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I think we ought to have a new rule: You can ask two questions, and then we can pick the one we want to answer.
Donald Rumsfeld
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Donald Rumsfeld
Age: 88 †
Born: 1932
Born: July 9
Died: 2021
Died: June 29
Author
Businessperson
Diplomat
Former U.S. Secretary Of Defense
Military Officer
Politician
Chicago
Illinois
Donald Henry Rumsfeld
Think
Picks
Thinking
Rule
Questions
Answer
Ought
Answers
Asks
Two
Pick
More quotes by Donald Rumsfeld
Success tends to go not to the person who is error-free, because he also tends to be risk-averse. Rather it goes to the person who recognizes that life is pretty much a percentage business. It isn't making mistakes that's critical it's correcting them and getting on with the principal task.
Donald Rumsfeld
Congress, the press, and the bureaucracy too often focus on how much money or effort is spent, rather than whether the money or effort actually achieves the announced goal.
Donald Rumsfeld
Don't divide the world into 'them' and 'us.' Avoid infatuation with or resentment of the press, the Congress, rivals, or opponents. Accept them as facts. They have their jobs and you have yours.
Donald Rumsfeld
Don't necessarily avoid sharp edges. Occasionally they are necessary to leadership.
Donald Rumsfeld
Don't speak ill of your predecessors or successors. You didn't walk in their shoes.
Donald Rumsfeld
Keep your sense of humor. As General Joe Stillwell said, 'The higher a monkey climbs, the more you see of his behind'.
Donald Rumsfeld
You might be a cunning linguist, but I am a master debater.
Donald Rumsfeld
There are things that we know, and there are things that we don't know. Then there are the things that we don't even know that we don't know. Those are the things that are the hardest.
Donald Rumsfeld
Many people around the President have sizeable egos before entering government, some with good reason. Their new positions will do little to moderate their egos.
Donald Rumsfeld
No. That's someone else's business. Quagmire is - I don't do quagmires.
Donald Rumsfeld
You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time.
Donald Rumsfeld
Plan backwards as well as forward. Set objectives and trace back to see how to achieve them. You may find that no path can get you there. Plan forward to see where your steps will take you, which may not be clear or intuitive.
Donald Rumsfeld
Be able to resign. It will improve your value to the President and do wonders for your performance.
Donald Rumsfeld
If you try to please everybody, somebody's not going to like it.
Donald Rumsfeld
Imagine, a September 11 with weapons of mass destruction. It's not 3,000. It's tens of thousands of innocent men, women and children.
Donald Rumsfeld
I believe what I said yesterday. I don't know what I said, but I know what I think and I assume it's what I said.
Donald Rumsfeld
At 78 years old, I am not surprised at much anymore. Germany has taken divergent positions before, so has France, so has England, so has the US.
Donald Rumsfeld
We know where they are. They are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad.
Donald Rumsfeld
There's another way to phrase that and that is that the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. It is basically saying the same thing in a different way. Simply because you do not have evidence that something does exist does not mean that you have evidence that it doesn't exist.
Donald Rumsfeld
When I served as US Ambassador to NATO in the 1970s, the center of gravity in Europe was France and Germany.
Donald Rumsfeld