By Jonathan Stankiewicz
Former United States Defense Secretary and CIA Director, Robert Gates, spoke this past week in Welte Auditorium as part of the Robert C. Vance Distinguished Lecture series while some protested and publicly disagreed with his policies and decisions while he was in public office.
“We don’t get a chance for do overs,” said Gates. “The Iraq War will always be tainted.”
He spoke about his more than 40 years experience in politics dealing with National Security for the U.S.
Hours before Gates’ lecture, there was an Occupy CCSU protest with about 35 students protesting around campus. The Occupy protest turned into an anti-Gates rally just before Gates spoke in front of Welte Hall with about 25 students and faculty present.
Welte Auditorium, which seats over 1800 people, was a little over half filled with a very limited number of students in attendance.
Gates, 69, studied European history at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, receiving a bachelor’s degree in 1965. He earned a master’s degree from Indiana University in 1966 and, later, in 1974, received a doctorate in Russian and Soviet history from Georgetown University.
Before his retirement in June from his Secretary of Defense post, Gates was the President of Texas A&M University, and began his professional career in 1966 as an intelligence professional in the CIA.
As the nation’s only secretary of defense to serve two presidents of different political parties, Gates was in a post that saw the United States at war every day of his four and a half years in office.
In accepting the Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, from President Obama earlier this year, Gates said, “I will think of my troops till the end of my days. Serving as the Secretary of Defense has been the honor of my life. For that I will be eternally grateful.”
Gates, even retired, remains a prominent figure in the world and the complexities of the Middle East. He was able to give an insight to the audience that otherwise isn’t available to them.
On Al-Qaeda, Gates was quite frank that the terror group is just “on their heels now.” He warned that it isn’t unrealistic that another terrorist attack could happen on United States soil. Gates got serious on the matter when he said that failure in Afghanistan would mean a Taliban takeover. The success of the Taliban would strengthen Al-Qaeda. And on the recent decision to withdraw all US troops from Iraq, Gates said that it would have been better to keep a modest US troop presence in Iraq.
Gates tried to hit home that a US war with Iran would be a “catastrophe” and said that Iran’s behavior for the past 30-years has been more than frustrating for us. Gates was honest that the U.S. doesn’t need war.
China was also a strong talking point for Gates, who said that China’s leaders are becoming “more and more aggressive” and that thier recent actions, including building up their navy, could could lead to confrontations with surrounding countries and the US. Gates added that he feels that China is already a friend of the US but if treated as an enemy, it will become one.
Most important to Gates was America’s need for solving problems within our own country’s borders.
The task ahead of our country is to get our own fiscal affairs in order, said Gates. But that requires our own political class to show leadership and so far we have not seen that taking place, Gates added. We shouldn’t be hoping that the “changing of the guard” will make a difference, said Gates. Having different parties impose their own agendas in “brute force” makes it much more likely that those policies will be reversed in the next election. In his opinion it would take multiple presidencies and congresses to solve the current problems plaguing America.
To do that, Gates said, is to not repeat our mistakes from the past. Whether those mistakes be unreliable information or future endeavors that the US acts upon.
“We have lost the ability to execute even the most basic functions of government, much less solve the most difficult and divisive problems facing this country,” said Gates.“Americans continue to be the masters of our own fate. The rest of the world continues to march on as we focus on ourselves.”
