Tough Love

by Susan Rice

  “mixed, Jim Crow facilities”: Letter from Leon A. Dickson to his parents sent from Tuskegee Army Airfield, Alabama, July 6, 1945. Copy in possession of author.

  “psychological impact of that kind”: Dickson, Memoirs of an Isolate, p. 16.

  “Colored girls of beauty”: Ibid., p. 25.

  born a slave in South Carolina in 1845: Mildred L. Rice Jordan, Reclaiming African American Students: Legacies, Lessons, and Prescriptions: The Bordentown School (Bloomington, IN: iUniverse, 2017).

  Upon his return to Laurens County: Ibid., p. 4.

  Rev. Walter Rice spent ten years: Ibid.

  Its ranks gradually filled: “Report of the Manual Training and Industrial School Located at Bordentown—1894–95,” Annual Report of the Board of Education and of the Superintendent of Public Instruction of New Jersey, 1895 (Trenton, NJ: The John L. Murphy Publishing Company, 1896), p. 337, in Jordan, Reclaiming African American Students, p. 6.

  ranging from Latin to physics: Ibid.

  Great-grandfather Walter Rice died in 1899: Report of Death, Walter A. S. Rice, January 4, 1899, New Brunswick, NJ. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, NJ. Copy in possession of author.

  first to teaching and later to the ministry: Centennial Encyclopedia of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Vol. 1, Richard R. Wright, ed. (Philadelphia, PA: Book Concern of the AME Church, 1916), p. 281.

  Chairman of the Laurens County Republican Party: “Abstract from the Election Returns for 1870,” Reports and Resolutions of the General Assembly of the State of South Carolina, Regular Session, 1870–1871 (Columbia, SC: Republican Printing Company, 1871), p. 499; “List of School Commissioners,” p. 416.

  In 1880, he was badly beaten: “Exhibit E,” Papers and Testimony in the Contested Election Case of C. J. Stolbrand vs. D. Wyatt Aiken from the Third Congressional District of South Carolina, House of Representatives, Forty-seventh Congress, First Session, Miscellaneous Document No. 23 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1882), p. 85.

  Emmett enjoyed a comfortable early childhood: Emmett J. Rice, “Education of an Economist: From Fulbright Scholar to the Federal Reserve Board, 1951–1979,” an oral history conducted in 1984 by Gabrielle Morris. Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1991, p. 4.

  “There was a great deal of prejudice”: Ibid., p. 11.

  “a child of the Depression”: Ibid., p. 13.

  “Many black pilots thought”: Interview of Emmett J. Rice conducted by John “Jake” Rice-Cameron, Washington, D.C., February 2010. Transcript in possession of the author.

  “consciousness of being black”: Rice, “Education of an Economist,” p. 64.

  I concluded that I am only one person: Ibid., p. vi.

  CHAPTER 2: COMING UP

  “the forbidden six”: Red Book: Students’ Handbook of Radcliffe College, 1951–52, Issued by the Student Government Association of Radcliffe College, p. 84.

  “Cambridge is a well-stocked hunting ground”: Ibid., pp. 97, 99.

  She ultimately won a hotly contested battle: “Dickson Wins Radcliffe Race for SGA President Position,” The Crimson, March 19, 1953.

  “Both foreign and American friends”: Emmett J. Rice, “Education of an Economist: From Fulbright Scholar to the Federal Reserve Board, 1951–1979,” an oral history conducted in 1984 by Gabrielle Morris. Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1991, pp. iv–v.

  “It was the first living experience”: Ibid., p. 39.

  “It was much harder to get a job”: Ibid., p. 42.

  “making statements like that to foreigners”: Ibid., p. 43.

  “They did not like the idea”: Ibid., p. 55.

  “It was my job,” Dad said: Interview of Emmett J. Rice conducted by John “Jake” Rice-Cameron, Washington, D.C.: February 2010. Transcript in possession of the author.

  “I could not have worked in the [U.S.] Treasury”: Rice, “Education of an Economist,” p. 60.

  “It was possible for a black person”: Ibid., p. 41.

  On takeoff, the Boeing 707’s: Aviation Safety Network Accident Report, TWA Boeing 707-331 N761TW, May 29, 1964, Paris-Orly Airport, France. Flight Safety Foundation, http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19640529-2.

  CHAPTER 3: GROWING UP TOO SOON

  Named senior vice president for planning: “Rice Named to High Post with NBW,” Washington Post, January 11, 1973, p. D7.

  Americans to attend college since 1973: Email to Alexander Cox from Ed Pacchetti, U.S. Department of Education dated April 24, 2019, in which it is confirmed: “The number of unduplicated BEOG/Pell Grant recipients from the 1973–74 award year to present is approximately 80 million. This number has been validated by multiple teams at FSA using student-level data from our archived data and the current origination/disbursement system…” Email in the possession of the author.

  CHAPTER 6: BUSTING OUT

  collection of the best African American Art: Fired Up! Ready to Go! Finding Beauty, Demanding Equity: An African American Life in Art. The Collections of Peggy Cooper Cafritz. Peggy Cooper Cafritz and Charmaine Picard, eds. (New York, NY: Rizzoli Electra, 2018).

  CHAPTER 7: ROOKIE SEASON

  “saved at least a third”: Interview of President Bill Clinton, CNBC, March 13, 2013.

  “jamming is an ineffective”: “Memorandum for Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, National Security Council,” U.S. Department of Defense. May 5, 1994, https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB53/rw050594.pdf.

  “If there’s any particular magic”: State Department Briefing, Federal News Service, June 10, 1994.

  “protect threatened civilians”: Marlise Simons, “France Is Sending Force to Rwanda to Help Civilians,” New York Times, June 23, 1994, https://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/23/world/france-is-sending-force-to-rwanda-to-help-civilians.html.

  decided to deploy the U.S. military: Ray Wilkinson, “Heart of Darkness,” Refugees Magazine, Issue 110, UNHCR, December 1, 1997, http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/publications/refugeemag/3b6925384/refugees-magazine-issue-110-crisis-great-lakes-cover-story-heart-darkness.html.

  CHAPTER 9: STORMING STATE

  Indeed, in 1999, Ethiopian forces: “Ethiopia Admits Killing European Nationals in Plane Shooting,” The Guardian, September 1, 1999, https://www.theguardian.com/world/1999/sep/01/ethiopia.

  CHAPTER 10: “I REMEMBER WHEN I TOO WAS A YOUNG ASSISTANT SECRETARY”

  Susan Bartley lost both: My American colleagues killed in the Al Qaeda attack on Embassy Nairobi were: Jesse Nathan Aliganga Jr., Julian Bartley Sr., Julian Bartley Jr., Jean Rose Dalizu, Molly Huckaby Hardy, Kenneth Ray Hobson, Prabhi Guptara Kavaler, Arlene Kirk, Mary Louise Martin, Ann Michelle O’Connor, Sherry Lynn Olds, and Uttamlal T. Shah, https://1997-2001.state.gov/regions/africa/board_victims.html.

  It was selected largely because: Tim Weiner and James Risen, “Decision to Strike Factory in Sudan Based on Surmise Inferred from Evidence,” New York Times, September 21, 1998, https://www.nytimes.com/1998/09/21/world/decision-to-strike-factory-in-sudan-based-on-surmise-inferred-from-evidence.html.

  CHAPTER 11: GOING GLOBAL

  September 11 might have been prevented: David Rose, “The Osama Files,” Vanity Fair, January 2002, http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2002/01/osama200201/, accessed July 15, 2017.

  The fact is members of the Clinton Administration: Letters to the Editor, Vanity Fair, March 2002, pp. 94–96.

  The article exposed the biases: Ruth Shalit, “J’Accuse!,” Elle, Number 201, May 2002, p. 226.

  She had dreams of becoming the first: Ibid.

  “You have got people saying”: Ibid., p. 227.

  In the Post, they again targeted me: Tim Carney and Mansoor Ijaz, “Intelligence Failure? Let’s Go Back to Sudan,” Washington Post, June 30, 2002, https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2002/06/30/intelligence-failure-lets-go-back-to-sudan/1b8e47a7-a603-4657-aef9-ffb4c4b83276/?utm_term=.df65d75f0
43c.

  “after many interviews”: Statement by Daniel Byman, Professional Staff Member and Leader of the “Lookback” Team, Joint Inquiry into Intelligence Community Activities before and after the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001. May 20, 2019 email in the possession of the author.

  “Jesse Jackson won South Carolina”: David Catanese, “Bill Clinton’s 2 a.m. Phone Call to Jim Clyburn,” U.S. News & World Report, February 11, 2014, https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/02/11/bill-clintons-2-am-phone-call-to-jim-clyburn/, accessed October 27, 2018.

  “working, hard-working Americans”: May 7, 2008: “I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on,” she said in an interview with USA Today. As evidence, Clinton cited an Associated Press article “that found how Sen. Obama’s support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me.” “There’s a pattern emerging here,” she said. https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-05-07-clintoninterview_N.htm; https://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/08/clinton-touts-white-support/.

  CHAPTER 12: REPRESENT

  “As in previous administrations”: “Remarks of President-elect Barack Obama, Announcement of National Security Team,” The Office of the President-elect, December 1, 2008. https://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20090501163714/http://change.gov/newsroom/entry/key_members_of_obama_biden_national_security_team_announced/.

  “The people of Maine are proud”: Nomination of Hon. Susan E. Rice to Be U.N. Representative. Hearing Before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, One Hundred Eleventh Congress, First Session, January 15, 2009, pp. 1–3.

  “the peace and security”: https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-barack-obama-prague-delivered.

  “We need the United Nations”: “Obama’s National Security Team Announcement.”

  Only several years later: Matthew Rosenberg, “Obama Won’t Stay at Waldorf Astoria for U.N. Event; Security Concerns Are Cited,” New York Times, September 11, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/12/us/politics/white-house-spurns-waldorf-astoria-out-of-security-concerns.html.

  “Our opposition to the resolution”: Explanation of Vote by Ambassador Susan E. Rice on the Resolution on the Situation in the Middle East, including the question of Palestine, in the Security Council Chamber, February 18, 2011.

  “Todah rabah. Erev Tov”: “The Responsibility We Share for Our Common Future,” remarks by Ambassador Susan E. Rice, U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, at the Israeli Presidential Conference 2009, Facing Tomorrow, Jerusalem, October 21, 2009.

  CHAPTER 13: HIGH-STAKES DIPLOMACY

  U.S.-Iran military-to-military hotline: Jay Solomon, “Iran Rejects Proposed U.S. Military Hot Line,” Wall Street Journal, October 4, 2011, https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052970203791904576609093178338996.

  Next, in September, the U.S. revealed: David E. Sanger and William J. Broad, “U.S. and Allies Warn Iran over Nuclear ‘Deception,’ ” New York Times, September 25, 2009, https://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/26/world/middleeast/26nuke.html.

  On the record, I sharply condemned: “Rice Arrival Statement in Nairobi, Kenya,” U.S. Department of State, accessed on Reliefweb, November 21, 2000, https://reliefweb.int/report/sudan/rice-arrival-statement-nairobi-kenya-assesses-humanitarian-conditions-southern-sudan.

  “We have got to think about giving out cookies”: Stephanie McCrummen, “U.S. Envoy’s Outreach to Sudan Is Criticized as Naïve,” Washington Post, September 29, 2009, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/28/AR2009092802336.html.

  CHAPTER 14: THE ARAB SPRING COMES TO NEW YORK

  The Libyan army fired directly: https://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/05/world/africa/05nations.html?ref=world.

  “Prepare yourselves”: David D. Kirkpatrick and Kareem Fahim, “Qaddafi Warns of Assault on Benghazi as U.N. Vote Nears,” New York Times, March 17, 2011, https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/18/world/africa/18libya.html.

  “Many Libyan parents”: Rod Nordland, “In Libyan Rebel Capital, Shouts of Thanks to America and the West,” New York Times, May 28, 2011.

  CHAPTER 15: STAR WARS CANTINA

  “The U.S. is disgusted”: Colum Lynch and Alice Fordham, “Russia, China Block U.N. Vote,” Washington Post, February 5, 2012.

  “Sometimes it’s a little bit”: Karen Tanabe, “Susan Rice Talks United Nations and ‘Star Wars,’ ” Politico, August 16, 2011, https://www.politico.com/blogs/click/2011/08/susan-rice-talks-united-nations-and-star-wars-038408.

  Chapter 16: Benghazi

  “It’s disgraceful that”: “What They Said, Before and After the Attack in Libya,” New York Times, September 12, 2012, https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/09/12/us/politics/libya-statements.html?hp.

  The currently available information: “Benghazi Talking Points Timeline,” ABC News, page 8, http://abcnews.go.com/images/Politics/Benghazi%20Talking%20Points%20Timeline.pdf.

  “a widespread cover-up”: Hannity, Fox News, September 20, 2012.

  “She [Ambassador Rice] goes out”: The Five, Fox News, September 21, 2012.

  “You made several troubling statements”: Letter from Senators McCain, Graham, Johnson, and Ayotte to Ambassador Susan Rice, September 25, 2012.

  “I believe she should resign”: Rep. Peter King on CNN, speaking to Wolf Blitzer, September 28, 2012.

  We later learned: U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, “Review of the Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Facilities in Benghazi, Libya,” pp. 40–41.

  “It remains unclear if any group”: Ibid.

  “Madam Ambassador, he [the Libyan president]”: Face the Nation, CBS News, September 16, 2012, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/face-the-nation-transcripts-september-16-2012-libyan-pres-magariaf-amb-rice-and-sen-mccain/2/.

  As the Intelligence Community collects: Shawn Turner, “Statement by the Director of Public Affairs for ODNI on the Intelligence Related to the Terrorist Attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya,” Office of the Director of National Intelligence, September 28, 2012, https://www.dni.gov/index.php/newsroom/press-releases/press-releases-2012/item/731-statement-by-the-director-of-public-affairs-for-odni-shawn-turner-on-the-intelligence-related-to-the-terrorist-attack-on-the-u-s-consulate-in-benghazi-libya.

  the Intelligence Community again adjusted: Michael Morell, The Great War of Our Time: The CIA’s Fight Against Terrorism from Al Qa’ida to ISIS (New York: Twelve, 2015), pp. 206–9. Also Eric Schmitt, “After the Benghazi Attack, Talk Lagged Behind Intelligence,” New York Times, October 21, 2012.

  “not a highly coordinated plot”: U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, “Review of the Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Facilities in Benghazi, Libya,” p. 40.

  “The U.S. ambassador”: “Libyan President Says 50 Arrested in U.S. Consulate Attack,” Reuters, September 16, 2012.

  “But in the days after”: David Kirkpatrick, “Election-Year Stakes Overshadow Nuances of the Libya Investigation,” New York Times, October 15, 2012.

  What I repeatedly said: Morell, The Great War of Our Time, pp. 205–6.

  Our current assessment: Meet the Press, NBC News, September 16, 2012, http://www.nbcnews.com/id/49051097/ns/meet_the_press-transcripts/t/september-benjamin-netanyahu-susan-rice-keith-ellison-peter-king-bob-woodward-jeffrey-goldberg-andrea-mitchell/#.W-XUt5NKhPZ.

  Subsequent investigations: David Kirkpatrick, “Deadly Mix in Benghazi: False Allies, Crude Video,” New York Times, December 28, 2013. Also Morell, The Great War of Our Time, pp. 205–6.

  Among those who reportedly: Spencer Hsu and Ann Marimow, “Accused Benghazi Ringleader Convicted on Terrorism Charges in 2012 Attacks That Killed U.S. Ambassador,” Washington Post, November 28, 2017. Also Morell, The Great War of Our Time, p. 206.

  “if any Administration official”: Patrick Kennedy, “Testimony to the House Oversight Committee,” October 10, 2012, https://oversight.hous
e.gov/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/2012-10-10-Kennedy-testimony-Final1.pdf, as cited in Noah Schachtman and Robert Beckhusen, “State Department: We Monitored Libya Attack ‘In Almost Real Time,’ ” Wired, October 10, 2012.

  “This latest assault”: Mitt Romney speech at Virginia Military Institute, October 8, 2012, https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/10/08/mitt-romneys-remarks-at-virginia-military-institute/.

  “either incompetent or untrustworthy”: Sen. Lindsey Graham interview with Charles C. W. Cooke, The National Review, October 12, 2012, https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/senator-graham-secretary-state-susan-rice-impossible-charles-c-w-cooke/.

  “I’m particularly troubled”: John Kerry, “Kerry Defends Ambassador Rice Against Attacks,” United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, September 28, 2012.

  “In order to inform”: Elizabeth Titus, “Reid Defends Rice, W.H. on Libya,” Politico, September 29, 2012, https://www.politico.com/story/2012/09/reid-defends-rice-wh-on-libya-081813#ixzz2CETukEqe.

  “Secretary Clinton has done”: Commission on Presidential Debates, “October 16, 2012 Debate Transcript,” October 16, 2012, https://www.debates.org/voter-education/debate-transcripts/october-16-2012-the-second-obama-romney-presidential-debate/.

  “There was no demonstration”: Ibid.

  “The suggestion that anybody”: Ibid.

  “Susan Rice should have known better”: Fox and Friends, Fox News, November 14, 2012. Also Luke Johnson, “John McCain: I Would Block Susan Rice for Secretary of State,” Huffington Post, November 14, 2012, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/14/john-mccain-susan-rice_n_2128940.html.

  “not being very bright”: Sen. John McCain in conversation with Charlie Rose and Norah O’Donnell, CBS This Morning, November 14, 2012. Also Kevin Robillard, “McCain: Rice ‘Not Qualified’ for State,” Politico, November 14, 2012, https://www.politico.com/story/2012/11/mccain-rice-not-qualified-for-state-083824.