WP/Pincus: The Book on Richard Clarke

[kskiska]

Style Served Him Well But Made Enemies

By Dan Eggen and Walter Pincus
Tuesday, March 23, 2004; Page A01

Minutes after the second jetliner hit the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, Richard A. Clarke recounts in his new book, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice anointed him "crisis manager."

The assignment meant Clarke, the White House counterterrorism adviser, found himself ordering around high-level officials and urging his superiors to ground air traffic, according to his account. Clarke also takes credit for barring President Bush from immediately returning to Washington.

The passage, which opens Clarke's incendiary new book, "Against All Enemies," provides a telling look at Clarke's traits as the nation's longtime counterterrorism czar. It indicates that Rice and other senior officials had so much confidence in Clarke, they entrusted him with a key leadership role after the hijackings.

But it also reveals a hard-charging style and a penchant for self-promotion that has earned him many enemies over the years, and which has given ammunition to his critics in recent days.

"Dick certainly did infuriate a lot of his interagency colleagues with his take-no-prisoners style," said Daniel Benjamin, a counterterrorism official in the Clinton White House who is now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "But that was one of the things that made him valuable to his masters and to the political leadership. . . . He broke a lot of crockery, but Dick's mastery of the bureaucracy was almost unrivaled in the 1990s."

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16192-2004Mar22.html

[Cooley Hurd]

1. At first, I read it as a hit piece...

...which surprised me, coming from Pincus. However, they certainly don't appear to dispute the facts laid out in Clarke's book. Brash? Quick tempered? Sure. But, he knew his shit...

[DeepModem Mom]

2. kick

[JoFerret]

3. Good story, good counterweight

of truth re: his partisanship etc and all the smears and lies the GOP have attacked him with. Clarkes portraits of Bush, Rice, Wolfowitz et al are devastating. Quite devastating. A ship of fools. (But then...we knew that.)

[0007]

4. Unlike Paul O'Neill's grapes that were a little on the tart side,

Richard Clarke's grapes are sweet and have a lasting taste to be remembered.

[snippy]

5. Clarke had access to Bush and Rice which proves he was out of the loop.

[bobbieinok]

7. Fabulous

[snippy]

8. Thank you, but I'm just repeating what the Bush administration said.

[mainer]

6. Pincus puts a misleading spin on the Clinton strike in Iraq

I've read that section of the book. Yes, Clarke says that at first he was disappointed that Clinton didn't strike harder on Iraq -- but then he admits later that it was probably the right move on Clinton's part, because it gave an effective warning to Saddam without taking unnecessary lives.

Pincus makes it sound like Clarke still disapproves -- that's not what I read in the book.

[wabeewoman]

9. I ordered the book

and am anxious to read it for myself. Given that I am a huge fan of Clinton, I think you also have to look at his actions in the context of the times. No only were the republicans harassing his every move but if he attempted any of the unlawful actions bush has, they would have had his plate on a platter. As is often said of parents, I think he did the best he could with what he had. And I notice Clinton takes responsibility for what he did, something bush has yet to learn to do. I just wish when they report this stuff, they would also note that his proposed this but congress wouldn't approve and such. It would give a much truer picture of what was happening. The news media is awful one dimensional with no analysis or looking at the complexity of issues or what else was happening at the time.