McNamara was a really smart guy who made some really stupid mistakes. Tapped to be Defense Secretary while president of the Ford Motor Co., he was at President Kennedy's side during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He also directed the increasing deployment of U.S. forces to Vietnam, even as he began to harbor doubts about the efficacy of the endeavor. Over the past two decades, McNamara has admitted lying to Congress about the justification for U.S. involvement in the war, and acknowledged that his errant judgment was partly responsible for nearly 60,000 American lives.