Memo to the President Elect: How We Can Restore America's Reputation and Leadership

339 Pages·2008·1.35 MB·English

by  Madeleine Albright

Memo to the
President Elect
How We Can Restore America’s
Reputation and Leadership
Madeleine Albright
with Bill Woodward
Dedicated to America’s presidents, both good and not-so-good,
whose labors on behalf of our country have endowed the offi ce
with its rich history, and to the candidates for the White House
in 2008, whose willingness to place their records and reputations
on the line reflect what leadership demands and democracy is
all about
Contents
Prologue 1
part one
chapter 1 A Mandate to Lead 11
chapter 2 What Kind of President? 27
chapter 3 Thy Staff Shall Comfort Thee 41
chapter 4 The Art of Persuasion 61
chapter 5 Fifty Lady Sharpshooters 81
chapter 6 Be Sure You’re Right; Then Go Ahead 99
chapter 7 The Lion and the Lion-tamers 113
part two
chapter 8 New Foundations 131
chapter 9 Hoops of Iron 153
chapter 10 America’s Place in the Asian Century 177
chapter 11 Pride and Prejudice in Russia and South Asia 201
chapter 12 One Iraq Is Enough 225
chapter 13 Middle East: The Power to Choose 251
chapter 14 Isolating Al Qaeda 271
part three
chapter 15 Above the Thundering Abyss 289
Notes 299
Acknowledgments 313
Index 317
About the Authors
Other Books by Madeleine Albright
Credits
Cover
Copyright
About the Publisher
Prologue
F
or Americans, the death of a president is traumatic. We
mourn together the passing of a man and a piece of our
history. In meeting halls across the land, the squalls of
partisanship are calmed. Mortality softens our view of one an-
other. Whether in person or vicariously, we file by the casket.
The death of a president led to this book, for it was on Janu-
ary 2, 2007, at a funeral serv ice for Gerald Ford, that I conceived
it. The setting was Washington’s majestic National Cathedral
where, counting Ford, five presidents—members of an exclu-
sive club—were gathered. Also present were six fi rst ladies,
members of another exclusive club, which included for the fi rst
time an aspirant to membership in both.
Ford is the only president to take the oath without having
had his name on a national ballot. He was an unlikely chief
executive, known less for his accomplishments than his kindly
temperament. He was the kind of politician who might show up
for dinner without feeling he had to be the center of attention,
2 Memo to the President Elect
the archetypical Middle American, made extraordinary by the
office he held.
On this bleak midwinter morning, Ford had no way to avoid
the spotlight: newspapers ran stories about his life, cable stations
recycled documentaries, former colleagues searched for the right
adjectives to sum him up. In the cathedral, the presidents sat
in the front pews—Carter, Bush, Clinton, Bush. I wondered if
they were thinking of the day when the nation would put aside
all else to remember them; it is how our minds work, to think
such thoughts at a funeral, whether one has been president or
not.
Mindful of the security, I had arrived early. Waiting for the
serv ice to begin, I recalled my experience with the future presi-
dents’ club. As a student, I had interviewed John Kennedy—then
still a senator—for my college newspaper. The only question I
remember asking was whether he would give me his autograph;
he was happy to oblige. As an adult, I had the privilege of advis-
ing a number of Democratic candidates for national offi ce—in-
cluding Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman to run on the ticket
of a major party. All the candidates I counseled were p eople
whom I admired, but even so all but one of them lost, the excep-
tion being Bill Clinton, who invited me to serve as secretary of
state, the best job I could imagine.
President Ford’s memorial ser vice could not have been more
traditional—grand old Protestant hymns, fl uttering fl ags, dec-
larations of pride in America, and confidence in that promise
of promises: “Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never
die.” It is with words of this nature that we both accept our
ending and peer beyond it, acknowledging mortality but prepar-
ing for what comes next. Americans especially are in the habit
of looking forward. That has certainly been my reflex, which is
Prologue 3
why the idea came to me even while saying goodbye to an old
president that I might compose a memo to a new one.
Motivational speakers tell us that we should learn how to brief
the boss in the time it takes to ride an elevator from the tenth
floor to the first. A useful skill, but when the boss is about to
assume the American presidency, we need more space. A candi-
date may be able to campaign on a slogan, but a president must
govern. You don’t learn that on an elevator.
As this is written, we can only guess which candidate will
prevail in the 2008 balloting. I write now because we should be
considering now, before we vote, the national security puzzles
the next president will have to solve. I write as well because I
cannot contain my dismay at the direction our current leaders
have taken us. It is said that, in his later years, Mark Twain wrote
with a pen warmed up in hell; I have noticed steam coming
from the keyboard of my laptop. Because I have been trained as
a diplomat, my words are usually understated; because I am by
nature blunt, my anger at the Bush administration’s misread-
ing of America and the world will occasionally burn its way
to the surface. More than anger, though, I feel sadness—as do
many Americans, regardless of political affi liation—that we
have strayed so far from the broad avenues of common sense.
That sadness is not confined to us; I was told by one friendly Eu-
ropean (and there still are some), “We need for America—the
real America—to be back.” The next president will determine
whether that happens and, if so, what it will mean.
My primary goal in this memo is not to look behind us, but
to explore the daunting lineup of challenges that fall under the
heading “What is to be done?” On one hand, the president elect
4 Memo to the President Elect
will benefit from a nearly universal desire to see someone new
in the White House. On the other, he will face a Herculean task
in trying to remedy the harm that has been caused to America’s
well-being and good name.
Before proceeding, a word about gender. When I was in col-
lege, books analyzing the executive branch assumed that the
president and, for that matter, the secretary of state would be
male—presumptions that have become obsolete. Regardless of
how this election turns out, a woman president is in our future.
In writing prospectively, I had to choose between either the
masculine or feminine pronoun in referring to the next presi-
dent; or, alternatively, I could have used both, as in, “The next
president, when in front of photographers, should never lift his
or her beagle by the ears.” I thought it would be more charitable
to the reader to refer to the occupants of high offices by the gen-
der of the incumbent—thus the president is referred to as “he”
and the secretary of state as “she.” An imperfect solution, but I
hope acceptable.
The most common type of memo, at least in Washington, is
internal and administrative—outlining, for example, a federal
agency’s new policy on font preferences or the retention of e-
mails. My own interest, however, has been captured by meatier
memos, those that seek to explain or persuade and that ad-
dress issues of weight: war, peace, prosperity, and justice. While
UN ambassador, I wrote memos to President Clinton when I
thought that the normal decision-making process needed a jolt.
The papers were returned with Clinton’s comments scribbled
on the side of the pages; at times, I felt as if I were back in school
when I looked to see what the president had to say. Often, I