaving to serve the U.S. once again. Gates, however, took the weekend to consider what his final decision should be, and ultimately decided that he was unwilling to return to Washington, D.C., in any capacity simply because he "had nothing to look forward to in D.C. and plenty to look forward to at A&M.;"
Gates was unanimously confirmed by the United States Senate Armed Services Committee on December 5, 2006. During his confirmation hearing on December 5, 2006, Gates replied to a question that in his opinion the United States was neither winning nor losing the war in Iraq. The next day, Gates was confirmed by the full Senate by a margin of 95-2, with Republican Senators Rick Santorum and Jim Bunning casting the two dissenting votes and senators Elizabeth Dole, Evan Bayh, and Joe Biden not voting. On December 18, 2006, Gates was sworn in as Secretary of Defense by White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten at a private White House ceremony and then by Vice President Dick Cheney at the Pentagon.
Under the Bush administration, Gates directed the war in Iraq's troop surge, a marked change in tactics from his predecessor. With violence on the decline in Iraq, in 2008, Gates also began the troop withdrawal of Iraq, a policy continued into the Obama administration.
Robert Gates gives a gig 'em with a group of Aggie Marines at Camp Fallujah, Iraq]]
While Gates has continued the troop withdrawals in Iraq, which already had begun in the Bush administration, Gates has implemented a rapid, limited surge of troops in Afghanistan in 2009. Robert Gates would remove General David D. McKiernan from command in Afghanistan on May 6, 2009. Gates replaced him with General Stanley A. McChrystal. The Washington Post called it "a rare decision to remove a wartime commander." The Washington Post described the replacement as one of several replacements of Generals who represented the "traditional Army" with Generals "who have pressed for the use of counter-insurgency tactics."
In December 2009 Gates visited Afghanistan following President Barack Obama's announcement of the deployment of 30,000 additional personnel against the Taliban insurgency. in March 2011|left]] Time magazine notes that Gates and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have "forged a formidable partnership", speaking frequently, "comparing notes before they go to the White House", meeting with each other weekly and having lunch once a month at either the Pentagon or the State Department.
In a March 2010 speech to a NATO conference in Washington, Secretary Gates said that "The demilitarization of Europe — where large swaths of the general public and political class are averse to military force and the risks that go with it — has gone from a blessing in the 20th century to an impediment to achieving real security and lasting peace in the 21st".
Gates announced in February 2010 that the department would lift its ban on women serving on submarines. Gates is also preparing the armed forces for the repeal of the don't ask, don't tell policy. When implemented, homosexuals will be able to openly serve in the military. In service of that goal, he announced in late March 2010 the approval of new regulations that would make it more difficult to kick gays out of the military. Gates called the guideline changes, which went into effect immediately, a matter of "common sense and common decency" that would be "an important improvement" allowing the Pentagon to apply current law in "a fairer and more appropriate" manner, until Congress repeals the law commonly known as "don’t ask, don't tell." The Pentagon's legal counsel, Jeh Johnson, said the new regulations are by no means a moratorium on the current law and stressed that cases would move forward under the new standards.
to monitor the progress of Operation Neptune Spear.]] Gates was photographed in the White House Situation Room photograph taken on May 1, 2011 by Pete Souza.
In August 2010, speaking to Foreign Policy magazine Secretary Gates said that he would remain as Secretary of Defense until 2011 and then retire. "I think that it would be a mistake to wait until January 2012," he said. "This is not the kind of job you want to fill in the spring of an election year."
In his last speech in June 2011 before NATO, Gates again stated that other NATO members must do more as the United States tackles its budget deficit. He said bluntly that “In the past, I’ve worried openly about NATO turning into a two-tiered alliance: Between members who specialize in ’soft’ humanitarian, development, peacekeeping and talking tasks, and those conducting the ‘hard’ combat missions. Between those willing and able to pay the price and bear the burdens of alliance commitments, and those who enjoy the benefits of NATO membership – be they security guarantees or headquarters billets – but don’t want to share the risks and the costs. This is no longer a hypothetical worry. We are there today. And it is unacceptable. The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress – and in the American body politic writ large – to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense. Nations apparently willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets. Indeed, if current trends in the decline of European defense capabilities are not halted and reversed, future U.S. political leaders – those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me – may not consider the return on America’s investment in NATO worth the cost.”
Gates officially retired as Secretary of Defense on July 1, 2011 and was presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian award, by President Obama during his retirement ceremony.
It was announced in August 2010 that Gates is trying to find $100 billion in Defense savings over the next five years in order to instill a “culture of savings and restraint” in the military. Secretary Gates said that “It is important that we not repeat the mistakes of the past, where tough economic times or the winding down of a military campaign leads to steep and unwise reductions in defense,” Gates said "As a matter of principle and political reality, the Department of Defense cannot expect America's elected representatives to approve budget increases each year unless we are doing a good job, indeed everything possible, to make every dollar count." These cuts include the closing of Joint Forces Command, fifty general and admirals, and the removal of 150 senior civilian positions.
In a June 10, 2011 speech in Brussels, The New York Times reported that "Mr. Gates slammed NATO nations for failing to meet their commitments in Afghanistan — or for imposing sweeping restrictions on those forces they do send — which he said hobbled the mission. ... Perhaps most significantly, Mr. Gates issued a dire warning that the United States, exhausted by a decade of war and dreading its own mounting budget deficits, simply may not see NATO as worth supporting any longer."
;Government awards Presidential Medal of Freedom
;Other awards
|- |- |- {{U.S. Secretary box |before = Donald Rumsfeld |department = Secretary of Defense |years = 2006–2011|president = George W. Bush, Barack Obama |after = Leon Panetta}} |-
Category:1943 births Category:The College of William & Mary alumni Category:Directors of the Central Intelligence Agency Category:Distinguished Eagle Scouts Category:George W. Bush Administration cabinet members Category:Georgetown University alumni Category:Indiana University alumni Category:Iran–Contra affair Category:Living people Category:Obama Administration cabinet members Category:People from Wichita, Kansas Category:Presidential Citizens Medal recipients Category:Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients Category:Presidents of Texas A&M; University Category:United States National Security Council staffers Category:United States Secretaries of Defense Category:United States Air Force officers
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