Washington Post
Having It Both Ways
By Anne Applebaum
April 21, 2004
About five months ago, Colin Powell received an award named in honor of
George C. Marshall, another American general who became secretary of
state. In advance of that event, Powell indicated that he would like to
give an interview to The Post -- and told a Post reporter to read up on
two incidents in Marshall's career beforehand. The first concerned
President Franklin D. Roosevelt's failure to name Marshall as commander
of the D-Day invasion. "Marshall, whatever disappointment he felt over
that, he simply ate it," Powell said in the interview. "It's what
serving this nation is all about."
The second involved Marshall's bitter objections to President Harry
Truman's recognition of the state of Israel, and Marshall's decision not
to air those objections in public. "I think any subordinate accommodates
himself to the wishes of his superior," Powell said.
Any subordinate accommodates himself to the wishes of his superior.
That's what serving this nation is all about. Whatever disappointment he
felt, he simply ate it.
In those few brief phrases, Colin Powell established, on the one hand,
that he admired George Marshall for his loyalty. He also hinted --
strongly -- that he, like Marshall, disagrees with his president.
So is Colin Powell loyal? Is he simply "serving" -- and "eating it" when
disappointed -- or does he also want us to know that he would do things
differently, if he were in charge? The question arises again this week,
with the publication of Bob Woodward's book "Plan of Attack," which
dissects the administration's decision to fight the Iraq war. Powell has
confirmed serving as a source for the book, and indeed some of its
scenes -- such as accounts of how he tried to talk the president out of
rushing to war -- seem to have come from him. Powell has now declared
that he was "committed as anyone else" to the war, but the intent of the
original leak, like the intent of his Marshall award interview, is
clear. Once again Powell is trying to have it both ways, and it is not
an attractive picture. Surely true loyalty means not only swallowing
your pride when you disagree with your commander in chief but keeping
quiet about it as well, at least while in office.
Nor is this just about definitions of loyalty. For, unfortunately,
Powell's mixed feelings had deeper consequences. There is no doubt that
when he wants to, Powell can defend the president's policies abroad with
more eloquence than anyone else in the administration. In the winter of
2002, following President Bush's "axis of evil" speech, the secretary of
state suddenly appeared all over the European press. In a masterful
interview with the Financial Times, he laughed off criticism from the
European foreign affairs commissioner ("I shall have to have a word with
him, as they say in Britain") and the French foreign minister (he's just
"getting the vapours"). On the opposite end of the political spectrum,
he inspired the Daily Telegraph to run a gushing headline: "We Americans
know how to get a job done when we put our minds to it."
In the fall of 2002, however -- right when Bush was pushing Powell's
preferred "diplomatic solution" to the Iraq problem at the United
Nations -- the U.S. secretary of state was nowhere to be seen. In the
run-up to the Persian Gulf War in 1991, then-Secretary of State James
Baker spent weeks at a time in Europe and the Middle East, including
most of November 1990. Powell, by contrast, went to Europe once in the
autumn of 2002, to the NATO summit in Prague, and then only on very
brief trips the following spring.
More importantly, he didn't play the role that he could have played in
the European media, defending the decision to go to war. That is hardly
surprising, because he opposed that decision -- and has never been shy
about letting us know. His opposition would have been perfectly
legitimate, of course, had he been an ordinary citizen, say, or even a
member of Congress. But because he was secretary of state, his
half-loyalty undermined further the diplomacy of an administration
already inclined to scoff at the views of foreigners, and has continued
to do so in the year since the war was launched.
None of which is to say Powell is solely or even partly to blame for all
of the mistakes that have been made in Iraq. But he can partly be held
to account for the lack of international support, which it was his
responsibility to rally, and for the failure of the U.N. process, which
was his idea. He can also be held responsible for the fact that much of
the State Department has apparently washed its hands of the entire
country (to the extent that some senior State Department officials
refuse to answer questions about Iraq at all). And if he doesn't want to
be held responsible for a policy he dislikes -- then he should have
resigned a long time ago.
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