Posted on 06/04/2007 9:19:38 AM PDT by kellynla
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice tells Newsweek that she'd be "very happy with institution-building" as her legacy, even though the classic legacy of a secretary of State's tenure is the big breakthrough agreement. "And I think people underestimate the development side [of the administration's policies], and disease prevention. Particularly in Africa ... [like] the AIDS initiative, which I think has changed the international response to treating disease. But I wouldn't rule out still that we would push very hard forward on Middle East issues, in particular the Israeli-Palestinian issue."
Senior Editor Michael Hirsh asks Rice if she's not as hopeful about a big breakthrough.
"Depends on what you mean by breakthrough. I think the very fact that everybody talks blithely now about the two-state solution [Palestine and Israel] as if we were all always wanting it ... Of course we weren't in 2001. And you now have a broad international consensus. That's a conceptual breakthrough," Rice says in the interview, which appears in the June 11 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands Monday, June 4).
Rice also discusses Iran and conflict with members of Vice President Dick Cheney's staff. "There's only one expression that matters, and that's the president of the United States. And I represent in what I say and what I do what the president of the United States thinks and wants done. In that sense, we have been together a long time, the president and I, in any number of different incarnations, and when I am speaking, I'm speaking on his behalf."
She continues, "Look, there's always noise in any large system. But I want to say something about the vice president. You know, if he doesn't agree, the vice president talks about it, just as if [Defense Secretary] Bob Gates doesn't agree, or I don't agree, we sit down and talk about it. And then if necessary we talk about it with the president and he decides ... The vice president has never been somebody who tries to do that on the sidelines, behind the scenes. He really doesn't."
In a separate article, a Newsweek investigation shows that Cheney's national-security team has been actively challenging Rice's Iran strategy in recent months. "We hear a completely different story coming out of Cheney's office, even now, than what we hear from Rice on Iran," a Western diplomat whose embassy has close dealings with the White House, tells Newsweek. Officials from the veep's office have been openly dismissive of the nuclear negotiations in think-tank meetings with Middle East analysts in Washington, according to a high-level administration official who asked for anonymity because of his position.
Since Tehran has defied two U.N. resolutions calling for a suspension of its uranium-enrichment program, "there's a certain amount of schadenfreude among the hard-liners," says a European diplomat who's involved in the talks but would not comment for the record. And Newsweek has learned that the veep's team seems eager to build a case that Iran is targeting Americans not just in Iraq but along the border of its other neighbor, Afghanistan, Hirsh and Investigative Correspondent Mark Hosenball report.
In the last few weeks, Cheney's staff have unexpectedly become more active participants in an interagency group that steers policy on Afghanistan, according to an official familiar with the internal deliberations. During weekly meetings of the committee, known as the Afghanistan Interagency Operating Group, Cheney staffers have been intensely interested in a single issue: recent intelligence reports alleging that Iran is supplying weapons to Afghanistan's resurgent Islamist militia, the Taliban, according to two administration officials who asked for anonymity when discussing internal meetings.
In early April, British forces operating under NATO command in Afghanistan's wild-west Helmand province stopped a convoy carrying what appeared to be ordnance of Iranian origin intended for delivery to the Taliban. The explosives bore suspected Iranian markings similar to those found on weapons confiscated from Shiite militias in Iraq-and the Brits intercepted another shipment a month later.
An official familiar with the interagency group's deliberations said that Cheney's aides kept asking what sounded like leading questions, demanding to know whether there was any Iranian entity other than the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-the state security force Washington accuses of arming Iraqi insurgents-that could be responsible for the arms shipments. Cheney's aides, the official added, appeared less interested in other more mundane items on the Afghanistan policy committee's agenda.
British officials who asked for anonymity because of the nature of their work emphasize that they lack hard evidence linking the shipments to the Revolutionary Guards, and that the weapons could just as easily have been bought on the black market in Iran. But according to one official familiar with the intelligence on Iranian interference in Iraq, Cheney earlier this year began exhibiting particular interest in any evidence detailing Tehran's aid to anti-American insurgents there. Asked about the vice president's allegedly keen interest in Iran's activities in Afghanistan, Cheney spokeswoman Megan McGinn said, "We do not discuss intelligence matters or internal deliberations."
It will be interesting to see who wins this struggle, Cheney or Rice.
Another article might fit well in this thread:
“As Europe self-destructs”, by Caroline B. Glick @
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0607/glick060107.php03?printer_friendly
My comment: Once again America emulates European failure in a desperate attempt to appear “cool”.
Sounds like Cheney and his group don't like being put in the back of the class. Course that's where they should have been since 2002. Wonder how long it will be before some circles start to claim Rice is an 'appeaser'...
In the last few weeks, Cheney's staff have unexpectedly become more active participants in an interagency group that steers policy on Afghanistan, according to an official familiar with the internal deliberations.
Dick's just digging for a reason to give to bomb Iran. Bush, thank God, seems to be exhibiting some real character and may be stepping away from the 'new conservatives'. Contrary of course to Dick's wishes...If this is true, Billy Kristol will probably be bashing the President pretty soon on Fox.
I’m a big fan of the unconditional surrender. It comes from a totally defeated enemy.
The State dept. handles diplomacy and opening doors. The VP is digging into the back channel dealings of Iran.
Sounds like a functioning team to me. If everyone agreed and was saying the same thing, that would be the time to worry. Bush encourages different perspectives, and then makes his own judgements.
Condi has been an unsung hero in working the angles, even with a very weak administration.
Are you brain dead? Haven't you been following Bush's actions lately? Stepping away from compasionate conservative? If he is , it is to step toward more globalism and defeat for the US. Real character, what a laugh, the man is trying to sell us to any country that wants to send in illegals and you think he is showing character. He calls us all racist, stupid, uncomprehending idiots and you think he is showing real character? Please, put a barf alert on any more comments you make like this so I won't accidently read them!
Rice is such a dope. Didn't she see the article yesterday showing the mass exaggeration of AIDS cases in Africa, and the diversion of international aid to dictatorships? And pushing Israel to give up even more land to terrorists? Those are what she considers her legacy? What a useless creature she is.
Interestingly, I have not seen any comments from Cheney re: amnesty - that would seem to indicate he’s with normal Americans and not with the bushrats.
She is such a twit. This is what you get for bringing an academic into the State Department. We got the same crap with Albright, out of Georgetown. I wish Bush had just bypassed her and let her take the NFL Commish job instead.
Which situation would that be? Iran's desire to wipe Israel off the map? Iran's desire to destroy the "Great Satan"? Iran's desire to see a new global Islamic Caliphate?
Doesn't matter now does it? As conservatives have sat here for over 4 years watching Republicans blunder around the Middle East making enemies and pissing off moderate Muslim states, it's becoming abundantly clear (well to everyone but Fox News) that establishment of American leadership did not, does not, and will not work.
If the rest of the world wants to blow itself to kingdom come, fine. But contrary to 'it's immoral, it's immoral' Hannity, we're not the world's policemen
lol, the fact that you think we can retreat into an isolationist utopia and the rest of the world can go to hell without affecting us is very 17th century. It didn't work in the 1910's or the 1930's, what makes you think it will work in an era of almost complete globalization?
I agree in a perfect world isolationism and "diplomacy" would be ideal, but to advocate such a strategy in today's global climate shows a profound misunderstanding of both the intentions and capabilities of our enemies.
It didn't? Wilson had to have an ocean liner sunk, claim that Americans had the right to sail into a war zone freely, intervene in Mexico, and publish a telegraph that meant little if anything. Roosevelt OTOH had to piss off the entire Japanese Empire with embargoes. So I guess when you mean it 'didn't work' you're suggesting we interfere even more with other sovereign nations?
but to advocate such a strategy in today's global climate shows a profound misunderstanding of both the intentions and capabilities of our enemies
Ah yes I do forget. They 'hate us for our ATMs'. No wait that's not right. They 'hate us for our poodle dogs'....no,no...they hate us for something, that's what the administration tells us and I believe everything the government tells me. I'm 'patriotic' thata way....
To be involved globally does not by definition mean you have to instill your values in every nation. You work with them, you trade with them, free exchange of ideas. You accept differences, hold the line yes on your values, but you do not interfere in sovereign nations no matter how much their leader may have been a SOB unless they attacked us directly. Which Iraq didn't.
She should be a behind-the-scenes advisor or back in the university world. I like her as a person but cannot stand to listen to her speak. Her tone is too too lofty, and she has so many pauses even in prepared speeches that I find myself saying to the TV, "just say it."
You might want to research Islamofascism on your own before you make these kind of ignorant statements.
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