Colin L. Powell State Department Established: 1789 2003 Budget: $24.5 billion Full-time Employees: 29,500 Rumsfeld's Salary: : $171,900 Web Site: www.state.gov Overall Grade: A Back To Overview And Other Cabinet Grades

National Journal
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Friday, Jan. 24, 2003

When President-Elect George W. Bush nominated Colin L. Powell as his secretary of State on December 16, 2000, he emotionally praised his first Cabinet pick as "an American hero." The reaction was swift: Bush was credited with pulling off a political masterstroke.

A war hero, best-selling author, and all-around American icon, Powell, 65, had been unsuccessfully wooed by Republicans for a possible presidential bid in 1996. But in 2000, the Bush campaign not only persuaded Powell to support the Texas governor, it also signaled that Powell would become the nation's first African-American secretary of State, bolstering Bush's vow to lead a diverse and inclusive Republican administration. With Powell's resume boasting service as a combat veteran, White House national security adviser, four-star general, and chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the appointment also greatly mitigated concern over Bush's inexperience in national security affairs.

From the very beginning, then, Powell was slated to lend unmistakable "star power" to the Bush Cabinet. Almost no one seemed to have investigated at any length, however, whether Powell's basic philosophy or instincts in international affairs were compatible with Bush's own, or with those of Vice President Cheney, an unusually close Bush confidant and the leader of the president's transition team.

Disagreements emerged virtually from the start. Even before Bush was sworn in, Powell and Cheney clashed over the best choice for secretary of Defense. While neither Powell nor Cheney got his first pick (Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge versus former Sen. Dan Coats, R-Ind.), the president's eventual choice, Donald Rumsfeld, was much closer in worldview to Cheney, with whom he had worked in the Ford White House. Both Cheney and Rumsfeld stocked their senior staffs with like-minded individuals who believe that the United States must be far more assertive in pursuing its national interests and confronting likely adversaries, and less constrained by multinational institutions, arms control treaties, and cumbersome alliances.

As a Vietnam veteran, and a former corps commander in Europe under the NATO umbrella, Powell has always retained a soldier's caution in matters of war and a firm belief in strong multilateral alliances. He aligns himself with traditional Republican internationalists, including former Secretaries of State George Shultz and James Baker, and former National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, all of whom worked with Powell in the Reagan and Bush 41 administrations.

To this day, the Bush 43 administration's traditionalists are fighting the hard-liners for the heart and mind of a president whose instincts initially seemed to gravitate strongly toward the latter. As long as that internal tug-of-war goes on, U.S. foreign policy seems destined to feature the swings and reversals that have characterized the Bush administration's first two years. Increasingly, Bush seems to prefer this operating model for foreign affairs, giving both sides relatively free rein to argue their cases privately and publicly until he steps in and makes a final decision.

Given Powell's won/loss tally in the internal debates so far, how then does he earn the top rating in the Bush Cabinet? Ironically, it is at least partially because at times he is so outnumbered. Though some underestimate Powell because of his affable demeanor, his long experience in Washington has made him a formidable and tenacious bureaucratic infighter. In instance after instance-ranging from a proposed pullout from the Balkans, to a non-negotiable stance with North Korea, to disengagement from the Middle East peace process, to a confrontation with Iraq in which the United States initially threatened to bypass the United Nations -- Powell has patiently, resolutely steered the Bush administration's initial hard-line stance back toward a more conciliatory position. True-blue conservatives detest this retreat from confrontation, saying that Powell is being disloyal to Bush, or at any rate, to the conservative agenda. But there is no evidence to suggest that Bush sees Powell that way. And no presidency, whether right- or left-leaning, has succeeded without people who could build bridges to moderates and the opposing camp. No other Cabinet member does this as effectively as Powell does for Bush.

"Some conservatives question whether Powell is being disloyal to the president and subverting his policies, but I think Bush shrewdly understands that this good-cop, bad-cop dynamic can be an extraordinarily effective way of carrying out foreign policy," said Danielle Pletka, an analyst with the conservative American Enterprise Institute in Washington. "It would be a mistake for any administration to have a bunch of clones sitting in the Cabinet, and Bush is quite willing to stay above the fray and let the arguments go on around him until he makes a final decision. In the meantime," Pletka said, "if the Europeans want to think they have a soul mate at the State Department, and the Israelis want to think they have a soul mate at the Defense Department, that's great. So I think Powell has been a very effective secretary of State for this administration."

That dynamic has also made Powell a critical player in furthering Bush's No. 1 priority of winning the war against terrorism, because he can deliver an indispensable constituency: foreign publics and their governments.

"Powell is the person most foreign governments look to as wise to their concerns," said Ambassador William Leurs, president of the United Nations Association in New York. "Because of his long military and political experience, and background as a minority who grew up the child of immigrants, Powell seems to have an ingrained respect and understanding for the views of people who think differently from Americans. That's made him the prime interlocutor for countries that need to talk to the United States," Leurs said. "There are very few secretaries of State in our history who were viewed as so vital by the international community as Colin Powell."

Powell has also been invaluable in selling the Bush administration's foreign-policy agenda domestically. A large majority of Americans believe that the United States should confront Iraq only through the United Nations, a position that Powell championed internally and then implemented smartly by securing a 15-0 vote on the Security Council. In a Harris Poll conducted late last year, Powell received by far the highest ratings (75 percent positive, 20 percent negative) among Bush administration officials, making him not only the most popular Cabinet officer, but also more popular than Bush himself (64 percent positive, 35 percent negative). Powell also received uniformly excellent, even gushing, reviews from virtually everyone canvassed for his relations with Capitol Hill and management of the State Department. Lawmakers and diplomats like, and respect, Colin Powell. His rating reflects the frequently expressed sentiment, among Republicans and Democrats and experts alike, that Powell is the Cabinet member whose departure would reverberate most profoundly at this critical time in the nation's history.

Inside Influence Grade: B
Despite his high profile, Powell was initially not a Bush confidant on the order of Cheney or National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. Because his commander in chief puts great store in personal relationships and gut instincts, Powell's lack of a direct connection seemed to marginalize him somewhat in the administration's first months. When the White House decided to reject the Kyoto treaty on global warming, Powell seemed barely in the loop, for instance, and he was famously chastised for suggesting early on that the administration would generally adopt the Clinton administration's policy of engagement with North Korea. In a memorable cover story on September 10, 2001, Time magazine characterized Powell as the "Odd Man Out" in the Bush inner circle.

Insiders say, however, that Bush's confidence and trust in Powell began to grow markedly after a Chinese fighter collided with and forced down a U.S. Navy surveillance plane in March 2001. While Rumsfeld made a number of incendiary public comments that briefly inflamed the crisis, Powell stepped in and quietly negotiated a successful return of the Navy crew and a face-saving end to the matter.

"I think that crisis with China was a turning point, because before that, the hard-liners seemed to hold total sway," said Jim Steinberg, a senior analyst at the Brookings Institution and former National Security Council official in the Clinton administration. "I think Powell's successful diplomacy drove home the sober realization to Bush that these complex relationships couldn't be handled on the basis of ideology alone. After that crisis, you began to see a more thoughtful foreign policy."

According to insiders, Powell marked another milestone in the spring and summer of last year, in the prelude to an administration decision on Iraq. Though reluctant by nature to forcefully insinuate himself into his boss's presence, Powell was persuaded by aides to request weekly face time with Bush. As Bob Woodward recounts in his book, Bush at War, that outreach resulted in a key dinner meeting of Bush, Powell, and Rice on August 5, 2002, which led directly to Bush's decision to take the matter of Iraq before the U.N. Security Council. It was a key victory for Powell.

For the most part, Powell has continued his weekly private meetings with Bush, whom he now calls a close friend, and he has clearly cultivated Rice as a close ally. "As Bush and Powell have spent more personal time together, their relationship has obviously grown closer," said a close Powell aide.

Hill Clout Grade: A
Given his star wattage, and his experience in top Washington jobs in the Pentagon and the White House, Powell had a natural advantage over his Cabinet cohorts in establishing good relations on Capitol Hill. Because he viewed congressional support as critical to his key goal of reinvigorating a chronically money-starved and demoralized State Department, Powell quickly set about courting Congress, approaching the effort with the sense of purpose and methodical planning he once brought to military campaigns.

Powell made the rounds of the relevant lawmakers' offices, testified before major committees whenever requested, and characteristically showed up well prepared. He also encouraged and empowered subordinates at the State Department to respond to subcommittees' requests for testimony.

In particular, Powell established close relations with senior members, both Democratic and Republican, of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, including former Chairmen Jesse Helms, R-N.C., and Joseph R. Biden Jr., D-Del., and current Chairman Richard G. Lugar, R-Ind. Equally important, Powell does not have, with any single member, the kind of antagonistic relationship that can sometimes derail a Cabinet officer's agenda. Under Powell, the State Department has for the first time opened a Capitol Hill liaison office to handle requests from House members, and it plans to open a similar office on the Senate side as soon as office space can be found.

The outreach has paid off. In 2002, for instance, the State Department received $100 million to hire 399 new employees, and it is expected to receive like amounts in the next two years to pay for additional hires. Congress has also funded a multiyear plan, costing roughly $1 billion annually, to improve security at embassies and State Department facilities. Lugar has publicly pledged support for Powell initiatives to modernize the State Department's information systems and help fight the AIDS epidemic in Africa.

"It's practically a Washington parlor game to reflect on whether Powell is up or down among Bush's inner circle, but I can tell you he's very popular on Capitol Hill, and that brings with it a lot of influence," said Andy Fisher, a senior Lugar aide. "I can't remember him ever denying a request to testify, and when he does testify, I've never seen him have a bad day. So I think Powell has been enormously important to the success of the Bush administration."

Political Imperatives Grade: A
Foreign policy may not win you an election, but a foreign-policy disaster can lose you one. September 11 was a disaster, but the Bush presidency, supported by key Cabinet members, has responded well and has earned an advantage from doing so. Powell has played his part in the administration's post-9/11 success. He has taken the lead, for example, in organizing the various "coalitions of the willing" for the different aspects of the war against terrorism-financial, diplomatic, military. Getting the Russians and Chinese aboard, securing the support of President Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan, winning over the Europeans, the Central Asians, the Southeast Asians-you name it, Powell has been there, visiting, cajoling, horse-trading to keep coalitions together.

Now, think a moment about the most serious moments of crisis across the world during the Bush presidency -- times when if things had gone badly, the result could have been a disaster for the United States, and for the world: the U.S.-China clash over the spy plane; the near-war between India and Pakistan over Kashmir; the nonstop violence between Israel and the Palestinians early last year; the confrontation between Iraq and Washington; the current crisis with North Korea. Who was the guy who not only advocated moderation, but went in and, through quiet negotiations, calmed the situation himself or used organized international pressure to ease the crisis? Colin Powell. Has he achieved "peace in our time" in any of those long-simmering disputes? No. But putting out fires so they don't become conflagrations is no small accomplishment.

Powell does not carry out the fervent conservative agenda-anti-abortionism, pro-Israel-at-all-costsism, confrontation-everywhereism-that some of Bush's political base would like. But he helps put the face of moderation on the Bush presidency-and that helps the White House with many political constituencies, including African-Americans, Democrats, liberals, and centrists at home; and Europeans, Asians, Africans, and Latin Americans abroad. And if you doubt Powell's political power, just ask Trent Lott. In remarking on Lott's praise of Strom Thurmond's segregationist presidential campaign of 1948, Powell said this: "There was nothing about the ... Dixiecrat agenda that should have been acceptable in any way to any American at that time, or any American now." A day later, Lott lost his job as Senate majority leader.

Running The Department Grade: A
When Powell assumed the helm of the State Department, most observers agreed it was acutely underfunded, understaffed, and demoralized after years of often-acrimonious bickering with former Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms, R-N.C, and his staff. And former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright had relied heavily on her own tight-knit group of political appointees during her tenure, doing little to boost the morale of the career Foreign Service officers.

Little wonder that State Department employees held a mass rally to greet Powell on his first day on the job, during which he pledged to focus as much on leading and managing the department as on serving as the president's principal foreign-policy adviser. Indeed, bucking up the morale of his dispirited troops played directly to a strength identifiable throughout Powell's career: an easy sense of command and an instinct for motivating and winning the loyalty of subordinates.

Foreign Service officers at State still talk about President Bush's early visit to the building in preparation for his first state visit to Mexico. Rather than have a senior political appointee or ambassador brief the president, as would have been customary, Powell had the desk officers in charge of the Mexican account address Bush directly. On such small gestures hinge the intangibles of morale and esprit de corps.

"When Powell came to the State Department, it was essentially hollowed out from a decade of downsizing," said John Naland, president of the American Foreign Service Association in Washington. "He's led a sustained effort to increase its funding and staffing. More importantly, he has the leadership skills to make every State Department employee feel like a vital part of the team," Naland said. "Recruitment for the Foreign Service is now breaking records. So I would put Powell as easily the best leader and manager State has seen since George Shultz, who created the Foreign Service Institute. As far as the Foreign Service is concerned, Powell has been an absolute standout."

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