US President George W. Bush has asked Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to stay on in Bush's second term to keep running the Iraq war and adapting the US military to face post-Cold War threats like terrorism, a senior Bush administration official said last night.
As part of a broad overhaul of his second-term Cabinet, Bush nominated former New York police commissioner Bernard Kerik to head the US homeland security department and accepted the resignation of Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson yesterday.
Rumsfeld , 72, faced calls for his resignation last summer over the prisoner abuse scandal at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, and some lawmakers have accused him of not sending enough troops to control Iraq after Saddam Hussein was toppled.
But the White House decided it was better to stick with Rumsfeld at a time when the United States is at war in Iraq, with more troops being sent to help the country get ready for Jan. 30 elections.
Rumsfeld is also overseeing a major post-Cold War transformation of the U.S. military to make the force more mobile and responsive to new threats such as terrorism.
Bush met with Rumsfeld on Monday and "asked Secretary Rumsfeld to stay in his post, and he has agreed," the senior official said, calling Rumsfeld "the right person" for the job.
"Secretary Rumsfeld is a proven leader during challenging times. We're fighting a different kind of war and it's crucial that we win this war," the official said.
Rumsfeld had made clear his preference to stay on in the job at least for a while. A senior defense official would not talk about Bush's decision. "I will simply tell you that the secretary is hard at work doing his job," the official said.
The secretary was often an antagonist of the more moderate Secretary of State Colin Powell on foreign affairs and military issues. Powell has resigned effective when his designated replacement, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, is confirmed by the Senate.