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Robert S. McNamara Leaves Office

February 29, 1968

1968-02-29-McNamara-leaves-Office---Honor--Ceremony-for-McMa
1968-02-29-McNamara-leaves-Office---Honor--Ceremony-for-McMa
Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and President Lyndon Johnson attend a ceremony in honor of McNamara’s resignation, February 1968. (OSD Historical Office)

Robert McNamara departs the office of Secretary of Defense. The next day, lawyer and unofficial presidential adviser Clark M. Clifford succeeds him.

In replacing McNamara with Clifford, President Johnson hopes that the new Secretary will be an advocate for the administration’s Vietnam policy. These hopes are rapidly disappointed. After assessing the situation in Vietnam and General Westmoreland’s request for additional troops, Clifford spends much of his 11 months as secretary working to extricate the United States from Vietnam.1

1Drea, McNamara, Clifford, and the Burdens of Vietnam, i, 16, 176–177; Christenson, Expanding the Secretary’s Role in Foreign Affairs, 23–27; “Robert S. McNamara biography,” Historical Office, Office of the Secretary of Defense, accessed (November 28, 2014), http://history.defense.gov/Multimedia/Biographies/ArticleView/tabid/8347/Article/8969/robert-s-mcnamara.aspx (link is external).