[Peace-discuss] Bryd on Condolessa Rice's record

[ppatton at uiuc.edu]

by US Senator Robert C. Byrd
Remarks delivered Tuesday as the Senate debated the nomination
of Dr. Condoleezza Rice to be Secretary of State. The Senate
is scheduled to vote on the nomination on Wednesday.
 

The Constitution, in Article Two, Section Two, states that the
President "shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and
Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public
Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all
other Officers of the United States..." Recognizing that the
Senate’s role of advice and consent is one of the few
legislative powers explicitly cited in the Constitution,
Senator Byrd believes that it is a power that Senators of both
parties must rigorously protect. It is not a ceremonial exercise.


To confirm Dr. Rice to be the next Secretary of State is to
say to the American people, and the world, that the answers to
those questions are no longer important. Her confirmation will
most certainly be viewed as another endorsement of the
Administration’s unconstitutional doctrine of preemptive war,
its bullying policies of unilateralism, and its callous
rejection of our long-standing allies.

With regard to this nomination, Senator Byrd has been
particularly concerned about Dr. Rice’s role in crafting the
Bush doctrine of preemption, or the first-strike war. No one
denies that the President has the inherent authority to repel
attacks against our country, but Senator Byrd believes that
the doctrine of first-strike war against another country which
does not pose an imminent threat to the United States is
unconstitutional.

In Federalist Number 77, Alexander Hamilton wrote:

    “It will readily be comprehended, that a man who had
himself the sole disposition of offices, would be governed
much more by his private inclinations and interests, than when
he was bound to submit the propriety of his choice to the
discussion and determination of a different and independent
body, and that body an entire branch of the legislature. The
possibility of rejection would be a strong motive to care in
proposing.” 

Although Hamilton explains the importance of the role of the
Senate in the appointment of officers of the United States,
neither he, nor the Constitution, is specific about what
criteria Senators must use to judge the qualifications of a
nominee. The Constitution only requires that the Senate give
its advice and consent. It is therefore left to Senators to
use their own judgment in considering their vote. The factors
involved in such judgments may vary among Senators, among
nominees, and may even change in response to the needs of the
times.

The position of Secretary of State is among the most important
offices for which the Constitution requires the advice and
consent of the Senate. It is the Secretary of State that sits
at the right hand of the President during meetings of the
Cabinet. The Secretary of State is all the more important
today, considering the enormous diplomatic challenges our
country will face in the next four years.

I must commend the Foreign Relations Committee for its work in
bringing the nomination of Dr. Condoleezza Rice to the Floor
of the Senate. Chairman Richard Lugar conducted two days of
hearings for this nominee, and the debate that began in the
committee on this nomination is now being continued here on
the Floor of the Senate. Senator Biden also provided a voice
of great foreign policy experience during those hearings. I
was particularly impressed by Senator Boxer, who tackled her
role on the committee with passion and forthrightness, as did
Senator Kerry.

There is no doubt that Dr. Rice has a remarkable record of
personal achievement. She obtained her bachelor’s degree at
the tender age of 19. Speaking as someone who did not earn a
bachelor’s degree until I had reached 77 years of age, I have
a special appreciation for Dr. Rice’s impressive academic
achievement. She then obtained a doctorate in international
studies, and quickly rose through the academic ranks to become
Provost of Stanford University.

Dr. Rice has also gathered extensive experience in foreign
policy matters. She is a recognized expert on matters relating
to Russia and the former Soviet Union. She has twice worked on
the National Security Council, once as the senior advisor on
Soviet issues, and most recently, for four years as National
Security Advisor. Dr. Rice has had ample exposure to the
nuances of international politics, and by that measure, she is
certainly qualified for the position of Secretary of State.

The next Secretary of State will have large shoes to fill. I
have closely watched the career of Colin Powell since he
served as National Security Advisor to President Reagan, and
we worked together during the Senate consideration of the INF
Treaty of 1988. He distinguished himself in his service as
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, particularly during the
1991 Gulf War. When his nomination came before the Senate in
2001, I supported his confirmation based upon the strength of
his record.

The vote that the Senate will conduct tomorrow, however, is
not simply a formality to approve of a nominee’s educational
achievement or level of expertise. I do not subscribe to the
notion that the Senate must confirm a President’s nominees,
barring criminality or lack of experience. The Constitution
enjoins Senators to use their judgment in considering nominations.

I am particularly dismayed by accusations I have read that
Senate Democrats, by insisting on having an opportunity to
debate the nomination of Dr. Rice, have somehow been engaged
in nothing more substantial than “petty politics” or partisan
delaying tactics. Nothing could be further from the truth. The
Senate’s role of advice and consent to presidential
nominations is not a ceremonial exercise.

I have stood on this Senate floor more times than I can count
to defend the prerogatives of this institution and the
separate but equal – with emphasis on the word “equal” –
powers of the three branches of government. A unique power of
the Legislative Branch is the Senate’s role in providing
advice and consent on the matter of nominations. That power is
not vested in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee or any
other committee; nor does it repose in a handful of Senate
leaders. It is not a function of pomp and circumstance, and it
was never intended by the Framers to be used to burnish the
image of a President on inauguration day.

And yet that is exactly what Senators were being pressured to
do last week – to acquiesce mutely to the nomination of one of
the most important members of the President’s Cabinet without
the merest hiccup of debate or the smallest inconvenience of a
roll call vote.

And so we are here today to fulfill our constitutional duty to
consider the nomination of Dr. Rice to be Secretary of State.
Mr. President, I have carefully considered Dr. Rice’s record
as National Security Advisor in the two months that have
passed since the President announced her nomination to be
Secretary of State. That record, I am afraid, is one of
intimate involvement in a number of Administration foreign
policies which I strongly oppose. These policies have fostered
enormous opposition -- both at home and abroad -- to the White
House’s view of America’s place in the world.

That view of America is one which encourages our Nation to
flex its muscles without being bound by any calls for
restraint. The most forceful explanation of this idea can be
found in "The National Security Strategy of the United
States," a report which was issued by the White House in
September 2002. Under this strategy, the President lays claim
to an expansive power to use our military to strike other
nations first, even if we have not been threatened or provoked.

There is no question that the President has the inherent
authority to repel attacks against our country, but this
National Security Strategy is unconstitutional on its face. It
takes the checks and balances established in the Constitution
that limit the President’s ability to use our military at his
pleasure, and throws them out the window.

This doctrine of preemptive strikes places the sole decision
of war and peace in the hands of the President and undermines
the Constitutional power of Congress to declare war. The
Founding Fathers required that such an important issue of war
be debated by the elected representatives of the people in the
Legislative Branch precisely because no single man could be
trusted with such an awesome power as bringing a nation to war
by his decision alone. And yet, that it exactly what the
National Security Strategy proposes.

Not only does this pernicious doctrine of preemptive war
contradict the Constitution, it barely acknowledges its
existence. The National Security Strategy makes only one
passing reference to the Constitution: it states that
"America’s constitution" -- that is "constitution" with a
small C -- "has served us well." As if the Constitution does
not still serve this country well! One might ask if that
reference to the Constitution was intended to be a compliment
or an obituary?

As National Security Advisor, Dr. Rice was in charge of
developing the National Security Strategy. She also spoke out
forcefully in support of the dangerous doctrine of preemptive
war. In one speech, she argues that there need not be an
imminent threat before the United States attacks another
nation: "So as a matter of common sense," said Dr. Rice on
October 1, 2002, "the United States must be prepared to take
action, when necessary, before threats have fully materialized."

But that "matter of common sense" is nowhere to be found in
the Constitution. For that matter, isn’t it possible to
disagree with this “matter of common sense?” What is common
sense to one might not be shared by another. What’s more,
matters of common sense can lead people to the wrong
conclusions. John Dickinson, the chief author of the Articles
of Confederation, said in 1787, “Experience must be our only
guide; reason may mislead us.” As for me, I will heed the
experience of Founding Fathers, as enshrined in the
Constitution, over the reason and “common sense” of the
Administration’s National Security Strategy.

We can all agree that the President, any President, has the
inherent duty and power to repel an attack on the United
States. But where in the Constitution can the President claim
the right to strike at another nation before it has even
threatened our country, as Dr. Rice asserted in that speech?
To put it plainly, Dr. Rice has asserted that the President
holds far more of the war power than the Constitution grants him.

This doctrine of attacking countries before a threat has
“fully materialized” was put into motion as soon as the
National Security Strategy was released. Beginning in
September 2002, Dr. Rice also took a position on the front
lines of the Administration’s effort to hype the danger of
Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction.

Dr. Rice is responsible for some of the most overblown
rhetoric that the Administration used to scare the American
people into believing that there was an imminent threat from
Iraq. On September 8, 2002, Dr. Rice conjured visions of
American cities being consumed by mushroom clouds. On an
appearance on CNN, she warned: “The problem here is that there
will always be some uncertainty about how quickly he [Saddam]
can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don't want the smoking gun
to be a mushroom cloud."

Dr. Rice also claimed that she had conclusive evidence about
Iraq’s alleged nuclear weapons program. During that same
interview, she also said: “We do know that he is actively
pursuing a nuclear weapon. We do know that there have been
shipments going into… Iraq, for instance, of aluminum tubes…
that are really only suited for nuclear weapons programs.”

We now know that Iraq’s nuclear program was a fiction. Charles
Duelfer, the chief arms inspector of the CIA’s Iraq Survey
Group, reported on September 30, 2004: “Saddam Husayn ended
the nuclear program in 1991 following the Gulf war. [The Iraq
Survey Group] found no evidence to suggest concerted efforts
to restart the program.”

But Dr. Rice’s statements in 2002 were not only wrong, they
also did not accurately reflect the intelligence reports of
the time. Declassified portions of the CIA’s National
Intelligence Estimate from October 2002 make it clear that
there were disagreements among our intelligence analysts about
the state of Iraq’s nuclear program. But Dr. Rice seriously
misrepresented their disputes when she categorically stated,
“We do know that [Saddam] is actively pursuing a nuclear weapon.”

Her allegation also misrepresented to the American people the
controversy in those same intelligence reports about the
aluminum tubes. Again, Dr. Rice said that these tubes were
“really only suited for nuclear weapons programs.” But
intelligence experts at the State Department and the
Department of Energy believed that those tubes had nothing to
do with building a nuclear weapon, and made their dissent
known in the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate. This
view, which was at odds with Dr. Rice’s representations, was
later confirmed by the International Atomic Energy Agency and
our own CIA arms inspectors.

Dr. Rice made other statements that helped to build a case for
war by implying a link between Iraq and September 11. On
multiple occasions, Dr. Rice spoke about the supposed evidence
that Saddam and Al Qaeda were in league with each other. For
example, on September 25, 2002, Dr. Rice said on the PBS NewsHour:

“No one is trying to make an argument at this point that
Saddam Hussein somehow had operational control of what
happened on September 11, so we don’t want to push this too
far, but this is a story that is unfolding, and it is getting
clear, and we’re learning more…. But yes, there clearly are
contact[s] between Al Qaeda and Iraq that can be documented;
there clearly is testimony that some of the contacts have been
important contacts and that there is a relationship there.”

What Dr. Rice did not say was that some of those supposed
links were being called into question by our intelligence
agencies, such as the alleged meeting between a 9-11
ringleader and an Iraqi intelligence agent in Prague that has
now been debunked. These attempts to connect Iraq and Al Qaeda
appear to be a prime example of cherry-picking intelligence to
hype the supposed threat of Iraq, while keeping contrary
evidence away from the American people, wrapped up in the red
tape of top secret reports.

Dr. Rice pressed the point even further, creating scenarios
that threatened tens of thousands of American lives, even when
that threat wasn’t supported by intelligence. On March 9,
2003, just eleven days before the invasion of Iraq, Dr. Rice
appeared on “Face the Nation” and said:

“Now the al-Qaida is an organization that's quite dispersed
and --and quite widespread in its effects, but it clearly has
had links to the Iraqis, not to mention Iraqi links to all
kinds of other terrorists. And what we do not want is the day
when Saddam Hussein decides that he's had enough of dealing
with sanctions, enough of dealing with, quote, unquote,
"containment," enough of dealing with America, and it's time
to end it on his terms, by transferring one of these weapons,
just a little vial of something, to a terrorist for blackmail
or for worse.”

But the intelligence community had already addressed this
scenario with great skepticism. In fact, the CIA’s National
Intelligence Estimate from October 2002 concluded that it had
“low confidence” that Saddam would ever transfer any weapons
of mass destruction – weapons that he did not have, as it
turned out – to anyone outside of his control. This is yet
more evidence of an abuse of intelligence in order to build
the case for an unprovoked war with Iraq.

And what has been the effect of the first use of the reckless
doctrine of preemptive war? In a most ironic and deadly twist,
the false situation described by the Administration before the
war -- namely, that Iraq was a training ground for terrorists
poised to attack us -- is exactly the situation that our war
in Iraq has created.

But it was this unjustified war that created the situation
that the President claimed he was trying to prevent. Violent
extremists have flooded into Iraq from all corners of the
world. Iraqis have taken up arms themselves to fight against
the continuing U.S. occupation of their country. According to
a CIA report released in December 2004, intelligence analysts
now see Iraq, destabilized by the Administration’s
ill-conceived war, as the training ground for a new generation
of terrorists. [Mapping the Global Future: Report of the
National Intelligence Council’s 2020 Project, pp. 94] It
should be profoundly disturbing to all Americans if the most
dangerous breeding ground for terrorism shifted from
Afghanistan to Iraq, simply because of the Administration’s
ill-advised rush to war in March 2003.

Dr. Rice’s role in the war against Iraq was not limited to
building the case for an unprecedented, preemptive invasion of
a country that had not attacked us first. Her role also
extends to the Administration’s failed efforts to establish
peace in Iraq. In October 2003, five months after he declared
"Mission Accomplished," the President created the Iraq
Stabilization Group, headed by Dr. Rice. The task of the Iraq
Stabilization Group was to coordinate efforts to speed
reconstruction aid to help bring the violence in Iraq to an end.

But what has the Iraq Stabilization Group accomplished under
the leadership of Dr. Rice? When she took the helm of the
stabilization efforts, 319 U.S. troops had been killed in
Iraq. That number now stands at 1,368 as of today (Tuesday
1/25). More than 10,600 troops have been wounded. The cost of
the war has spiraled to $149 billion, and the White House is
on the verge of asking Congress for another $80 billion.
Despite the mandate of the Iraq Stabilization Group, the
situation in Iraq has gone from bad to worse. More ominously,
the level of violence only keeps growing, week after week,
month after month, and no Administration official, whether
from the White House, the Pentagon, or Foggy Bottom, has made
any predictions about when the violence will finally subside.

Furthermore, of the $18.4 billion in Iraqi reconstruction aid
appropriated by Congress in October 2003, the Administration
has spent only $2.7 billion. With these funds moving so
slowly, it is hard to believe that the Iraq Stabilization
Group has had any success at all in speeding the
reconstruction efforts in Iraq. For all the hue and cry about
the need to speed up aid to Iraq, one wonders if there should
be more tough questions asked of Dr. Rice about what she has
accomplished as the head of this group.

There are also many unanswered questions about Dr. Rice’s
record as National Security Advisor. Richard Clarke, the
former White House counter-terrorism advisor, has leveled
scathing criticism against Dr. Rice and the National Security
Council for failing to recognize the threat from Al Qaeda and
Osama bin Laden in the months leading up to the September 11,
2001, terrorist attacks. In particular, Mr. Clarke states that
he submitted a request on January 25, 2001, for an urgent
meeting of the National Security Council on the threat of al
Qaeda.

However, due to decisions made by Dr. Rice and her staff, that
urgent meeting did not occur until too late: the meeting was
not actually called until September 4, 2001. Mr. Clarke, who
is widely acknowledged as one of the leading authorities on
terrorism in government at that time, told the 9-11 Commission
that he was so frustrated with those decisions that he asked
to be reassigned to different issues, and the Bush White House
approved that request.

Dr. Rice appeared before the 9-11 Commission on April 8, 2004,
but if anything, her testimony raised only more questions
about what the President and others knew about the threats to
New York City and Washington, D.C. in the weeks before the
attacks, and whether more could have been done to prevent them.

Why wasn’t any action taken when she and the President
received an intelligence report on August 6, 2001, entitled,
“Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States?” Why
did Dr. Rice and President Bush reassign Richard Clarke, the
leading terrorism expert in the White House, soon after taking
office in 2001? Why did it take nine months for Dr. Rice to
call the first high-level National Security Council meeting on
the threat of Osama bin Laden? As the Senate debates her
nomination today, we still have not heard full answers to
these questions.

In addition to Mr. Clarke’s criticism, Dr. David Kay, the
former CIA weapons inspector in Iraq, also has strong words
for the National Security Council and its role in the run up
to the war in Iraq. When Dr. Kay appeared before the Senate
Intelligence Committee on August 18, 2004, to analyze why the
Administration’s pre-war intelligence was so wrong about
weapons of mass destruction, he described the National
Security Council as the "dog that didn’t bark" to warn the
President about the weakness of those intelligence reports.
Dr. Kay continued: “Every president who has been successful,
at least that I know of, in the history of this republic, has
developed both informal and formal means of getting checks on
whether people who tell him things are in fact telling him the
whole truth.… The recent history has been a reliance on the
NSC system to do it. I quite frankly think that has not served
this president very well.”

What Dr. Kay appears to state was his view that the National
Security Council, under the leadership of Dr. Rice, did not do
a sufficient job of raising doubts about the quality of the
intelligence about Iraq. On the contrary, based upon Dr.
Rice’s statements that I quoted earlier, her rhetoric even
went beyond the questionable intelligence that the CIA had
available on Iraq, in order to hype the threats of aluminum
tubes, mushroom clouds, and connections between Iraq and
September 11.

In light of the massive reorganization of our intelligence
agencies enacted by Congress last year, shouldn’t this
nomination spur the Senate to stop, look, and listen about
what has been going on in the National Security Council for
the last four years? Don’t these serious questions about the
failings of the National Security Council under Dr. Rice
deserve a more through examination before the Senate votes to
confirm her as the next Secretary of State?

Accountability has become an old-fashioned notion in some
circles these days, but accountability is not a negotiable
commodity when it comes to the highest circles of our nation’s
government. The accountability of government officials is an
obligation, not a luxury. And yet, accountability is an
obligation that this President and his administration appear
loath to fulfill.

Instead of being held to account for their actions, the
architects of the policies that led our nation into war with
Iraq, policies based on faulty intelligence and phantom
weapons of mass destruction, have been rewarded by the
President with accolades and promotions. Instead of admitting
to mistakes in the war on Iraq and its disastrous aftermath,
the President and his inner circle of advisers continue to
cling to myths and misconceptions. The only notion of
accountability that this President is willing to acknowledge
is the November elections, which he has described as a moment
of accountability and an endorsement of his policies.
Unfortunately, after-the-fact validation of victory is hardly
the standard of accountability that the American people have
the right to expect from their elected officials. It is one
thing to accept responsibility for success; it is quite
another to accept accountability for failure.

Sadly, failure has tainted far too many aspects of our
nation’s international policies over the past four years,
culminating in the deadly insurgency that has resulted from
the invasion of Iraq. With respect to this particular
nomination, I believe that there needs to be accountability
for the mistakes and missteps that have led the United States
into the dilemma in which it finds itself today, besieged by
increasing violence in Iraq, battling an unprecedented decline
in world opinion, and increasingly isolated from our allies
due to our provocative, belligerent, bellicose, and
unilateralist foreign policy.

Whether the Administration will continue to pursue these
policies cannot be known to Senators today, as we prepare to
cast our votes. At her confirmation hearing on January 18, Dr.
Rice proclaimed that “Our interaction with the rest of the
world must be a conversation, not a monologue.” But two days
later, President Bush gave an inaugural address that seemed to
rattle sabers at any nation that he does not consider to be
free. Before Senators cast their vote, we must wonder whether
we are casting our lot for more diplomacy or more
belligerence? Reconciliation or more confrontation? Which face
of this Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde foreign policy will be
revealed in the next four years?

Although I do not question her credentials, I do oppose many
of the critical decisions that Dr. Rice has made during her
four years as National Security Advisor. She has a record, and
the record is there for us to judge. There remain too many
unanswered questions about Dr. Rice’s failure to protect our
country before the tragic attacks of September 11, her public
efforts to politicize intelligence, and her often stated
allegiance to the doctrine of preemption.

To confirm Dr. Rice to be the next Secretary of State is to
say to the American people, and the world, that the answers to
those questions are no longer important. Her confirmation will
most certainly be viewed as another endorsement of the
Administration’s unconstitutional doctrine of preemptive war,
its bullying policies of unilateralism, and its callous
rejection of our long-standing allies.

The stakes for the United States are too high. I cannot
endorse higher responsibilities for those who helped set our
great country down the path of increasing isolation, enmity in
the world, and a war that has no end. For these reasons, I
shall cast my vote in opposition to the confirmation of
Condoleezza Rice to be the next Secretary of State.