Rise of the Vulcans The History of Bush's War Cabinet

by Mann, James

• ISBN13: 9780670032990
• ISBN10: 0670032999
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2004-03-08
• Publisher: Viking Adult

Summary

When George W. Bush campaigned for the White House, he was such a novice in foreign policy that he couldn’t name the president of Pakistan. But he was advised by a group that called themselves the Vulcans—a group of men and one woman with long and shared experience in government, dating back to the Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and first Bush administrations. After returning to power in 2001, the Vulcans—including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Armitage, and Condoleeza Rice—were widely expected to restore U.S. foreign policy to what it had been in past Republican administrations. Instead, they put America on an entirely new course, adopting a far-reaching set of ideas and policies that changed the world and America’s role in it.In this revelatory and newsworthy volume, James Mann narrates the hidden story of these six history makers, their early careers and rise to power, the interactions and underlying tensions among them, their visions, and their roles in the current administration. Along the way, he offers a wealth of new information (about how Rumsfeld schemed in the Nixon White House, how Cheney toiled as Rumsfeld’s doorkeeper, how Wolfowitz first warned of nuclear proliferation in the Middle East in the 1960s) to complete a remarkable look at George W. Bush’s inner circle.

Author Biography

James Mann is the senior writer in residence at the CSIS International Security Program and the author of two critically acclaimed books: About Face: A History of America-'s Curious Relationship with China from Nixon to Clinton and Beijing Jeep. Previously, he was a long-time correspondent with the Los Angeles Times, and his writing has also appeared in The New Republic and The Atlantic Monthly.

Table of Contents

Introduction	ix
ONE: A Rising Politician Amid War and Dirty Tricks	1	(20)
TWO: The Intellectual as Protege	21	(16)
THREE: A Soldier and a Sailor	37	(19)
FOUR: Combating the Soviets, Detente and Henry Kissinger	56	(23)
FIVE: Enter the Persian Gulf	79	(16)
SIX: Transitions	95	(17)
SEVEN: Camelot of the Conservatives	112	(15)
EIGHT: Of Dictatorships and Democracy	127	(11)
NINE: In the Midst of Armageddon	138	(12)
TEN: A Scandal and Its Aftermath	150	(15)
ELEVEN: A New Republican President, a New Foreign Policy Team	165	(14)
TWELVE: Use of Force	179	(19)
THIRTEEN: Death of an Empire, Birth of a Vision	198	(18)
FOURTEEN: Vulcans in Exile	216	(18)
FIFTEEN: A Vulcan Agenda	234	(14)
SIXTEEN: The Campaign	248	(13)
SEVENTEEN: Who Runs the Pentagon?	261	(16)
EIGHTEEN: Warnings and Signals	277	(17)
NINETEEN: History Starts Today	294	(17)
TWENTY: A New Strategy	311	(21)
TWENTY-ONE: Toward War with Iraq	332	(27)
Conclusion	359	(14)
Acknowledgments	373	(4)
Notes	377	(34)
Index	411

Excerpts

Introduction As George W. Bush campaigned for the presidency in 1999 and 2000, he gradually settled upon a consistent theme. Seeking to deflect questions about his lack of experience in foreign policy, he explained again and again that he possessed an eminent group of advisers, one with vastly more experience than the Democrats. Most of these advisers had already served at the highest levels of government during his father?s administration, in the heady days of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the first Gulf War against Iraq. Some of the advisers had served in the Reagan administration; some had even worked in the 1970s for Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.Whenever the younger Bush stumbled over details?as he did, for example, when an ambush- style ?pop quiz? by a television reporter demonstrated that he couldn?t name the leaders of Pakistan or India1?the candidate could argue that what mattered was a president?s ability to select good people. ?I?ve got one of the finest foreign policy teams ever assembled,? he said in response to one Democratic challenge.2 He pointed to the men and women supporting him, such as his vice presidential nominee, Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Armitage, as symbols of continuity and stability. This group of advisers became, for all practical purposes, Bush?s principal foreign policy plank in his first race for the White House. His message was not so much what he would do as whom he would appoint. During the campaign Bush?s foreign policy advisers came up with a nickname to describe themselves. They dubbed their team the Vulcans, in honor of the Roman god of fire, the forge and metalwork. Rice, who was serving as foreign policy coordinator for the Bush campaign, had been raised in Birmingham, Alabama, where a mammoth fifty-six-foot statue of Vulcan on a hill overlooking downtown paid homage to the city?s steel industry. The name had started as a joke, but it caught on, and the campaign group began to use it in public. That word, Vulcans, captured perfectly the image the Bush foreign policy team sought to convey, a sense of power, toughness, resilience and durability. (Ironically, Birmingham?s statue of Vulcan was taken down for repairs in 1999 because it was beginning to fall apart, a detail that the Bush team understandably did not emphasize when it began employing the metaphor.) To no one?s surprise, once Bush became president-elect, he turned to this same group of veterans to fill most of the top jobs. By the time the new administration?s foreign policy team was assembled in early 2001, it had the feel of a class reunion. Most of its members had already worked closely alongside one another in previous administrations, and the ties among them were close, intricate and overlapping. Donald Rumsfeld, the new defense secretary, had first worked alongside Cheney more than three decades earlier, when Cheney served as Rumsfeld?s administrative assistant in the Nixon administration. Cheney, as defense secretary in the first Bush administration, had selected Colin Powell (over several more senior generals) to be the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and had served with him for three years. Richard Armitage, the new deputy secretary of state, had worked with Powell when the two men helped run the Pentagon in the Reagan administration. Paul Wolfowitz, the new deputy secretary of defense in 2001, had collaborated closely with Armitage when the two men were responsible for America?s relations with Asia under Reagan. Wolfowitz had also served in the Pentagon as a top aide to Cheney. During the 1990s, when the Republicans were out of power, Wolfowitz had served on a prominent missile commission headed by Rumsfeld, and Armitage had run a small private consulting firm that employed Cheney?s daughter. By 2001 the Republicans had already controlled the White House for twenty of the previous thir