Powell Expresses Concerns About Bush Nominee
By DOUGLAS JEHL, The New York Times
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Powell's associates say he was troubled by Bolton's treatment of others at the State Department.
WASHINGTON (April 21) - President Bush on Thursday issued a strong new defense of John R. Bolton, his nominee as ambassador to the United Nations. But associates of Colin L. Powell, the former secretary of state, said he had expressed reservations about Mr. Bolton in conversations with at least two wavering Republican senators.
The associates said Mr. Powell, in private telephone conversations, had made clear his concerns about Mr. Bolton on several fronts, including his harsh treatment of subordinates.
The associates said Mr. Powell had also praised Mr. Bolton's performance on some matters during his tenure as under secretary of state, but they said Mr. Powell had stopped well short of the endorsements offered by Mr. Bush and by Mr. Powell's own successor, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
The accounts of Mr. Powell's private messages about Mr. Bolton suggested a new gulf between the former secretary of state and Mr. Bush. In a speech in Washington on Thursday, Mr. Bush portrayed Democratic opposition to Mr. Bolton as politically driven, and urged the Senate to confirm the nomination.
Mr. Bush's comment and others by a White House spokesman suggested that the administration was determined to defend Mr. Bolton's nomination, despite crumbling support among Senate Republicans that has left the nomination in peril.
In his speech on Thursday, to the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America, Mr. Bush brought up the subject quickly, saying, "I welcome you to the nation's capital, where sometimes politics gets in the way of doing the people's business."
"Take John Bolton, the good man I nominated to represent our country at the United Nations," Mr. Bush said. "John's distinguished career in service to our nation demonstrates that he is the right man at the right time for this important assignment. I urge the Senate to put politics aside and confirm John Bolton to the United Nations."
Mr. Powell has not spoken publicly about the Bolton nomination. But his associates said he had told two Republican senators, Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, that he had been troubled by the way Mr. Bolton had treated an intelligence analyst and others at the State Department who had disagreed with him.
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Mr. Chafee and Mr. Hagel, both members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, have expressed concern about Mr. Bolton's temperament, credibility and treatment of intelligence analysts. The senators' concerns, with those of Senator George V. Voinovich, the Ohio Republican, were among the factors that led the committee to postpone a vote on Mr. Bolton's nomination until next month.
Accounts were conflicting as to whether Mr. Powell or the senators had initiated the phone calls. A spokeswoman for Mr. Powell said he had only returned calls from others, but one person familiar with one conversation said it had been Mr. Powell who had reached out to Mr. Hagel.
In testifying against Mr. Bolton's nomination, Carl W. Ford Jr., a former assistant secretary of state, told the committee that Mr. Powell had acted in 2002 to reassure intelligence analysts troubled by Mr. Bolton's harsh treatment of one of their colleagues, Christian P. Westermann, in a dispute related to Cuba. Mr. Powell's former chief of staff, Lawrence Wilkerson, said in an interview this week that Mr. Bolton would be an "abysmal ambassador" to the United Nations.
This month, five former Republican secretaries of state signed a letter to the Senate committee that endorsed Mr. Bolton's nomination, but Mr. Powell was not among them. In a telephone conversation with Mr. Chafee, the associates said, Mr. Powell said he had not joined in the endorsement in part because he did not normally sign group letters, but also because he believed such endorsements were appropriate only in cases where his point of view was clear cut.
Told of the accounts provided by Mr. Powell's associates, Peggy Cifrino, a spokeswoman for Mr. Powell, said in an e-mail message: "To be precise, General Powell has returned calls from senators who wanted to discuss specific questions that have been raised. He has not reached out to senators. The general considers the discussions private."
Mr. Powell was secretary of state under Mr. Bush for nearly four years, and told associates in 2004 that he was looking forward to returning to private life. But he was described by some associates as hurt that Mr. Bush, in selecting Ms. Rice as the new secretary, did not ask Mr. Powell if he wanted to stay.
Mr. Powell remains highly regarded by many moderate Republicans, but as secretary of state, his relationship with Vice President Dick Cheney was notably strained, according to many accounts, including a detailed narrative in "Plan of Attack," the latest book by Bob Woodward of The Washington Post.
Mr. Cheney is now regarded as Mr. Bolton's chief patron in the administration, and some |
