Word: rumsfeld
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More than a year ago, when President George W. Bush and Rumsfeld first asked Franks for a plan to topple Saddam Hussein, Franks replied that he would need five divisions and five aircraft carriers to make it work. A dismayed Rumsfeld famously sent the plan back two or three times, asking the four-star general to shrink the forces in half, or even more. Following the Powell doctrine that all Vietnam-era generals swear by, Franks wanted an overpowering force to make sure America would prevail. Rumsfeld wanted him to do it faster and lighter, in part because he didn...
...Rumsfeld got a fair chunk of what he wanted too: more special forces than Franks preferred, a faster race to Baghdad than the general had originally envisioned and a quicker start to the ground war than the Centcom chief had proposed. Rumsfeld also wanted the air and ground campaigns to start simultaneously; if war begins late next week, one will quickly follow the other. "Rumsfeld is particularly enamored of special-operations stuff, and Franks is less so, and that was reflected in how the Iraq plan came together," a senior Centcom officer says. "The two of them tugged and massaged...
Many of the men who have worn four stars on their shoulders in the past say that Franks has already exceeded his critics' expectations. He has brought to one of the most difficult strategic assignments in a generation a mind agile enough to satisfy the perpetually demanding Rumsfeld--and still get approval of a plan that favors overwhelming force. "Rumsfeld doesn't always know what he wants, but he knows what he doesn't want," a Pentagon official says. "Franks is good at finding him what he wants." Franks explains the give-and-take in the hard-to-reckon Pentagon...
Franks gets along with Rumsfeld--who doesn't suffer fools lightly, especially if they are in uniform--because he has the right mix of attitude and intellect. More than a dozen senior officers who have worked with him over the years say that behind the aw-shucks, I've-never-had-sushi wrapping is a very well-oiled military mind. In an interview with TIME, Rumsfeld heaped praise on his field marshal for being open to new ideas. "He's intelligent and quick, and he knows his stuff," Rumsfeld said. "He has total ownership over these matters. He cares only...
...like any good soldier, the general knows when to keep his head down. Rumsfeld loves the spotlight; Franks is only too happy to stay out of it. "Franks thought that Schwarzkopf cut way too high a profile during the Gulf War," says a military subordinate who has worked on Franks' Centcom staff. "He thinks it's tawdry." Ultimately, Franks is really more comfortable behind the scenes. A Marine officer puts it another way: "He's been a low-profile guy all the way up. That's been the secret to his success...