Editing Donald Rumsfeld (section)

=== SALT II Treaty ===
During his tenure as Secretary of Defense, Rumsfeld worked to finish the SALT II Treaty.<ref name="Litlovers.com" /> Rumsfeld, together with [[Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff]] General [[George Scratchley Brown|George S. Brown]] drafted the treaty.<ref name="Litlovers.com" /> However, an agreement was not made before the 1976 election. SALT II was finished and signed during the Carter administration.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Rearden|first=Steven L.|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/867144095|title=Council of war : a history of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1942–1991|date=2012|publisher=NDU Press for the Joint History Office, Office of the Director, Joint Staff, Joint Chiefs of Staff|isbn=978-1-78039-886-0|location=Washington, D.C.|oclc=867144095}}</ref><ref name="Litlovers.com" />

In 1977, Rumsfeld was awarded the nation's highest civilian award, the [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]].<ref name="Historical Office Rumsfeld Bush Administration" /> Kissinger, his bureaucratic adversary, later paid him a different sort of compliment, pronouncing him "a special Washington phenomenon: the skilled full-time politician-bureaucrat in whom ambition, ability, and substance fuse seamlessly".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2003/11/rumsfelds-roots/378570/ |title=Rumsfeld's Roots |last=Mann |first=James |date=October 8, 2003 |work=The Atlantic |access-date=August 18, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080709025136/http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200310u/int2003-10-08 |archive-date=July 9, 2008 |url-status=live}}</ref>

Rumsfeld's first tenure as Secretary of Defense ended on January 20, 1977. He was succeeded by former [[United States Secretary of the Air Force|Secretary of the Air Force]] [[Harold Brown (Secretary of Defense)|Harold Brown]].<ref name="Litlovers.com" />