Known And Unknown_ A Memoir Part 13

The Republican wave continued through 1995. Bob Dole, then serving as the Senate minority leader, became the Republican presidential nominee. With Dole leading Clinton in early polls, a federal government shutdown was blamed on Republicans in Congress, damaging their image. The Clinton political machine launched tough attacks on Dole and the Democrats pulled ahead.

I watched the unfolding campaign from Chicago. I was sorry to see Dole struggling against the inc.u.mbent president. In the spring of 1996, Bob's wife, Elizabeth, called and asked me to come to Was.h.i.+ngton to help the campaign on policy issues. I agreed to do it on a part-time basis. I'd known Elizabeth since she had served in the Nixon administration. Strong and polished, she was an excellent partner for Bob.

Dole was struggling with the same problem that Gerald Ford had faced early on-he was a legislator by nature who had to make the transition to becoming a presidential candidate and an executive. There was so much to like and admire about Bob Dole the person, and certainly the legislator. But the traits that drew people to him and made him a lion in the Senate did not translate well to a candidate for president.

Having run for president three times, he was not always receptive to advice, especially from a campaign staff he hardly knew. On a flight aboard his campaign plane, Dole finally gave in to pleas from his aides to practice a speech with a teleprompter. So he proceeded to practice the speech by reading it-in silence. The staff stood there baffled while Dole practiced the speech in his head.

I spent my time on policy issues, working with longtime Minnesota congressman Vin Weber. Together we helped Dole craft a supply-side economic message by seeking input from some of the leading economic experts in the country, including Milton Friedman, publisher Steve Forbes, and Dr. John Taylor of Stanford University. The Dole proposal had as its centerpiece a 15 percent across-the-board tax cut for the American people. He argued that by letting people keep more of their own money, they could better stimulate the economy than the federal government could. Still, with the country seeming to be at peace and reasonably prosperous, Dole lagged behind Clinton.

In the late summer of 1996, languis.h.i.+ng in the polls, Dole called me up one evening. He said he was going to announce me as the general chairman of his campaign. I laughed when I heard the idea, which seemed to have come out of nowhere. I reminded Dole that I had agreed to help out part-time on policy.

"Well, I've got to do it," Dole insisted. "I have to show we're doing something to shake up the campaign." Again I resisted, since I knew who was running the Dole campaign-the candidate and his large paid staff of professional managers. By the end of the conversation I thought I had made myself clear that I could not do it.

To my dismay, Dole went ahead the next day and announced that I was his chairman. I subsequently learned that Dole already had a campaign chairman-New Hamps.h.i.+re governor Steve Merrill-who apparently had not been informed of the change. Graciously, Merrill contacted me and said he was willing to a.s.sist the campaign in any way possible.

Within a month, Dole's supporters gathered in San Diego for a convention that they hoped would define his candidacy for the American people and dent Clinton's lead in the polls. In San Diego, I noticed that the relatively new twenty-four-hour television era had turned Was.h.i.+ngton politicians into celebrities. Republican delegates treated the most recognizable faces in the party as if they were movie stars. I also noticed another change from my days in Congress. As the size of congressional staffs had increased, so had their power. In the old days one dealt directly with a member of Congress on policy issues. By 1996, one often dealt with a member of the congressman's staff instead.2 The Dole campaign tried in vain to focus voters and the media on the character question the administration was battling. At one point, after citing a list of scandals and investigations against the administration, Dole blurted out, "Where is the outrage?" I understood his frustration. He felt the media was not holding the Clinton team to the same standard of behavior applied to other politicians.

The American people didn't share Dole's outrage, and President Clinton won reelection convincingly, though the final margin was closer than a number of the polls had suggested. Within weeks of Dole's defeat, there were rumors about the leading contenders for 2000. One name surfaced early-George W. Bush, the governor of Texas.3

After the campaign I went back to the business world, serving on various boards of directors. As the collapses of Enron and WorldCom demonstrated a few years later, one of the important roles of outside directors is to try to look around corners and identify any problems with a company's strategies or management. Because I held management to a high standard and asked a good many questions about operations, some CEOs considered me a difficult director. Others sometimes cheered me on. One CEO said to Joyce, "Don is a terrific director, but you sure as h.e.l.l wouldn't want more than one of them on your board."

I became increasingly involved with a small start-up company in California named Gilead Sciences, Inc. Mike Riordan, a MD from Johns Hopkins University with an MBA from Harvard, started the company with a small venture capital investment. Eventually, Gilead produced one of the early AIDS treatment drugs. It later developed Viread (also called Tenofovir), the backbone of HIV treatment today, as well as Tamiflu, a flu drug. By March 1996, Gilead had moved from a market capitalization of zero to $1 billion, with $300 million in cash and several blockbuster drugs. Its stock was rising and the company was getting excellent reviews from security a.n.a.lysts.4 This was a tribute to excellent science and, as always in the pharmaceutical business, a dose of good fortune. It was also a tribute to people willing to risk their careers on a small start-up company and the thousands of investors willing to risk their money on a long shot. This was a tribute to excellent science and, as always in the pharmaceutical business, a dose of good fortune. It was also a tribute to people willing to risk their careers on a small start-up company and the thousands of investors willing to risk their money on a long shot.

I liked the idea of working with a small group of bright, talented young people in Silicon Valley as they started the enterprise from scratch. Gilead had terrific potential and some brilliant minds, but so did other start-up biotech firms. I agreed to join the board early on, and eventually became the chairman. I helped recruit a superb group of top-flight people to the board to broaden its perspective and attract investment.

Our board brought broad experience to the talented young management team. These board members, with their relations.h.i.+ps around the world, helped guide Gilead in its transition from start-up to a more mature player in a highly compet.i.tive industry.

I also made a pitch for Condoleezza Rice, who had served in the GeorgeH. W. Bush administration and was the provost of Stanford University, to join the board of directors.

"[W]e'd better get ourselves in the queue before she makes any public decisions about her future," I advised George Shultz.5 I pointed out that our company met in Foster City, California, a thirty-minute drive from Stanford. When I would see Rice at various events, I would jokingly pester her about joining Gilead's board. I sent her notes trying to make the case. "Condi," one began, "When are you going to call me up and say, 'Gee, Don, I would be delighted to join the Gilead Board.... Those are good folks, it is an interesting business, it is nearby, it only meets four times a year, so the answer is yes!'"6 Rice expressed interest but did not commit. She had decided to go on the boards of larger and considerably more prominent firms, such as Chevron. It was not long before she began advising George W. Bush, whose presidential prospects seemed bright.

In 1999, Bush asked to meet with me when I was serving as chairman of the Commission to a.s.sess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States. The commission had been established by Congress to evaluate threats posed by ballistic missiles, particularly ones in the hands of rogue regimes. Bush was interested in the commission's work. He mentioned that Shultz had suggested that we meet.7 My earlier encounters with the younger George Bush in the 1970s and 1980s had been brief. Perhaps it is my midwestern roots, but I confess to a not very wise or useful bias about those who enjoy the inherited benefit of prominent names. Getting to know George W. Bush was a good lesson against letting personal stereotypes color your thinking about people. The Bush I met in his suite at the Capital Hilton in Was.h.i.+ngton had taken difficult steps to change his life, was serving as governor of Texas, and was working hard to be elected president of the United States.

I found him to be unlike the picture the press was drawing of him as uncurious and something of a slacker. He asked serious questions, was self-confident, and had a command of the important issues. Decidedly down-to-earth, with no inclination to formality, his demeanor was different from his father's somewhat patrician manner. Sometimes, as I'd learn over the years, George W. Bush would have his feet up on his desk and be chewing an unlit cigar. He pointed out that he'd grown up in Midland, Texas. He had a toughness, and he told me that he stood apart from "that Eastern establishment."8 I left our 1999 meeting impressed. I left our 1999 meeting impressed.

After the disappointment of the Dole campaign, politics didn't tug on me as it once had, but national security issues did. I wasn't formally advising Bush, but at Rice's invitation I offered occasional thoughts.

Once, in a letter to Josh Bolten, who was then serving as the policy director for the Bush campaign, I offered some thoughts on national security. I warned against the idea of a "graduated response"-sending small numbers of troops and then escalating that number over time. "'Graduated response' didn't work in Vietnam for President Johnson," I observed. "If the U.S. is going to get into a fight, it is worth winning, and we should hit hard up front. Hoping for a measured, antiseptic war (immaculate coercion) to be successful," I cautioned, "is the hope only of the unschooled."9 I was slow to endorse anyone for the presidency in 2000. A complicating factor for me was that early on I had two friends in the race, Steve Forbes and Elizabeth Dole, so I preferred to stay out of the Republican primary battle.

There was, however, one presidential candidate running that year who I was quick to support: New Jersey senator Bill Bradley was waging an uphill campaign against Vice President Al Gore for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination. Having invited Bradley thirty years earlier to work with me at the Office of Economic Opportunity, my interest in his career had continued. When he announced his campaign against Gore, I sent him a contribution. I believed the thoughtful and honorable Bradley would make a considerably better president than Gore, whom I saw as lecturing and wooden. And so my first presidential campaign contribution in 2000 was to a Democrat, although I let Bradley know that I would not be with him in November.

Throughout the early part of the year I watched Bush with interest as he racked up primary victories, knocking out each of his rivals, including Senator John McCain of Arizona, a man with a hair-trigger temper and a propensity to fas.h.i.+on and s.h.i.+ft his positions to appeal to the media. In May 2000, after the primaries were over, I joined a number of former national security officials at an event to endorse Bush. In attendance were Henry Kissinger and George Shultz, as well as Colin Powell and others. Together, we stood behind Governor Bush as he announced his plans for reducing the size of America's nuclear missile a.r.s.enal while deploying a missile defense system. The decisions about how to accomplish his objectives, Bush said, would fall to his secretary of defense.10 Unlike many presidential nominees, Bush selected an excellent running mate. He made a reasoned, sober choice of a well-known figure who might not offer him much near-term political advantage but who would be both a source of sound counsel and well prepared to a.s.sume the presidency if necessary. It was a surprise when d.i.c.k Cheney's name was announced-and in this case a pleasant surprise. Cheney was no longer my young a.s.sistant but the respected candidate who Joyce and I hoped would become the next vice president of the United States.

At Cheney's request, I traveled to Danville, Kentucky, in October 2000 to attend the debate between the contending vice presidential candidates, Cheney and Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut. It was an excellent debate between two fine, experienced, honorable, well-prepared public servants. I thought d.i.c.k got the better of it. His quiet competence was rea.s.suring, and it was strengthened by his good humor, which most Americans had not seen.

In November, Joyce and I were invited to be with d.i.c.k and Lynne in Austin, Texas, for the election returns. By then I had lived through a good number of very close elections. The 1958 congressional campaign I managed was lost by an eyelash. In the 1960 presidential election, the balloting had seesawed all night between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy. Eight years later Nixon had barely defeated Hubert Humphrey, and in 1976 we didn't know if Ford had won or lost until the next morning. But the 2000 presidential election night lasted for more than a month, and it only lurched to a conclusion on December 12, 2000, when George W. Bush officially became the president-elect.

I certainly was supportive of the new President and Vice President, but at sixty-eight years old I thought at most I might help out on a part-time basis if asked, as I had with President Reagan. I was engaged with a variety of activities, including serving on the boards of the RAND Corporation and the National Park Foundation, as well as on several corporate boards. In December 2000 alone I attended six different board meetings in New York, Chicago, California, and Zurich, and was traveling periodically to Was.h.i.+ngton for government commission meetings. Joyce and I had agreed I would pare down some of my business activities over the next year and spend most of my time at our home in Taos, New Mexico, where our family tended to gather. "We are moving into our rural period," Joyce confidently announced to friends at our fiftieth high school reunion earlier in 2000. certainly was supportive of the new President and Vice President, but at sixty-eight years old I thought at most I might help out on a part-time basis if asked, as I had with President Reagan. I was engaged with a variety of activities, including serving on the boards of the RAND Corporation and the National Park Foundation, as well as on several corporate boards. In December 2000 alone I attended six different board meetings in New York, Chicago, California, and Zurich, and was traveling periodically to Was.h.i.+ngton for government commission meetings. Joyce and I had agreed I would pare down some of my business activities over the next year and spend most of my time at our home in Taos, New Mexico, where our family tended to gather. "We are moving into our rural period," Joyce confidently announced to friends at our fiftieth high school reunion earlier in 2000.

As the Bush transition kicked into gear, I was still serving as chairman of the Commission to a.s.sess United States National Security s.p.a.ce Management and Organization. We were examining how our patchwork of national security inst.i.tutions dealt with issues in s.p.a.ce-bringing me full circle to the issue I had first dealt with as a new member of Congress back in 1963, serving on the s.p.a.ce committee.

I was at a meeting of the s.p.a.ce Commission in Was.h.i.+ngton in late December when Cheney called me. He told me he wanted to get together and that he preferred our meeting to be confidential; he would send a car and driver to bring me to the Madison Hotel downtown, where Cheney and the President-elect were meeting with people being considered for senior administration positions. I was taken into the hotel through the bas.e.m.e.nt so that I would not encounter reporters or hotel staff.11 I a.s.sumed Cheney wanted my thoughts on candidates being considered for various national security positions. But as we started to talk, I realized d.i.c.k was wondering if I would consider coming into the administration. He asked my views about two posts-CIA director and secretary of defense-saying the President-elect felt both were in need of attention, and that reforming them would be a priority for the administration. Cheney told me that Bush had not yet made decisions on who would lead either department. He had in mind several candidates for each post, and my name was on both lists.

After discussing the two departments, Cheney asked, "Don, if the situation is right and that's where the President-elect finally comes out, do you think you would be willing to take on a full-time a.s.signment?"

That idea had not occurred to me before our conversation. I said I would have to think about it and talk to Joyce.

"Fair enough," d.i.c.k said. "Think about it, and if things develop, we'll want you to talk to the President-elect."

Later that evening, Cheney, trying to reach me, telephoned Joyce. She told d.i.c.k what she had told me: She would be up for whatever I might decide to do. When Cheney called me again, he said, "Don, I talked to the President-elect, and he'd like to meet with you down in Austin on Friday."

Cheney gave me a sense of how the administration was shaping up. It was already known that Colin Powell was going to be secretary of state. John Ashcroft was to be announced soon as attorney general. Condi Rice would be the national security adviser.

Apparently Bush was interested in my experience in government, my record in business, and my credentials with conservatives. But with the selection of Cheney as vice president and Paul O'Neill as treasury secretary, there was already talk of Bush relying on retreads from the Ford administration. I would be seen as yet one more.

Then, of course, there was the other matter. It was no secret to Governor Bush that his father's relations.h.i.+p with me lacked warmth.12 Cheney said that at one point, when he was the head of Governor Bush's vice presidential search committee, my name had been raised as a potential running mate. But as Cheney put it, in his usual understated way, the Bush family "did not salute" the idea. Cheney said that at one point, when he was the head of Governor Bush's vice presidential search committee, my name had been raised as a potential running mate. But as Cheney put it, in his usual understated way, the Bush family "did not salute" the idea.

Still, Cheney was confident that President-elect Bush would make his own decisions about whether I was right for a position in his administration. "My preference is for you to go to DoD," Cheney said, adding, "You are Condi's and Colin's top choice for the job."

It was starting to look like Joyce's and my "rural period" might be postponed.

PART VIII

Leaning Forward

Austin, TexasDECEMBER 22, 2000 The Bush-Cheney team was scrambling through their abbreviated transition period. When I was asked to meet with Bush on December 22, some of the people being considered for key positions were cycling through Austin.

The George W. Bush I encountered at the governor's mansion three days before Christmas was very much the man I had met previously: inquisitive, interested in national security issues, and comfortable with himself. A disciplined man who kept precisely to a fast-moving schedule, he was not much for small talk, which suited me fine.

I congratulated the President-elect on his victory, and he thanked me for my support during the campaign. "I know d.i.c.k told you I wanted to visit about a few things," Bush said. In particular, he was expecting to hear my thoughts on the Defense Department and the Central Intelligence Agency.

I was still surprised by Governor Bush's request to see me. He had to be aware that I did not have a close relations.h.i.+p with his father. I thought it spoke well of him that he was interested in meeting me himself to draw his own conclusions. Our meeting that December would be only the second substantive conversation we had ever had.

Bush first asked to hear my views about the Defense Department.1 I ventured that the Department seemed to have drifted somewhat since the end of the Cold War. President Clinton had not seemed to have a comfortable relations.h.i.+p with the military, due in part to the accusation that he had evaded military service during the Vietnam War. Clinton's early foray into defense policy on the issue of gays in the military exacerbated the problem, with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, led by its then chairman General Colin Powell taking the rare step of publicly exposing a disagreement with the President. I ventured that the Department seemed to have drifted somewhat since the end of the Cold War. President Clinton had not seemed to have a comfortable relations.h.i.+p with the military, due in part to the accusation that he had evaded military service during the Vietnam War. Clinton's early foray into defense policy on the issue of gays in the military exacerbated the problem, with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, led by its then chairman General Colin Powell taking the rare step of publicly exposing a disagreement with the President.2 Once burned, Clinton seemed to have left the department largely to its own devices. Once burned, Clinton seemed to have left the department largely to its own devices.3 That presidential remove, I suggested, had had consequences. It provided the senior officials in the Pentagon the lat.i.tude to operate relatively free of top-level strategic direction. Under those circ.u.mstances, moreover, various members of Congress were better able to promote their particular interests, sometimes at the expense of sound national policy. In the combatant commands, four-star admirals and generals had wielded considerable power, and for years had been called, I thought inappropriately, commanders in chief. To my thinking, the United States had only one commander in chief, and it was the elected president.4 "The task for the incoming secretary of defense will be to implement what you promised throughout the campaign," I said. "You will need to fulfill your pledge that 'help is on the way' for the United States military." If the President-elect hoped to achieve the goals for the Department of Defense that he had outlined over the course of his campaign, he would need a secretary of defense willing to adjust the arrangements that many in the Pentagon had grown comfortable with-that of a light-touch administration that sanctioned their activities from a respectful distance. The task for his new secretary would not be to simply tweak existing policies and practices at the margins.

Bush nodded in agreement. He had outlined ambitious plans for the United States military, emphasizing his view that it needed to accelerate its transformation toward agility, speed, deployability, precision, and lethality. Bush did not strike me as one who worried about ruffling feathers, but he had not served in Was.h.i.+ngton and had never had to tangle with a bureaucracy as entrenched and powerful as that of the Defense Department, the defense contractors, and congressional interests closely tied to the status quo. I cautioned that military officers as well as career civilian officials in Defense and throughout the executive branch would be wary of reforms that impinged on their acquired authority.

I highlighted an additional challenge to the President-elect. Many members of Congress wanted further cuts to the Defense Department budget. I was convinced the budget needed to be increased significantly to correct the shortfalls of the prior decade and to ensure a military force suitable for our nation's strategic requirements. America's armed forces had been reduced by more than half a million personnel. The defense budget had been cut by $50 billion in inflation-adjusted dollars from the time President Clinton took office in 1993. Yet while defense investment had been reduced sharply, as Bush had noted in his campaign, military deployments had tripled.

I raised other issues with him that I believed the department faced, including: the requirement to begin testing and deploying ballistic missile defenses; improvements to homeland security; a strengthened effort on information warfare; and the urgent need to improve our country's intelligence capabilities.5 Some of these issues, particularly missile defense, had become polarized. I thought Governor Bush's record of reaching across the aisle to Democrats in the Texas state legislature boded well for garnering bipartisan support for national security programs. Some of these issues, particularly missile defense, had become polarized. I thought Governor Bush's record of reaching across the aisle to Democrats in the Texas state legislature boded well for garnering bipartisan support for national security programs.

In short, our conversation reflected my belief that the Department of Defense had some longstanding problems and that fixing them would unquestionably require breaking some crockery and bruising more than a few egos. I was direct about this with Bush. He was an experienced executive and politician and knew that what he had promised on the campaign trail with respect to defense policy was important and needed, but that it carried political risk-for the President and for his secretary of defense.

Bush considered those thoughts, and seemed to appreciate them. Unlike our previous meeting, he asked few questions. He appeared to be more interested in having me talk. He next asked my views on the CIA. Having previously served as secretary of defense, I a.s.sumed that if the President-elect was thinking about me for a position in his administration, it would most likely be at the CIA.

I thought Bush and the members of the National Security Council would need to exert a stronger hand in setting the intelligence community's priorities, to ensure they reflected the administration's policy objectives. How would the Agency, for example, balance its resources among collecting intelligence on rogue regimes pursuing weapons of ma.s.s destruction, a.n.a.lyzing trends in global warming, collecting energy price information, and considering the threats from AIDS or cyberwarfare? Would the CIA spend more or less resources hunting down war criminals in the Balkans or trying to track down terrorists? These were decisions on priorities that would need clear direction from the President and his senior advisers. My experience had led me to believe that direction had been lacking.

"Turbulence in the intelligence community has been a problem," I told him. There had been six CIA directors and seven directors of the Defense Intelligence Agency between 1987 and 2000. "If a corporation changed its management almost every other year," I said, "it would go broke-and it ought to." Bush laughed. I suggested that he nominate someone who could remain in the position long enough to make substantial progress.

Bush asked how I felt about taking a role in his administration. "I'm not eager to go back into government," I replied, "but I would consider it if you thought I could be helpful." However, I advised, there were a number of things he would need to be aware of before coming to a decision.

I cautioned him that after more than two decades in the private sector, running two Fortune 500 companies, serving on a number of boards of directors, and being involved in a number of nonprofit activities, my personal situation was complex and my business responsibilities were extensive. While not connected to major defense contractors, I did have ties to a number of companies, some of which did business, however loosely, with the federal government. Extracting myself from all of those relations.h.i.+ps would be difficult-not to mention costly.

I also informed him that like many families across America, ours had not been immune to the problem of drug addiction. Two of our children, Marcy and Nick, had found themselves caught up in that personal torment, and the experience had been heartbreaking and difficult for Joyce and me. But by December 2000, Marcy and Nick were both in recovery. Marcy had been clean for more than a decade and was active in the community of recovering addicts. I wanted the President-elect to be aware of this, so I shared our family's experience with him, as I had with Cheney, who had known our children since they were little. Bush listened with understanding.*

"You might be better off considering candidates who had fewer complications in their lives," I suggested to him. Bush said he appreciated my position and asked me to forward to him or Cheney the names of people I thought might be appropriate for DoD or CIA. I promised to do so.

Before our meeting ended, I had one other thought I wanted to share. I had observed over the past few years that there were ways of behaving that could invite one's enemies to act aggressively, with unintended but dangerous consequences.6 The American withdrawal under fire from Somalia in the early 1990s was an example. In like fas.h.i.+on, American leaders did not act forcefully in response to al-Qaida's fatal attack on the USS The American withdrawal under fire from Somalia in the early 1990s was an example. In like fas.h.i.+on, American leaders did not act forcefully in response to al-Qaida's fatal attack on the USS Cole Cole in Yemen in 2000. The c.u.mulative effect, I cautioned, suggested to our enemies that the United States was not willing to defend its interests. "Weakness is provocative," I said to the President-elect, who nodded in agreement. "But so is the perception of weakness," I added. in Yemen in 2000. The c.u.mulative effect, I cautioned, suggested to our enemies that the United States was not willing to defend its interests. "Weakness is provocative," I said to the President-elect, who nodded in agreement. "But so is the perception of weakness," I added.

As I saw it, a decade of hesitation and half measures had undermined our national security. The incoming administration would need to give the country strategic direction and build up our defenses and intelligence capabilities. Anyone a.s.suming those posts would need to have that in mind.

I wanted Bush to know that if he selected me I would not intend to simply preside over the department or agency. "Governor, if I were to serve in your administration I would be leaning forward," I said. "If you would be uncomfortable with that, then I would be the wrong man for the job."

CHAPTER 21

Here We Go Again.

After my meeting with Bush, Joyce and I spent the Christmas holidays with our family at our home just north of Taos, New Mexico. d.i.c.k Cheney called me the afternoon of December 26 to talk about the names I had pa.s.sed along for the CIA and the Pentagon. I had suggested that they consider Jim Woolsey, who had been Clinton's CIA director, and Bob Kerrey, the former Democratic senator from Nebraska for secretary of defense.1 I liked the idea of someone who could give the administration bipartisan appeal. I also mentioned a CEO like General Electric's Jack Welch, who had been a successful manager and had a distance from politics. But I had another, more unorthodox notion that I wanted to suggest. "d.i.c.k, here's an interesting idea," I began. "What if-" I liked the idea of someone who could give the administration bipartisan appeal. I also mentioned a CEO like General Electric's Jack Welch, who had been a successful manager and had a distance from politics. But I had another, more unorthodox notion that I wanted to suggest. "d.i.c.k, here's an interesting idea," I began. "What if-"

"Hold on, Don, I've got another call," Cheney interrupted. "Let me get back to you."

Ten minutes later Cheney rang me up again. "We don't need any more advice, Don," Cheney said. "That was the President-elect calling. He told me to tell you he wants you to be secretary of defense."2 "Actually before we were interrupted, I was going to suggest you as SecDef," I told Cheney.

It was an idea similar to one I had suggested to President Ford a quarter of a century before, that Nelson Rockefeller, in addition to being the vice president, might also have substantive responsibilities running a cabinet department. There was nothing in the Const.i.tution that prevented such an arrangement. Cheney had run the Defense Department before. I felt that if anyone could handle both positions, it was d.i.c.k.

Cheney didn't sound surprised by the suggestion. "The President-elect had the same idea," he acknowledged. But Bush ultimately concluded that running a cabinet agency could conflict with bringing in Cheney as a key adviser on a wider range of policy matters and raised a question about having a sitting vice president regularly testify to Congress.

I told d.i.c.k I wanted to discuss Bush's offer with Joyce and think about it more before giving my answer. Later that day, I decided to accept the nomination. The young man who had joined me at the Office of Economic Opportunity as my special a.s.sistant back in 1969 would become one of the most influential vice presidents in American history. And to my amazement, I would go from having been the youngest secretary of defense in our country's history to the oldest.

When I left the Pentagon in 1977, the Carter administration reversed many of our decisions seemingly just because they were made by the prior administration. I was not going to do the same. I wanted to understand the rationale behind the Clinton administration's decisions before making changes.

Eleven days before the inauguration, I met with President Clinton's outgoing defense secretary, Bill Cohen. I had known him when he was a Republican senator from Maine and was eager to hear his thoughts. Measured and knowledgeable, he touched on more than fifty issues he expected I would have to deal with as his successor. A number of them proved prescient. He mentioned the threat posed by Iraq's attacks on U.S. and British aircraft in the northern and southern no-fly zones. Noting the recent terrorist bombing of the USS Cole Cole in Yemen, he raised the dangers posed by al-Qaida and its leader, Osama bin Laden. He also suggested that it might make sense to appoint a combatant commander to be in charge of protecting the American homeland from attack. in Yemen, he raised the dangers posed by al-Qaida and its leader, Osama bin Laden. He also suggested that it might make sense to appoint a combatant commander to be in charge of protecting the American homeland from attack.3 Cohen's briefing was enormously helpful as I prepared to testify as a nominee for secretary of defense for the second time. Cohen's briefing was enormously helpful as I prepared to testify as a nominee for secretary of defense for the second time.

When I was nominated by President Ford in 1975, the major issue of the day had been detente with the Soviet Union. Now, with the Cold War behind us, there had been upbeat talk during the 1990s of a "peace dividend" that would allow the U.S. government to spend more on domestic programs by reducing investment in national security. Some a.n.a.lysts and scholars had argued that we were at the "end of history"-that the United States and its democratic principles were beyond ideological challenge in the world.4 If the world was moving steadily and irreversibly toward democracy and capitalism as some claimed, perhaps there was less need for a robust U.S. national security strategy. Focusing only on the short term and the immediate rather than taking time to consider longer-term potential challenges is an understandable temptation. There is often pressure for the seemingly urgent to crowd out the important. The postCold War holiday from strategic thought that characterized much of the prior decade turned out to be not a luxury but a dangerous misjudgment. Overconfidence had sp.a.w.ned complacency. U.S. intelligence capabilities had atrophied, and U.S. operations from Somalia to Haiti had communicated uncertain American resolve. The problems of Islamist extremism, the nuclear weapons programs of North Korea and Iran, the threats from ballistic missile programs, and the crumbling of the United Nations' containment measures for Iraq had been exacerbated.

I doubted we had reached a golden era when nations would pound their swords into plowshares. If there was anything new at the dawn of the twenty-first century, it was the status of the United States as the sole great power in the world, voluntarily shouldering enormous responsibilities for global humanitarian a.s.sistance, peace, and prosperity. Dean Rusk, the secretary of state during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, once observed that "only one-third of the world is asleep at any given time and the other two-thirds is up to something."5 Though to many our world seemed relatively peaceful, we needed to understand that the world of the twenty-first century, with weapons of unprecedented lethality and availability, is dangerous and untidy. Though to many our world seemed relatively peaceful, we needed to understand that the world of the twenty-first century, with weapons of unprecedented lethality and availability, is dangerous and untidy.6 Not surprisingly, many of the questions at my Senate confirmation hearing tended toward short-term political considerations rather than long-term strategic considerations. The most contentious issue was Bush's call to withdraw the United States from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Among other provisions, the treaty, signed by the Americans and the Soviets during the Nixon era, barred even the testing of antimissile technologies, let alone any deployment. Bush wanted out of the treaty so we could proceed with the development of a missile defense program.

In 1983, I was present in the White House when President Reagan announced his ballistic missile defense initiative. Though critics on the left derided his plan as an attempt to achieve Star Wars Star Warslike armaments, Reagan was a strong proponent. Bush now hoped to carry Reagan's legacy forward by building on two decades of planning, research, and design, and get to the point of actually deploying an operational system.

With the Soviet empire gone, with the Russian government seeking improved relations with the West, and with a number of impressive technological advances, I was surprised to see what had changed in congressional discussions of the issue-practically nothing. Opponents of Bush's plan used arguments almost identical to those wielded against Reagan. Sometimes they were the same arguments from the same people.

Critics were still contending that a missile defense program was not technologically feasible. Increasingly, however, testing indicated that such a system could work. Of course the tests also included some failures. But as I learned from my time in the pharmaceutical business, the development of important products often requires years of trial and error, and a failure can be a valuable learning experience. A zero-failure mentality means no one will try anything, and nothing new will be developed.

Critics also contended the system would cost too much. I pointed out that the defense budget was less than 3 percent of our country's gross domestic product, and that missile defense was less than 3 percent of the defense budget. Was the prospect of protecting Los Angeles or Atlanta from a dictator with a rogue missile not worth that cost? It seemed that a number of the biggest spenders in Congress suddenly became penny-pinchers to block defense programs they opposed.

Some senators argued that missile defense would be destabilizing, and lead to a new arms race or alienate the Russians.7 In answering their concerns on this score, I recalled lessons that had been reinforced when I chaired the Ballistic Missile Threat Commission. "The problem with ballistic missiles, with weapons of ma.s.s destruction...," I suggested, "is they work without being fired." In answering their concerns on this score, I recalled lessons that had been reinforced when I chaired the Ballistic Missile Threat Commission. "The problem with ballistic missiles, with weapons of ma.s.s destruction...," I suggested, "is they work without being fired."8 To the extent that hostile regimes or terrorists could threaten America, our interests, our friends, and our allies with ballistic missiles or chemical or biological weapons, they could alter our behavior and perhaps cause us to acquiesce to actions that we would otherwise resist. Further, our lack of a missile defense system encouraged enemies to invest in offensive missiles to which we remained vulnerable. With an increasing number of nations working to advance their ballistic missile technology, vulnerability was not a strategy I favored for America in the twenty-first century. To the extent that hostile regimes or terrorists could threaten America, our interests, our friends, and our allies with ballistic missiles or chemical or biological weapons, they could alter our behavior and perhaps cause us to acquiesce to actions that we would otherwise resist. Further, our lack of a missile defense system encouraged enemies to invest in offensive missiles to which we remained vulnerable. With an increasing number of nations working to advance their ballistic missile technology, vulnerability was not a strategy I favored for America in the twenty-first century.

Those arguments made little headway with senators such as Carl Levin, then the ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee. Over the years I would differ many times with Levin, who often wore his partisan-s.h.i.+p, like his half-gla.s.ses, right on the tip of his nose. Levin cloaked his pa.s.sion with his studied prosecutorial demeanor but seemed curiously immune to reason on missile defense.

After forging no new ground on missile defense, the senators at the hearing turned to other matters. Senator Pat Roberts posed what I thought was the most interesting and important question at my confirmation hearing. "What's the one big thing that keeps you up at night?" the Kansan asked. There were a number of things I might have mentioned-North Korea, Iran, Iraq, nuclear proliferation, cyberwarfare, or terrorism. But if anything were to keep me up at night, I knew it was my concern about the quality of our intelligence. As I had said to Bush during our meeting in Austin, our country's most important national security challenge was "improving our intelligence capabilities so that we know more about what people think and how they behave and how their behavior can be altered."9 We needed an ability to uncover what our enemies were thinking and what motivated them. I believed that with more knowledge of that sort we would be better able to alter an enemy's behavior before they launched an attack, rather than waiting and having to take action after an attack. We needed an ability to uncover what our enemies were thinking and what motivated them. I believed that with more knowledge of that sort we would be better able to alter an enemy's behavior before they launched an attack, rather than waiting and having to take action after an attack.10 The hearing ended on a pleasant note when my confirmation received the committee's unanimous support.* Among others, Senator d.i.c.k Durbin, a Democrat from my home state of Illinois, said positive words about my record in government and on the wrestling mat. I knew enough about Was.h.i.+ngton to suspect that, given the decisions ahead, such approbation was unlikely to last. Among others, Senator d.i.c.k Durbin, a Democrat from my home state of Illinois, said positive words about my record in government and on the wrestling mat. I knew enough about Was.h.i.+ngton to suspect that, given the decisions ahead, such approbation was unlikely to last.

Six days after the President was inaugurated, Joyce and our family were welcomed to the White House for my public swearing-in ceremony. I had been privately sworn in right after the inauguration parade so I could begin my duties at the Department of Defense immediately, but the public event was special for Joyce and me because of those who had gathered with our family. Judge Larry Silberman, a friend and colleague from the Nixon, Ford, and Reagan administrations, performed the ceremony. I was again in the Oval Office with d.i.c.k Cheney for the first time in twenty-four years.

"Don asked me to join him here in the White House staff, some thirty-two years ago, and [it] was a turning point for me, from the standpoint of my career," the new Vice President recalled.11 "From that day on, he kept me busy enough so that I forgot about my graduate studies, gave up any idea of ever returning to academia, and set me on a path that I've never regretted." "From that day on, he kept me busy enough so that I forgot about my graduate studies, gave up any idea of ever returning to academia, and set me on a path that I've never regretted."

d.i.c.k noted that we'd both gone on to hold jobs as White House chief of staff and secretary of defense. "Some regard him as the best secretary of defense we ever had," Cheney said. Then with a smile he added, "I would say he was one of the best."

To commemorate the moment, Vice President Cheney later sent me two pictures. One was of the two of us as young men when we worked together at the Office of Economic Opportunity in the Nixon administration. The second was a more recent picture of us from the swearing-in ceremony. At the bottom, Cheney had written, "To Don, here we go again."

CHAPTER 22