The Confidante: Condoleezza Rice and the Creation of the Bush Legacy

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		The Confidante: Condoleezza Rice and the Creation of the Bush Legacy
		The Confidante: Condoleezza Rice and the Creation of the Bush Legacy

基本信息·出版社：St. Martin's Press
·页码：304 页
·出版日期：2007年09月
·ISBN：031236380X
·International Standard Book Number：031236380X
·条形码：9780312363802
·EAN：9780312363802
·装帧：精装
·正文语种：英语

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In his riveting glimpse into the life of one of the most powerful Secretaries of State in recent years, Washington Post diplomatic correspondent Glenn Kessler provides not only a revealing look at Condoleezza Rice but a rich portrait of the Bush administration’s controversial foreign policy regime. From her grievous errors in judgment as national security advisor to her notable influence over the president as Secretary of State, Rice has not gone unnoticed during her rise to power. But, as an intensely private person, she has—despite endless media attention—remained a mystery. As the first critical examination of Rice's skills as policy-maker, politician and manager, this definitive biography explains not only her rise to power, but the pivotal role she has played in our nation’s history.
 
Full of candor as well as honesty, The Confidante shows unseen moments in Rice’s life and of her frequently divisive performance during one of the most tumultuous foreign-policy periods in U.S. history. Drawing on personal interviews with Rice, an intimacy afforded to Kessler as one of the few reporters granted the opportunity to travel with her, Kessler takes readers inside the secret meetings Rice has held with foreign leaders and even her private conversations with President Bush. With access to all of Rice's top aides and sources in many overseas governments, Kessler also provides dramatic new information about one of the most secretive administrations in U.S. history.  He shows how Rice molded herself into the image of a globe-trotting diplomatic super star, negating memories of her past failures. He exposes new details about her secret role in Israel's withdrawal from Gaza, her maneuvers around government bureaucracy to strike a pivotal nuclear-energy deal with India, her persuasion of Bush to support a dramatic gesture to Iran, her failure to prevent the North Korean nuclear test, and her struggle to contain the devastating war between Israel and Lebanon. This brilliantly written book reveals not only her public and private humiliation of foreign officials but also how her charm and grace have been successful assets in repairing fractured relations overseas.
 
Condoleezza Rice remains today and in the future one of the most alluring, controversial, and ultimately influential decision makers in the United States. With this captivating work, Kessler shows what traits could solidify her shot at greatness or what cracks in her hard veneer could send her career hurtling to ruin.
作者简介 GLENN KESSLER is a diplomatic correspondent for The Washington Post and has been recipient of numerous awards, including two shared Pulitzer Prizes. Kessler, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, has reported from dozens of countries and also has covered the White House and Congress. He is a graduate of Brown University and Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs and lives in McLean, Virginia.
编辑推荐 "A tour de force. I have followed Rice for years, yet reading this book I feel like I only now understand her."--Thomas E. Ricks, author of Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq "Kessler, in this timely and important book, identifies the principal weakness of Rice’s stewardship as the absence of any 'coherent foreign policy vision,' especially regarding the Middle East.  The calamitous consequences for America of this shortcoming are likely to be felt for years to come."--Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security advisor, 1977-1981 
  
"Glenn Kessler is a tough, independent beat reporter of the old school. His chronicle of Condoleezza Rice's turn as Secretary of State is meticulous and fair, but it provides a devastating account of how Rice's diplomacy often rested on wish and illusion, and was finally overwhelmed by the Bush Administration's failed foreign policies."--Steve Coll, author of Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001
 
"Glenn Kessler has amassed a wealth of new material about Condoleezza Rice and the people around her. If you want to get beyond the image-makers and find out what Condoleezza Rice has actually been doing as secretary of state, this is the right book for you."--James Mann, Johns Hopkins University and author of Rise of the Vulcans: The History of the Bush War Cabinet
 
“As foreign policy tutor, security adviser, and now as secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice has stood at the center of George Bush’s foreign policy from day one. Glenn Kessler provides a fair and balanced assessment of how Rice’s actions and inactions in these first incarnations made her job of guiding foreign policy now so much more difficult. A masterful treatment that is bound to stand the test of time.”--Ivo Daalder, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and co-author of America Unbound: The Bush Revolution in Foreign Policy
专业书评 From Publishers Weekly

At the end of President George W. Bush's first term, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice was prepared to leave politics and return to an academic post at Stanford University before she was drafted by Bush to be secretary of state. Two years later, polls showed American voters regarded her as the most powerful woman in the country. In this gripping and intelligent account, Washington Post correspondent Kessler chronicles those two years, drawing on his firsthand experiences traveling with Rice as well as an impressive array of documents and interviews. Kessler organizes the book by region, vividly dramatizing Rice's travels and negotiations overseas—the chapter including her visits to Khartoum and Darfur is a standout—while providing thoughtful analysis and historical background to put these vignettes in context. Kessler praises Rice for a number of successes, including her role in weakening a secret CIA prison system in Europe, but he also criticizes her failure to provide a coherent foreign policy vision and her weakness at implementation and follow-up. This balanced, detailed text offers invaluable insight into Rice's rise to power, though its exclusive focus on foreign policy may limit its appeal. (Sept.)
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文摘 Chapter 1
At the Conservatoire Hector Berlioz in Paris, an eager group of sixteen French youngsters were learning to read music when they received a special visitor: a secretary of state on a mission to reshape American diplomacy—and her own image.
Rice was accompanied by more than two dozen aides, reporters, and other officials, including the mayor of Paris. They squeezed into the small classroom, but that did not seem to faze the businesslike teacher, who continued to lead the children through their paces. Rice, tapping her toes to keep time, soon joined in a French music comprehension refrain with the children, singing softly, “Fa-do-sol-si-re-la-sol.”
“I remember this,” she said, telling the children through an interpreter that she learned to read music from her grandmother when she was three, even before she learned to read. “It takes a lot of work to learn to read music,” she said. “You have to practice and practice and practice.” She didn’t mention that after years of study, in college she had abruptly abandoned her ambition to become a concert pianist, shifting to Soviet studies instead, when she realized she would never be in the top ranks.
As reporters watched the initially stilted conversation, one of her aides, Jim Wilkinson—who, more than anyone, was the impresario of the event—circulated among them, quietly making sure they understood how “cute” the staged event looked.
Rice was nearing the end of her first overseas trip, which began just days after she had been confirmed by the Senate. Almost every moment had been meticulously planned for weeks by Rice and her top aides, starting from the day President Bush announced that she would be his nominee for secretary of state in his second term. The State Department traditionally prides itself on being worried about the policy, not the politics, but Rice and her team had brought a White House sensitivity t
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