Posted on 10/20/2005 3:58:37 AM PDT by governsleastgovernsbest
>By Edward Alden in Washington >Published: October 20 2005 00:00 | Last updated: October 20 2005 00:19 >>
Vice-President Dick Cheney and a handful of others had hijacked the government's foreign policy apparatus, deciding in secret to carry out policies that had left the US weaker and more isolated in the world, the top aide to former Secretary of State Colin Powell claimed on Wednesday.
In a scathing attack on the record of President George W. Bush, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff to Mr Powell until last January, said: “What I saw was a cabal between the vice-president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made.
“Now it is paying the consequences of making those decisions in secret, but far more telling to me is America is paying the consequences.”
> Transcript: Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson >Click here > Mr Wilkerson said such secret decision-making was responsible for mistakes such as the long refusal to engage with North Korea or to back European efforts on Iran.
It also resulted in bitter battles in the administration among those excluded from the decisions.
“If you're not prepared to stop the feuding elements in the bureaucracy as they carry out your decisions, you are courting disaster. And I would say that we have courted disaster in Iraq, in North Korea, in Iran.”
The comments, made at the New America Foundation, a Washington think-tank, were the harshest attack on the administration by a former senior official since criticisms by Richard Clarke, former White House terrorism czar, and Paul O'Neill, former Treasury secretary, early last year.
Mr Wilkerson said his decision to go public had led to a personal falling out with Mr Powell, whom he served for 16 years at the Pentagon and the State Department.
“He's not happy with my speaking out because, and I admire this in him, he is the world's most loyal soldier."
Among his other charges:
■ The detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere was “a concrete example” of the decision-making problem, with the president and other top officials in effect giving the green light to soldiers to abuse detainees. “You don't have this kind of pervasive attitude out there unless you've condoned it.”
■ Condoleezza Rice, the former national security adviser and now secretary of state, was “part of the problem”. Instead of ensuring that Mr Bush received the best possible advice, “she would side with the president to build her intimacy with the president”.
■ The military, particularly the army and marine corps, is overstretched and demoralised. Officers, Mr Wilkerson claimed, “start voting with their feet, as they did in Vietnam. . . and all of a sudden your military begins to unravel”.
Mr Wilkerson said former president George H.W. Bush “one of the finest presidents we have ever had” understood how to make foreign policy work. In contrast, he said, his son was “not versed in international relations and not too much interested in them either”.
“There's a vast difference between the way George H.W. Bush dealt with major challenges, some of the greatest challenges at the end of the 20th century, and effected positive results in my view, and the way we conduct diplomacy today.”
www.newamerica.net
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The liberal media should have a field day with this. They actually get to use the word "cabal."
Sounds like the whine of a sore loser in battles between State, DOD and the WH.
Colin Powell is gone, VP Cheney is still in office. Get over it. All this backbiting is so typical of politicians who are pissed at being on the outside. And our enemies in the media love it and shout it from the housetops.
Thanks for the post. Interesting that the pro Powell crowd fails to recognize that someone else makes a credible case that Powell's position weakened the US. They don't have to agree but it would help to recognize the other side.
Think tank. Snort. Guess who's on the board, among others, of the New America Foundation? One Steven Rattner. There are some other interesting names as well. No wonder this guy appeared there.
http://dailydemarche.blogspot.com/
A blog by members of the State Department Republican Underground- conservative Foreign Service Officers serving overseas commenting on foreign policy and global reactions to America.
"Clear, Hold and Build
Secretary of State Rice once again today reinforced my belief that she is the right person, in the right place, at the right tome, for the job. Questioned by the Senate today on an "exit strategy" for Iraq, Dr. Rice put forth the idea that the goal of our strategy in Iraq is to “Clear areas from insurgent control, to hold them securely, and to build durable, national Iraqi institutions." She then stood her ground, and gave excellent answers to ridiculous questions. Case in point:
snip
A lot of innuendo; few facts.
The oil price spike's blowback. A lot of that windfall profit in Saudi coffers flows out into the PR machines of the Beltway and Greater Foggy Bottom.
I wonder, is this guy Wilkerson writing a book? Usually, guys like him come out of the woodwork to make allegations like these only to sell something.
Much as I liked and admired General Powell, I never thought he was the right choice for Secretary of State. I will say this, though, his reluctance to speaking out against the President, whatever problems he might have had as Secretary of State, shows he has a helluva lot more class than Wilkerson.
Please Colin, follow the advice of Genral McArthur: OLD SOLDIERS JUST FADE AWAY - PLEASE! Don't be a sore loser, although you are!
The "bureaucracy" is there to implement the decisions of the National Command Authority; not the other way around.
Quite often, the "bureaucracy" tends to ignore that fact.
I remember an interview someone was doing with Henry Kissinger and the interviewer started a question with, "Now you were in charge of foreign policy during those years, so...". Kissinger interrupted saying, "No, Mr. Nixon was in charge of foreign policy. I was the Secretary of State."
I caught her exchange with John Kerry last night on CSpan. He tried very hard to trip her up, but she handled him brilliantly. After his session was over, he was scolded for going 15 minutes instead of 10.
The Horror! The Horror!
Those poor, poor bureaucrats. For the first time in over eight years they found out they were not the elected government, they just worked for it.
A note on speeches at think tanks: Think tanks are the welfare agencies for out of work bureacrats and intellectuals.
I'm tasting sour grapes
Bernie Schwartz?
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