Rice, in Seattle, defends war policy

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice assured a supportive Seattle crowd last night that U.S. policy in Iraq was part of "a forward strategy for freedom in the Middle East" that was succeeding steadily.

"Time and truth are on our side," Rice said in her speech, sponsored by the non-profit World Affairs Council and held at the University of Washington's Meany Hall.


		Grant M. Haller / P-I
	National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice waves to the crowd at the UW's Meany Hall. Her speech was sponsored by the World Affairs Council.

Although she didn't mention the presidential election, Rice said the Bush administration's tactics in the post-Sept. 11 fight against terrorism had been effective -- strongly implying that they needed to continue.

Saturday marks the three-year anniversary of the terrorist hijackings.

Three years ago, Rice said, Pakistan recognized the Taliban, the Afghan government that brutally repressed its people and supported al-Qaida. Today, the U.S. and Pakistani governments are working together in the war on terrorism. Similar shifts could be seen in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Middle East, she said.

"The terrorist world is shrinking," Rice said.

But the fight against terror cannot be won on the defensive, she said.

"If we're going to remain the country that we want to be, we have to take the fight to the terrorists where they are," she said to the loudest applause of the night.

Rice addressed the crowd first in a 17-minute address before taking written questions from the audience, which were culled and presented by UW President Mark Emmert. She took no direct questions from the news media.

A question regarding the highly criticized way the United States has handled its post-Iraq war policies drew an admission from Rice that those plans had not been devised or executed flawlessly.

"Not everything has gone as we would have liked it to," she said, without elaborating. She said that books will be written and doctoral dissertations penned -- some of which, she joked, she may have to oversee if she returns to Stanford University after her government service -- "as to how things could have been handled better."

A group of about 20 sign-carrying protesters stood in front of the hall, and one objector softly voiced a question to Rice from the audience that went unanswered, but for the most part the crowd was supportive. Rice received standing ovations at the beginning and end of her talk from a majority of the audience.

One such supporter was Paul Kosinski of Spokane, who said he was visiting Seattle on a business trip and wanted to hear Rice speak.

Rice has "absolutely" been a valuable adviser to President Bush, Kosinski said. "She is able to guide him to the most effective way through this threat."

The John Kerry presidential campaign pre-empted Rice's speech with a critique of the Bush administration's Iraq policies.

According to Susan Rice, Kerry's senior adviser for national security affairs, Condoleezza Rice "is trying to spin what is a self-evidently failed national security policy."

"The situation in Iraq is a tragic mess," Susan Rice said in an interview from Kerry campaign headquarters in Washington, D.C. "President Bush has no plan to win the peace."

Condoleezza Rice justified the Bush administration's aim of toppling Saddam Hussein.

He had threatened his neighbors, she said, terrorized his citizens, harbored terrorists and shot at U.S. aircraft as they flew over the "no-fly" zone.

"In the post-9/11 world, this was a threat that no president could ignore," she said.

She was not asked last night about the news that there have now been 1,000 U.S. military deaths in Iraq.

Despite that news, she did note one positive effect of the war in Iraq and the deposing of Saddam.

Regarding those Iraqis who represented their country in the recent Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece, she said, "The best thing is that those who did not win a medal did not have to fear torture upon their return."

P-I reporter Sam Skolnik can be reached at 206-448-8176 or samskolnik@seattlepi.com

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