http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/28/AR2006032800736.html
Caspar W. Weinberger, 88; Reagan's Defense Secretary
By Adam Bernstein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 29, 2006; B07
Caspar W. Weinberger, 88, a veteran public servant who drastically
raised the post-Vietnam War military budget as Ronald Reagan's
secretary of defense and who later was indicted and then pardoned in
the Iran-contra affair, died March 28 at Eastern Maine Medical Center
in Bangor. He had kidney ailments and pneumonia.
Briefly a California assemblyman, Mr. Weinberger was a background
force in the state's Republican Party through the 1960s. Then-Gov.
Reagan named Mr. Weinberger to important state positions overseeing
finances, and he was regarded as a remarkably efficient administrator.
Summoned to Washington in 1970, Mr. Weinberger served under
Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford as chairman of the
Federal Trade Commission, director of the Office of Management and
Budget and secretary of the old Department of Health, Education and Welfare.
His reputation for pruning public spending -- particularly on social
programs -- led to an unflattering nickname ("Cap the Knife") and
enduring resentment from those opposed to his approach.
After five years as an executive with Bechtel Group, the
California-based engineering giant, he surfaced again in Washington
when Reagan won the presidency in 1980. As secretary of defense from
1981 to 1987, Mr. Weinberger served longer than any Pentagon chief
save for Robert S. McNamara during the Vietnam War.
Mr. Weinberger cumulatively raised the defense budget by $2 trillion,
among its greatest peacetime jumps (prompting a new nickname, "Cap
the Shovel"). This funding increase coincided with the decline of the
Soviet Union, whose military morale was already crippled in
Afghanistan. Mr. Weinberger and many others felt keenly the
Pentagon's role in the fall of communism.
He revived the B-1 bomber program that went dormant during the Carter
administration and lavished money on many more programs, including
the MX missile and the "Star Wars" space-based missile defense system.
For all the military buildup and his reputation as a hawk, Mr.
Weinberger resisted engaging in conflicts abroad unless absolutely unavoidable.
"Some thought it was incongruous that I did so much to build up our
defenses but was reluctant to commit forces abroad," he wrote in his
memoir "In the Arena" (2001). "I did not arm to attack. . . . We
armed so that we could negotiate from strength, defend freedom and
make war less likely."
As the years passed, Mr. Weinberger saw himself challenged more by
Congress about his spending patterns. One-time aides also offered
damning analyses.
Lawrence J. Korb, an assistant secretary of defense under Mr.
Weinberger who became a defense policy analyst, wrote that "the
defense budget and programs that he bequeathed to his successor,
Frank Carlucci, were so far out of balance that his five-year plan
had a shortfall of $500 billion. (In his first month in office,
Carlucci had to make some $200 billion in reductions.)"
Several procurement scandals, in which screws and claw hammers were
found to have cost more than $100 apiece, were deeply frustrating to
the cost-conscious side of Mr. Weinberger.
Ultimately, what might have sidelined him in the White House was his
penchant for scuttling arms talks he viewed as compromises to the
Soviets. Political watchers noted that his decision to resign --
which he attributed to his wife's cancer treatment -- came shortly
before a third meeting between Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
After he left office, Mr. Weinberger became a leading figure in the
Iran-contra affair, in which U.S. officials covertly sold arms to
Iran to win the release of U.S. hostages in the Middle East and used
some of the profits to support Nicaraguan rebels known as the
contras. This went against stated U.S. policy.
An independent prosecutor, Lawrence E. Walsh, brought felony charges
against Mr. Weinberger for obstructing justice by concealing
voluminous notes, and Mr. Weinberger wrote that Walsh "was
constructing a case against me to try to force me to implicate the president."
In June 1992, he was indicted by a federal grand jury, but in
December, President George H.W. Bush pardoned Mr. Weinberger and
called him "a true American patriot."
In recent years, Mr. Weinberger had joined Forbes magazine as
publisher, chairman and columnist. He also was a commentator
specializing in defense threats.
Caspar Willard Weinberger was born in San Francisco on Aug. 18, 1917.
His father, a lawyer, nicknamed his son "Cap" based on a character in
a popular novel of the day.
At Harvard University, Mr. Weinberger joined the Crimson newspaper,
where he considered a triumph getting a backstage interview with the
throaty actress Tallulah Bankhead. He graduated magna cum laude in
1938 and from Harvard's law school in 1941.
During World War II, he served in the Army and was detached to Gen.
Douglas MacArthur's intelligence staff headquarters variously in
Australia, New Guinea and the Philippines.
During his Pentagon years, Mr. Weinberger frequently mentioned his
fleeting encounters with the general, but his greatest hero remained
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, whose speeches he studied
and whose resilience he admired. He liked to draw an analogy between
Churchill and the Nazis and his own responsibilities against the Soviet Union.
Back in California in 1945, Mr. Weinberger wrote book reviews for the
San Francisco Chronicle and clerked for U.S. Court of Appeals Judge
William E. Orr. He joined the judge's prominent law firm in San
Francisco, working his way to partner mostly as an anti-trust litigator.
Meanwhile, he began his political career. He was elected to the state
assembly in 1952, representing a tony neighborhood of San Francisco.
Regarded as a moderate Republican, he was reelected twice, culled a
reputation as an able crusader against the liquor lobby, and then
lost a bid for state attorney general in 1958 to a more-conservative opponent.
He went on to serve as chairman of the Republican State Central
Committee. In the 1966 gubernatorial race, he backed Republican
candidate George Christopher, a former mayor of San Francisco, but
shifted his support to Reagan after the former actor won the nomination.
Many of Reagan's millionaire backers were skeptical about Mr.
Weinberger's bona fides, noting his faint support in 1964 for the
presidential bid of conservative Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.).
But when asked to fix the state's financial plight, Mr. Weinberger
lived up to his self-described fiscal Puritanism and was steeped in
praise. Mr. Weinberger was applauded for a budget surplus in 1968,
although some attributed it to an earlier tax increase.
Soon, he was in Washington, where he made key reforms at the Federal
Trade Commission and prompted criticism at the Office of Management
and Budget for his cost-cutting.
What he soon heralded as a $300 million budget surplus, despite an
overall growth in the deficit, was reportedly gained by ending or
greatly reducing appropriations for about 100 health, antipoverty and
drug control programs. Mr. Weinberger said the social service efforts
would be more effectively handled at the state and local level.
Eager for a political role in the Reagan administration, he became,
in January 1981, the 15th secretary of defense. He oversaw
limited-engagement strikes against the Caribbean island-nation of
Grenada and against Libya.
He said he initially discouraged sending the Marine Corps as a
peacekeeping force in Lebanon, calling it "an impossible mission." In
October 1983, when 241 U.S. servicemen were killed in their barracks
by suicide bombers, he likened the situation to a quagmire and pushed
for withdrawal, which soon occurred.
In 1987, Mr. Weinberger received the Presidential Medal of Freedom,
the nation's highest civilian medal.
In Washington, he cut a wiry figure and was known for wry,
self-deprecating quips. He enjoyed the symphony and ballet. He
lectured and wrote books, including two memoirs.
Survivors include his wife of 63 years, Jane Dalton Weinberger of
Mount Desert, Maine; a son, Caspar Jr.; a daughter, Arlin; three
grandchildren; and four great-grandchildren.
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Received on Sat Mar 02 2024 - 00:57:21 CST