Committee Approves Rice for State, Despite Questions

By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — The Senate Foreign Relations Committee today confirmed U.S. national security adviser Condoleezza Rice in a 16-2 vote to be the next secretary of state following heated Democratic questioning about her integrity, the administration’s nonproliferation efforts, and its policies regarding Iraq. The decision followed two days of intense questioning from committee members (see GSN, Jan. 18).

All Republicans and most Democrats, the latter with reservations, supported her nomination. Senator Joseph Biden (D-Del.), the committee’s ranking Democrat, said he would support Rice’s nomination in order to allow the president to choose his Cabinet.

“I like her, I’ve been disappointed, but I think the obligation I have … is to be able to work with her where we can,” Biden said.

Biden questioned her level of candor. “The questions we asked you in writing and then yesterday at the hearing I think gave you the opportunity to acknowledge some of the mistakes and misjudgments of the past four years.”

“But instead of seizing the opportunity, it seems to me Dr. Rice you danced around it, sort of stuck to the party line, which seemed pretty consistent, ‘We’re always right, we haven’t made any mistakes, we’re never wrong,’” he said.

Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.) voted against the nomination with Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.). The two lawmakers were Rice’s fiercest critics, with Boxer questioning the truthfulness of some of her testimony and both criticizing her role in previous Bush administration policy-making.

“I chose to vote my concerns, not to overlook them. I chose to vote my gut, not custom,” Kerry said. “The fact is that Dr. Rice is one of the principal architects, implementers and defenders of a series of policies and choices that in my judgment have not made our country as secure as we ought to be in the aftermath of 9/11 and have alienated much of the world and certainly much-needed allies in our effort to reduce the costs in lives and dollars to the American people.”

Boxer charged the “Bush administration used the fear of terror to make the war against Iraq appear to be a part of the response to 9/11.”

Senator George Allen (R-Va.) praised Rice for her background, “the fact that she grew up in the segregated South, persevered,” and said “the key point in her testimony and all of the questions was we want to advance freedom and I think that should be a bipartisan goal and aspiration.”

Rice defended her testimony, saying that former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s history, including an unwillingness to fully account for past weapons of mass destruction holdings, justified the war.

“We weren’t prepared to give Saddam Hussein the benefit of the doubt given his history and given the shadow of the future,” she said.

Rice said the administration may have made some mistakes but said if the Iraq war turns out well, that will not matter.

“I know enough about history to stand back and to recognize that you judge not at the moment but how it all adds up,” she said.

Boxer charged that Rice and the administration told the American public “half truth[s]” about Iraq in order to build support for the war, including by failing to note that the United States supported Iraq at the same time Baghdad used chemical weapons against Iran during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. 

“Why didn’t you tell them the full story? Why didn’t you mention that it was Rumsfeld who favored the normalization of relations with Iraq during a time when it was using chemical weapons against Iran?” she said, referring to then-Middle East envoy, and now Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

Boxer said Rice misled the public about the nature of aluminum tubes once headed for Iraq by failing to note some intelligence community doubts they were for a nuclear weapons program. (see GSN, Oct. 4, 2004). She also said Rice improperly suggested Iraq was connected to the Sept. 11 attacks. 

“To me it’s telling a half truth to the American people. It’s gaming the American people,” she said.

“It seems to me … an unwillingness to give the American people the full story because the mission, the zeal of selling the war so important to Dr. Rice, because that was her job,” she said.

Rice cited an Iraqi “attitude toward terrorism” and said there was a history of contacts with al-Qaeda that helped justify the war. She said “we didn’t go to war over aluminum tubes,” and noted Iraq’s history regarding weapons of mass destruction.

Rice said the United States often previously supported regimes “in hopes that they would bring stability in the Middle East” and that “sometimes belonged to the freedom deficit,” adding, “We’re not going to do that anymore.”

Kerry, meanwhile, questioned the administration’s level of commitment to securing weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union, stating “each year this administration has either cut or flat-lined the money for this enterprise.”

“I don’t understand how the administration can choose to spend ð— now we’re going to be close to $300 billion in Iraq, to disarm weapons that weren’t there, and yet $1 billion a year to secure weapons that we know are there, potentially, because every fissionable site is a potential weapon ð— real, ascertainable, tangible,” he said.

Rice said there were some bureaucratic obstacles, “principally in Russia,” to securing the material.

She said, though, “We’re on a schedule to do this in four years [through the Energy Department’s threat reduction program]. I think we will get it done in four years. We’re also on a very active program of securing nuclear sites with the Russians through Nunn-Lugar,” referring to Pentagon threat reduction efforts.

“I’m completely and totally dedicated to this program. I think Senator [Richard] Lugar (R-Ind.) would tell you that I’ve been one of its biggest advocates inside the administration, and I will continue to be one of its biggest advocates,” she said.

Kerry said the administration has “allowed summit after summit with Russian President [Vladimir] Putin to go by without any action that has been taken to overcome” obstacles hindering such activities.

“I’ve just represented to Senator Lugar that I intend to try and break through those bureaucratic obstacles,” Rice said.

Kerry also asked what efforts the administration has made to ensure systems in Pakistan would prevent the loss of nuclear weapons to Islamic radicals in the event of a coup.

“Senator, we have noted this problem, and we are prepared to try to deal with it. I would prefer not in open session to talk about this particular issue,” Rice said.

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