Pat Tillman's mother still demanding answers

[Michael Hogan]

By Mike Celizic

MSNBC

May. 6, 2008

Mary Tillman is still waiting for someone to be held accountable for the initial cover-up of the friendly-fire death of her son, NFL-star-turned-soldier Pat Tillman, four years ago in Afghanistan.

“Someone started this deception, and it didn’t start at the three-star level,” Tillman told TODAY’s Meredith Vieira Tuesday in New York.

Tillman has just published a book, "Boots on the Ground by Dusk: My Tribute to Pat Tillman," in which she reports that she believes that the cover-up after Pat Tillman’s death on April 22, 2004, reached to the highest levels of the Pentagon.

“... I believe Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld knew Pat was killed by fratricide and permitted the cover-up,” she wrote. “It is not believable that a man known for his propensity to micromanage would not want to know what happened to his most high-profile soldier. I informed the committee that Pat received a personal letter from Rumsfeld shortly after he and his brother enlisted, commending him for his commitment to serve. Pat was obviously in Rumsfeld's consciousness."

Complete story: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24480779/

More: http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/ti...?inline=nyt-per

[Ron Ecker]

She is quoted as saying of Rumsfeld, “It is not believable that a man known for his propensity to micromanage would not want to know what happened to his most high-profile soldier."

She should know that Rumsfeld was very selective in his micromanaging. During the 9/11 attacks, he preferred to stay in his office while his deputy Victoria Clark and others went to the war room to try to get up to speed, and after the Pentagon itself was hit, Rumsfeld couldn't be found at all by his staff because he was outside somewhere looking around and playing medic. Some micromanager.