Ashton Carter, Obama’s Last Pentagon Chief, Dies at Age 68
17:07 GMT 25.10.2022 (Updated: 12:44 GMT 13.04.2023)
© AFP 2023 / MANDEL NGAN
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Former US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has died at the age of 68, his family announced on Tuesday.
The family said he died of a “sudden cardiac arrest” on Monday night in Boston.
"As Secretary, he launched the successful campaign to defeat ISIS* in Iraq and Syria, opened all combat positions to women, and forged new connections between the Department of Defense and the nation’s technology community," his family said in a statement.
"While he was known for his keen understanding of military technology, nuclear weapons, and international affairs, Secretary Carter loved nothing more than spending time with the troops, making frequent trips to Iraq and Afghanistan to visit US forces,” they added.
Carter is survived by his wife Stephanie and two children, Ava and Will.
Carter was born in Philadelphia in 1954, the son of a World War II US Navy veteran and neurologist, and an English teacher. He had three other siblings. He double-majored in physics and medieval history at Yale and the University of Edinburgh before attending Oxford as a Rhodes scholar to research quarks. He later worked as a researcher at Brookhaven National Laboratory and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology before becoming a professor at Harvard in 1984.
He made his foray in the political sphere in 1993, when he was picked by US President Bill Clinton to be assistant secretary of defense for international security policy. Carter worked on several denuclearization projects, ranging from the Agreed Framework with North Korea to convincing Ukraine and Belarus to give up the nuclear arsenals they had inherited from the Soviet Union, which had dissolved itself in 1991.
While George W. Bush was president, Carter championed his policy of pre-emptive strikes, including the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In 2006, as North Korea was on the eve of testing its first nuclear weapon, Carter called for airstrikes against North Korean nuclear sites. He later repeated that sentiment vis-a-vis Iran’s suspected nuclear program, and faulted Bush for becoming “distracted” by Iraq instead of addressing the Iranian threat.
After Barack Obama became US President in 2009, he picked Carter to serve as Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics. In late 2014, Obama nominated Carter to replace Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense. He was confirmed 93-5 by the US Senate, receiving widespread support from Republicans as well as Democrats.
As defense chief, Carter oversaw the opening of US military operations against Daesh in Iraq and Syria - which happened without Syrian government support - while condemning Russia’s right to do so at the request of Damascus. He also wrongly accused Russia of violating the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty and tried to use the situation as an excuse to base American cruise missiles in Europe. He even proposed pre-emptive strikes against Russian missile test sites.
As head of the US military, Carter also ordered an end to discrimination against women as well as transgender people, opening all military roles to both groups.
*Daesh (also known as the Islamic State/ISIS/ISIL) is a terrorist organization banned by Russia and many other countries.
