Caspar W. Weinberger, 88, a prominent and controversial figure in American Cold War-era politics, succumbed to pneumonia on March 28 in Bangor, Maine.

After attending both Harvard College and Harvard Law School, Weinberger rose through the state government of California to eventually serve three American Presidents.

The New York Times, frequently accused of having an excessively liberal slant, is quick to point out that these Presidents – Nixon, Ford, and Reagan – were all Republicans and characterizes Weinberger as a hardboiled Cold Warrior who bore a “bone-deep suspicion of the Russians” and, even after the fall of the Iron Curtain, “had more faith in arms than diplomacy, at least in dealing with the Kremlin.” Although NYT obituaries writer David Stout does allow that Weinberger had his human side – citing, for example, that he vetoed a 1983 proposal for the military to shoot dogs so that their combat doctors could practice treating bullet wounds – the sense of the article is that these instances were the exception that proved the rule (Stout, in fact, minimizes this last point by explaining that Weinberger owned a Collie at the time).

The Los Angeles Times, however, characterizes Weinberger quite differently, describing him in their headline as “A Hawk Who Preferred Not to Fight.” Although the Times’s Claudia Luther does discuss the government’s immense hike in defense spending under Weinberger’s watchful eye, she mentions something that the New York Times significantly omits: the Weinberger doctrine, which he developed while serving as Reagan’s Secretary of Defence. A series of six tests that were to be used to determine whether or not the government should engage in military action, Weinberg formulated this doctrine as a direct result of his disagreement with the U.S.’s cavalier policy towards military action during the Vietnam War.

The most balanced obituary is that offered by The Washington Post, who offer equal column inches to Weinberger’s reputation as Cap the Knife, quick to cut funding to social welfare programs in favor of defense spending, as they do to his savvy and somewhat dove-ish approach to the use of military force.

All three papers do agree, however, that the most noteworthy element of this alumnus’s life was his entanglement in the Iran-Contra affair, in which Reagan famously went against American foreign policy in a “guns for hostages” exchange. Accused of concealing evidence from independent counsel Laurence Walsh, Weinberger narrowly escaped prosecution; in one of his last acts as President, George H.W. Bush – who, of course, served as Reagan’s Vice President – pardoned him Christmas Eve of 1992, a measure that Walsh claimed amounted to a cover-up.

Alleged government conspiracies aside, Weinberger was five years retired from politics before Walsh accused him of being involved in the Iran-Contra affair. He resigned from the Reagan White House in 1987, citing a desire to spend more time with his wife, who was battling cancer at the time. A self-proclaimed “frustrated newspaperman” (as the AP reports, he was the President of The Harvard Crimson, which, as of this writing, has not published an obituary), he became the publisher of Forbes in 1989 and began to contribute a regular column to the magazine. In 1993, he became the chairman of Forbes, Inc., a position he held until his death.