By IRNA
New York : Almost five years after the start of the Iraq war, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has acknowledged that US-led efforts to rebuild the country should have begun much earlier.
Rice told US lawmakers: “I would have to admit, I think we’ve learned that, yes, it is really important to be able to help others build their states, to help others build their nations.”
She was replying to a question on whether the administration of President George W. Bush had changed its mind on the controversial issue of helping other countries with “nation-building.”
“My view is, it is still something that we need to do with civilians,” Rice, who was national security advisor at the time of the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, told a congressional committee.
She also defended the administration’s 2008-2009 budget which has earmarked some 249 million dollars to create 351 diplomatic posts devoted to “nation-building”.
Bush had refused to entrust to the US Army the task of helping the Iraqis rebuild their institutions which had fallen into disrepair under former dictator Saddam Hussein.
And when he was campaigning for the 2000 elections, Bush vehemently opposed the idea of that the Army should be involved in such duties.
“I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation-building. I think our troops ought to be used to fight and win war,” he said in an election debate.
Rice, one of Bush’s closest advisors, also opposed the idea.
“This comes down to function,” she said at the time.
“Carrying out civil administration and police functions is simply going to degrade the American capability to do the things America has to do. We don’t need to have the 82nd Airborne escorting kids to kindergarten.”
Critics say that Rice, since taking office, has sacrificed diplomatic credentials of the State Department for her unconditional submission to former vice president Donald Rumsfeld and the incumbent Vice President Dick Cheney well known as the hawks.
They say that the State Department constitutionally is obliged to advance diplomacy in dealing with international crisis.
However, Rice is following the lead of the hawks focusing military operations rather than diplomacy in a clear negligence of her commitment.