Decision Points

policy to prepare for my visit the next day with South Korean President Kim Dae-jung , my first with an Asian head of state. The previous administration had offered concessions to North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il in return for a pledge to abandon his nuclear weapons program . The policy had not worked, and I told the team we were going to change it. From then on, North Korea would have to change its behavior
before
America made concessions.
    At 5:15 the next morning, I read the
Washington Post
. One story opened, “The Bush administration intends to pick up where the Clinton administration left off in negotiations with North Korea over its missile programs, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said yesterday.”
    I was stunned. I figured the reporter must have misquoted Colin,because the story was the exact opposite of what we had discussed at the meeting. I called Condi. Like me, she is an early riser, but she had not yet seen the paper. I gave her a summary of the
Post
story and said, “By the time Colin gets to the White House for the meeting, this had better be fixed.”
    I had given Condi a daunting assignment. She had to instruct the secretary of state, a world-famous former general a generation older than she, to correct his quote. Later that morning, Colin came bounding into the Oval Office and said, “Mr. President, don’t worry, it’s all been cleared up.”
    The next year, I asked Condi to take on a similar mission with the vice president. It was August 2002, and I was thinking through my decision on whether to seek a UN resolution to send weapons inspectors back to Iraq. Dick gave a speech at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Convention in which he said, “A return of inspectors would provide … false comfort that Saddam was somehow ‘back in his box.’ ” That made it sound like my decision had been made. But I was still considering my options. I asked Condi to make clear to Dick that he had gotten out in front of my position. She made the call and, to Dick’s credit, it never happened again.
    I prepared to announce Condi’s nomination as secretary of state shortly after the 2004 election. To fill the national security adviser post, I decided to promote her outstanding deputy, Steve Hadley, a humble and thoughtful lawyer whose advice was always crisp, discreet, and uncolored by any personal agenda. Then, out of nowhere, Andy informed me that Colin had expressed second thoughts about leaving.I considered Colin a friend and appreciated his achievements, especially his work to rally a strong coalition in the war on terror and lay the groundwork for future peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. But I had already decided on Condi.
    I’ve always wondered if one of the reasons Colin hesitated to leave is that he expected Don Rumsfeld to go, too. He was right to assume that. I had planned to make a change at Defense as part of a new national security team. Late in 2004, I asked Andy to approach Fred Smith again to see if he would consider the job. I had seen Fred, and he looked perfectly fine. The problem this time was not Fred’s health; it was his oldest daughter’s. Wendy had been born with a fatal genetic heart condition, and he needed to spend time with her. Sadly, she died in 2005.
    I considered other possible replacements at Defense. I thought about sending Condi to the Pentagon, but I decided she would be a better secretary of state. I considered Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, but I didn’t think he was the right fit, either. At one point, I reached out to Jim Baker. Had he accepted, Jim could have claimed a historic triple crown as the first person ever to serve as secretary of state, treasury, and defense. But he was enjoying his retirement and had no interest in returning to Washington.
    The reality is that there aren’t many people capable of leading the military during a complex global war. Don Rumsfeld was one of the few. He had valuable experience and shared my view of the war on terror as a long-term ideological struggle. At times, Don frustrated me with his abruptness toward military leaders and members of my staff. I felt he’d made a mistake by skipping the retirement ceremony of General Eric Shinseki, the four-star Army chief of staff who stepped down in 2003 after an honorable career. Don’s decision helped feed the false impression that the general had been fired for policy disagreements over Iraq. **
    Still, I liked Don. He respected the chain of command. He