I devoted a lot of time during the Bush administration to trying to figure out how to close the detention center at Guantánamo Bay. My first major decision relating to the facility was shortly after I became secretary. In 2006, the Pentagon had asked for congressional approval to spend $102 million on a court complex at Gitmo for trying the detainees. The complex was to include two courtrooms, conference and meeting facilities, and housing for twelve hundred people. I directed that the proposal be killed and that plans be prepared for a temporary facility at about a tenth of the cost.
By 2007 the detention center had become almost luxurious, with exercise equipment including elliptical trainers, television rooms, reading rooms with literature and magazines in Arabic and other languages, and extraordinarily professional and well-trained prison guards. But due to highly publicized photographs of the initial rough conditions and reports of abusive interrogations of several high-value detainees during its first year in operation, Guantánamo still carried enormous negative baggage politically around the world. President Bush and Condi Rice had both said publicly that they would like to see it closed. I did as well.
The challenge all along was that some of the prisoners at Guantá-namo were declared enemies of the United States who made it quite clear that, if released, they would like nothing better than to kill more Americans. They therefore could not be released. If Guantánamo were closed, where would they be sent? Secretary Rice and I, in conversations with both the president and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in January 2007, urged that the prison be closed and suggested that perhaps the prisoners could be moved to military facilities in the United States, where they would remain in military custody and subject to military judicial proceedings. Cheney and Gonzales disliked that idea, with government lawyers arguing that bringing the prisoners to the United States could give them significant additional rights under the Constitution. Rice’s and my initiative went nowhere. I did not share with my Bush administration colleagues the letter of praise for these efforts that I received from the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union. As Bush 41 would say, Wouldn’t be prudent.
At a hearing on May 20, 2008, Senator Dianne Feinstein asked me for a progress report on Guantánamo. “The brutally frank answer is that we’re stuck and we’re stuck in several ways,” I said. Some detainees were ready to be sent home, but their governments didn’t want them or could not guarantee their safekeeping. (A recent suicide bomber in Mosul had been a released detainee.) In Congress, there was a “not in my backyard” mentality with regard to moving the worst of the worst to military or civilian prisons in the United States.
The last effort inside the Bush administration to close Guantánamo was during the summer of 2008, after a Supreme Court decision knocked down the administration’s position with respect to detainee rights, including denying them habeas corpus. There were two meetings in the latter half of June in the Roosevelt Room at the White House, the president’s day-to-day conference room. It has several paintings of both Franklin and Theodore Roosevelt and the latter’s Nobel Peace Prize medal, as well as the flags of the military services with historic battle streamers dating back to the Revolution. Chief of Staff Josh Bolten chaired the meetings, attended by Rice, Attorney General Mike Mukasey (who had replaced Gonzales the preceding November), me, the FBI director, a number of White House staff, including some from the vice president’s office, and more lawyers than I could count. We went around and around on the implications of the Supreme Court decision, the legal complications of bringing detainees to the United States, the administration’s losing streak in the courts, and the politics of the issue. Rice and I were the only two in the meetings who argued for an aggressive effort to get legislation that would permit us to close the prison. Some on the White House staff, such as the communications director, Ed Gillespie, were concerned how the Republican base would react and asked how we could protect the American people if we closed Gitmo. I responded that they should forget the politics and let the president seize a historic initiative.
Condi and I lost the argument, and the problem of closing the prison at Guantánamo would fall to the next president. He would find the challenge just as daunting. On October 20, 2008, I directed the Pentagon to begin contingency planning to close Gitmo if the new president was to order it on taking office in January. I said the planning should include legislative remedies to the risks posed by closing the facility, examination of the Navy brig in Charleston, South Carolina, as an alternative, and identifying the two or three safeguards we would need in legislation as we figured out what to do with the detainees.
Piracy and the effort to ban cluster munitions (weapons that eject multiple explosive bomblets designed to kill troops or destroy vehicles) consumed considerable time during the last months of the Bush administration. The munitions were widely used by the Soviets in Afghanistan, by U.S. forces along the Korean demilitarized zone, and by the Israelis against Hizballah in 2006. The United States had become increasingly isolated internationally on the cluster munitions issue, refusing to sign on to an international ban. At the end of June, the White House saw this as a burgeoning public relations problem and wanted me to speak out in defense of the munitions and why they were important. In a meeting, I said, “So you want me to be the poster boy for cluster munitions?” Cheney, with a bit of a smile, said, “Yes, just like I was with torture and Hadley was with land mines!” Steve told me he wanted to be able to tell the president that I had personally looked into this and believed that the munitions were vitally important.
I consulted with senior leaders at the Pentagon. Mike Mullen said cluster munitions were very important, very effective weapons. Eric Edelman said there was broad interagency agreement that the munitions had utility and that 90 percent of casualties from unexploded munitions are from conventional bombs. Banning cluster bombs therefore would increase the risk of innocent casualties because we would need to use more conventional bombs. The Marine commandant, General James T. Conway, observed that North Korea, Russia, Iran, and India all had cluster munitions and none would sign an agreement banning them. Our solution was to develop cluster munitions that would automatically deactivate after a certain time. We committed to replacing 99 percent of our cluster munitions over a ten-year period.
As for piracy, it had been a growing problem for years in the Strait of Malacca, between Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, through which a huge percentage of global seaborne commerce passes. We had worked with those three governments, and over time they greatly reduced the level of piracy. But pirates operating out of Somalia became increasingly emboldened as they encountered little opposition either from the ships they seized and held for ransom or from local or international forces. Also, they lived and recruited in areas of Somalia where there was no governance, and no foreign country—especially the United States—would send military forces to clean out the nests. As we spent more and more time in the Situation Room trying to figure out how to resolve the problem, Condi at one point exclaimed, “Pirates? Pirates? For God’s sake, the last American secretary of state to deal with pirates was Thomas Jefferson!” Over time the international community, led by NATO, assembled a substantial naval force in the region, including both Chinese and Russian navy ships, and shipowners began using more aggressive techniques to keep the pirates from boarding—removing ladders, using hoses, arming the crews, placing security teams aboard. These measures reduced the threat but did not end it. For poor Somalis, the risks of getting caught or killed paled compared to the money they could make.
The last two examples of unexpected challenges that consumed vast quantities of time and energy concern two individuals in uniform, one of whom had a bright future but baggage, the other a heroic Marine sergeant.
Lieutenant General Stan McChrystal was the commander of the Joint Special Operations Command from 2003 to 2008. In this capacity, he led U.S. Special Forces in both Iraq and Afghanistan in the conduct of clandestine operations to capture or kill members
of al Qaeda and insurgent leaders. His operations were remarkably successful, including the capture of Saddam Hussein and the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, and played a major role in the success of the surge in Iraq and the counterinsurgency in Afghanistan. I had come to know and admire McChrystal during my first year as secretary, and I believed he was perhaps the finest warrior and leader of men in combat I had ever met. I was determined to promote him to a higher level of responsibility. But I thought Stan would have some difficulty getting confirmed for higher rank and position. He had been “the tip of the spear” for nearly five years in two theaters of war. Given how controversial Iraq had become, and the experience of both Pete Pace and George Casey, I saw trouble on that front. McChrystal had also been one of the subjects of an investigation into the death by friendly fire of Corporal Pat Tillman because he signed off on a Silver Star medal for valor for Tillman with a citation that made no mention of friendly fire as the cause of his death. The Pentagon investigation of the case recommended that eight officers be disciplined, one of them McChrystal. The Army did not agree and took no action against him.
On top of all this, Senator Levin had been conducting an in-depth investigation of the treatment of detainees (which I thought had Rumsfeld as its target) and expressed concern about abuse of detainees in Afghanistan by troops under McChrystal’s command. Levin let me know there had been forty-five allegations of misconduct in his command and that he, Levin, intended to bring McChrystal in for a hearing. I had looked into McChrystal’s actions in the Tillman case and the allegations of detainee abuse and, after extensive discussions with Mullen and others, determined to move forward with his advancement.
McChrystal had been rumored to be a candidate for several four-star positions, including commander of Special Operations Command, replacing Petraeus in Iraq, and commander of Central Command. However, I believed that I first needed to get McChrystal confirmed by the Senate for an unobtrusive, noncontroversial staff job, a confirmation that, in effect, would give him a clean slate. Then, my thinking went, when I pushed him for a higher-visibility job and a fourth star, it would be hard for the Senate to oppose him without suggesting they had done an inadequate job of vetting him previously. And so I enthusiastically supported Mullen’s recommendation that Stan be nominated as director of the Joint Staff, an important position but one that operated under the Washington radar. It is a position from which most incumbents go on to a fourth star.
In February 2008, we moved on this plan. Senator McCain initially opposed McChrystal because of the Tillman case and Levin was opposed because of the detainee issue. The Senate Armed Services Committee intended to fight McChrystal’s nomination. I told the president, “McChrystal is one of the heroic figures of these wars, and if we won’t stand and fight for him, then who?” And so we fought. A nasty confirmation fight can get even a brave man down, and so I called Stan in early June to let him know that, based on personal experience, this was all about politics and that every senior officer who had fought in Iraq and Afghanistan was likely to face the same kind of challenge—a disgraceful reality. I told him that the president and I were prepared to fight for him. In a very rare Armed Services Committee hearing for a nominee to a three-star position, McChrystal did well in responding to the senators’ questions. In August, he became the director of the Joint Staff. The path was clear for more senior command and a fourth star, which would follow in less than a year.
Of the estimated forty million men and women who have served in the armed forces since the Civil War, fewer than 3,500 have received the Medal of Honor, the highest honor the United States can bestow, some 60 percent posthumously. Too few have been awarded in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, in which there have been so many heroic, selfless deeds. President Bush was, I think, always disappointed that he was unable to present the Medal of Honor to a single living recipient. I once asked Chiarelli why so few had been recommended. He said because medals had been passed out so freely in Vietnam, succeeding officers were determined to raise the bar. They had raised it too high, he thought.
It was a big deal when a recommendation for the Medal of Honor came to my office. Everyone on the staff would read the file and be in awe. Whether the recommended recipient was living or dead, the documentation was massive, with multiple eyewitness accounts, maps, photos, and the results of multiple investigations and reviews. The standard for a recipient is extraordinarily high: “There must be no margin of doubt or possibility of error in awarding this honor.” There are many layers of approval. By the time a recommendation came to my desk, almost without exception, any questions had been resolved and any doubts put aside.
One such exception landed on my desk in mid-2008, with the recommendation that U.S. Marine Corps Sergeant Rafael Peralta receive the Medal of Honor for his heroism and self-sacrifice in the second battle of Fallujah on November 15, 2004. Peralta had volunteered for a house-clearing mission and, when entering the fourth house, had opened a door and was hit several times with AK-47 fire. As two other Marines entered behind him, an insurgent threw a grenade that surely would have killed them except that, according to eyewitnesses, Peralta pulled the grenade under his body, absorbing the blast. He was killed; the other Marines survived. The medal recommendation had been endorsed by the proper chain of approval, including the secretary of the Navy and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. However, the documentation also included dissenting views from the medical forensic community and the undersecretary for personnel and readiness. As a result, I personally interviewed several senior officers in Peralta’s chain of command, and in light of the unanimous support of the entire unformed leadership involved, I approved the recommendation. I was satisfied that Sergeant Peralta met all the criteria and deserved the Medal of Honor.
After I signed the recommendation to the president, I was informed that a complaint had been made to the department’s inspector general that Peralta could not have consciously taken the action credited with saving the two other Marines’ lives and therefore did not meet the criteria for the award. The inspector general intended to carry out an investigation unless I took some action to deal with the complaint. After consulting with a number of senior leaders, including Mike Mullen, I decided that the only way to clear the air quietly was to ask a special panel to look into the allegation. Chaired by a retired former Multinational Corps–Iraq commanding general, the panel included a retired Medal of Honor recipient, a neurosurgeon, and two forensic pathologists. The panel was given access to all available information, including detailed medical reports; interviewed numerous subject matter experts; conducted a recreation of the event; and inspected the available evidence. The panel concluded unanimously that, with his wounds, Peralta could not have consciously pulled the grenade under him. I had no choice but to withdraw my approval. Perhaps someday, should additional evidence and analysis come to light, the criteria for the award will be deemed to have been met, and Sergeant Peralta will receive the Medal of Honor. Regardless, there is no doubt he was a hero.
Every day, for four and a half years, issues like these came to me for decision, adjudication, or resolution. Nearly all, one way or another, affected the lives and careers of men and women who had rendered significant service to our country. Some decisions brought pain, others pleasure—for those affected and for me. In the evenings, when my wife would sometimes ask me how my day had gone, I’d just have to reply, “One damn thing after another.”
CHAPTER 8
Transition
I did not enjoy being secretary of defense. As soldiers would put it, I had too many rocks in my rucksack: foreign wars, war with Congress, war with my own department, one crisis after another. Above all, I had to send young men and women in harm’s way. Visiting them on the front lines and seeing the miserable conditions in which they lived, seeing them in hospitals, writing condolence letters to their families, and going to their funerals took a great toll on me. In Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book Team of Rivals, she
wrote of President Lincoln’s secretary of war, Edwin Stanton, who, after making a decision that would lead to a soldier’s death, was found “leaning over a desk, his face buried in his hands and his heavy frame shaking with sobs. ‘God help me to do my duty. God help me to do my duty!’ he was repeating in a low wail of anguish.” I wrote out that passage and kept it in my desk.
I wrote earlier that my time as secretary had two themes, war and love—the latter referring to my feelings about the troops. Sometime in 2008 I began telling troops in the war zones and elsewhere that I felt a sense of responsibility for them as if they were my own sons and daughters. I did not exaggerate. Nothing moved me more than a simple “thanks” from a soldier, and nothing made me madder than when I learned that one of them was being badly treated by his or her service or the Pentagon bureaucracy. My senior military assistants spent a huge amount of time helping individual young men and women in uniform who encountered indifference or neglect when faced with a problem; usually I would learn of such things in a letter sent to me, or see something in the media, or hear something in a meeting with troops. Whether it was getting new washing machines for a remote forward operating base in Afghanistan or helping a young Marine with post-traumatic stress cope with the bureaucracy, no problem was too trivial. I wanted those troops to know I would do anything to help them—and I hoped that word would spread. I also wanted to set an example: if I could make time to try to help a single soldier, then by God so could everyone else in authority. I knew my overwhelming love and sense of responsibility for the troops, along with my deep conviction that we had to succeed in these wars, would lead me to stay on as secretary if asked by a new president.
Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War Page 33