Prometheus 6

Lest ye forget

Posted 10/6/2003 10:02 PM Updated 10/7/2003 6:52 AM
Rice will manage Iraq's 'new phase'
By Judy Keen, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — President Bush is giving his national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, the authority to manage postwar Iraq and the rebuilding of Afghanistan.

While some saw it as a sign of frustration with the handling of postwar efforts, Bush and other officials said the move is a logical next step and reflected no dissatisfaction with progress.

"We want to cut through the red tape and make sure that we're getting the assistance there quickly so that they can carry out their priorities," Bush spokesman Scott McClellan said. "It's a new phase, a different phase we're entering."

Rice will head the Iraq Stabilization Group, which will have coordinating committees on counterterrorism, economic development, political affairs and media messages. Each committee will be headed by a Rice deputy and include representatives of the State, Defense and Treasury departments and the CIA.

---

Bush puts Rice in charge of reconstruction
By Caroline Daniel and Guy Dinmore in Washington
Published: December 14 2005 17:10 | Last updated: December 15 2005 02:21

President George W. Bush on Wednesday announced that the State Department would lead all US post-conflict reconstruction, a move that supersedes the controversial decision to give that task to the Pentagon in Iraq following the 2003 invasion.

The announcement came as Mr Bush delivered the last of four speeches intended to rebuild public support for the war on the eve of Thursday’s election for Iraq’s first official parliament.

With Rumsfeld Gone, Critics of War Look to Rice
By HELENE COOPER

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3 — For six years, first as national security adviser and then as secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice worked under the cover of a very effective shield: Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who was the administration’s lightning rod for criticism over its handling of Iraq.

But in recent weeks, with Mr. Rumsfeld gone, Ms. Rice has faced increased, and somewhat unfamiliar, criticism. At a Senate hearing on Jan. 11, she confronted a wall of opposition from Republicans as well as Democrats. During hearings this week on Iraq, several of her predecessors were pointed in their disapproval of her job performance.

Former Secretary of State James A. Baker III took issue with Ms. Rice’s refusal to engage Syria diplomatically. Back in his day, he told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, “We practiced diplomacy full time, and it paid off.”

This week, Senators Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, and John McCain, Republican of Arizona, released three letters demanding that Ms. Rice make public the administration’s requirements for actions to be taken by the Iraqi government to earn continued American support. Along with the letters, and Ms. Rice’s reply — which indicated that the Iraqis had already missed most of the benchmarks — the senators also released an irate statement.

“Secretary Rice finally provided a response” to the senators’ repeated requests, the statement said. “What Secretary Rice’s letter makes abundantly clear is that the administration does not intend to attach meaningful consequences for the Iraqis continuing to fail to meet their commitments.”

And on Jan. 20, The Economist published an editorial titled “The Falling Star of Condoleezza Rice.”

“Condoleezza Rice,” it said, “is not the woman she once was.”