Melvin Laird, who as defense secretary under President Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1973 helped extricate U.S. forces from the morass of the Vietnam War in a policy he dubbed "Vietnamization," has died at age 94.
His death was confirmed by the Richard Nixon Foundation on Wednesday.
Laird, a Republican from Wisconsin who once served in the U.S. House of Representatives, also maneuvered to get Nixon to pick Gerald Ford as vice president when Spiro Agnew resigned, was instrumental in creating the all-volunteer U.S. military and privately opposed Nixon's incursion into Cambodia.