Rumsfeld Hyped Atmosphere of Fear, Memos Show

WASHINGTON — Donald Rumsfeld, the former defense secretary, tried to maintain an atmosphere of fear in America as part of the Iraq war propaganda campaign, a series of leaked memos has shown.

One memo, written in April 2006, contained a list of instructions to Pentagon staff including "Keep elevating the threat" and "Talk about Somalia, the Philippines, etc. Make the American people realize they are surrounded in the world by violent extremists."

Another said, "Link Iraq to Iran. Iran is the concern of the American people, and if we fail in Iraq, it will advantage Iran." He also urged staff to produce "bumper sticker statements" to rally the public around the war.

The memos, written between 2002 until shortly after his resignation in 2006, were leaked by undisclosed sources to the Washington Post. Mr. Rumsfeld was unpopular with many for his tough management style.

The newspaper reported that his e-mails were so numerous they were called "snowflakes." He would send between 20 and 60 a day, often instructing his team to refute negative news stories in the press.

One note will please President Putin of Russia. It said: "We are getting run out of Central Asia by the Russians. They are doing a considerably better job at bullying those countries than the U.S. is doing to counter their bullying."

Keith Urbahn, an aide to Mr. Rumsfeld, told the Washington Post that the published memos were "selective" and "gross mischaracterizations" carefully picked from some 20,000 while he was defense secretary. There was no comment from Mr. Rumsfeld.