No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Years in Washington

56 THE FINANCIAL CRISIS OF 2008

WHEN THE PRESIDENT asked me to come back to Washington, we didn’t want to tip the press that an announcement about North Korea was coming. There were scores of State Department officials with me, and my sudden return to the capital was bound to be noticed. “Tell them you have to come back and help on some matters related to the financial crisis,” the President said.

“Well, I do,” I said. It wasn’t just a ruse.

In the summer of 2008, we were experiencing a number of problems in the global economy. Oil prices spiked to nearly $140 a barrel, causing problems for growth as well as driving food prices skyward and sparking riots around the world. The sudden surge enhanced the diplomatic leverage of such U.S. adversaries as Hugo Chávez and the Iranians. When I was a Chevron director, I had often commented that the politics of oil was geopolitics with a capital “G,” and now we were experiencing that firsthand. Chávez, for instance, was using his excess profits to influence elections across Latin America.

It was very difficult to address the energy problem coherently within the international system, but we did manage to put together a number of energy partnerships, largely through the good work of Gregory Manuel, whom I had brought to the State Department. Greg had been my student at Stanford and had worked for me at the NSC in the economics directorate. I needed someone who would be indefatigable and dogged in bringing the various interested parts of the State Department together to pursue energy initiatives. He worked with Reuben Jeffery to push work in the area forward and to maintain at least a dialogue with other countries.

That work paid off, yielding—as just one example—a comprehensive partnership with Brazil in the area of biofuels as an alternative energy source. Given the obvious benefits of energy policies that could reduce individual nations’ dependence on oil, it should have been easier to bring the countries of the world together. I had, for instance, hoped to draw the Central Asians—particularly Kazakhstan—into greater dialogue about energy security in South-Central Asia and beyond. But it was hard, and I never really had the time to devote to that important portfolio. It was an area that cried out for international leadership.

We were under such pressure on so many other issues that, too often, longer term economic issues of that kind did not receive the consistent effort they deserved. But in the fall of 2008, despite North Korea, Iran, Middle East peace, Iraq, and a host of other issues, the financial crisis was suddenly front and center and demanded attention.

My most important role in that regard was to support Hank Paulson in a period of extraordinary crisis that reminded me of the early days after 9/11. Each development brought new uncertainties, which demanded a mobilization of financial and economic resources on a scale not seen since the Great Depression. At Hank’s request, I sent Reuben Jeffery from State to work alongside David McCormick, the under secretary of the treasury for international affairs. Reuben would stop in to brief me on the latest news at the beginning and end of each day. As the crisis unfolded and then accelerated, Hank and I met with the President most mornings during the time usually reserved for the intelligence briefing. Hank would enter with yet another horror story of a bank failure and news that lending had ground to a halt. The economy was in grave trouble. One night at a reception in the East Room, Josh Bolten called me aside. “You probably ought to know that Goldman and Morgan Stanley could fail tomorrow,” he whispered.

“What?” I said. That’s the way it was—every day brought very bad news.

I didn’t have anything to offer in terms of economic advice, but it wasn’t hard to see the effect on leaders and diplomacy. Hank would handle relations with the first-order countries, but I promised to help with those that he didn’t have time to reach. I just wanted to show the world that we were on top of it, so every morning I’d call Hank’s chief of staff, Jim Wilkinson, who’d previously worked for me as a senior aide. “What are we saying today?” I would ask. It was dizzying and disconcerting.

In the depths of the crisis, the President held a meeting at Camp David with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and José Barroso, the president of the European Commission. Sitting at the same table where we’d responded to 9/11 and planned two wars, I listened to the leaders’ dismay at their inability to stem the tide of the crisis. Economic policy had so many more moving parts than even the complicated issues I was used to managing. The President and Sarkozy agreed to hold a meeting of the G20 leaders, just to reassure them and show confidence. Right before our eyes, a new international balance was unfolding. No one spoke of convening the G7 or G8. China, Brazil, India, and others had to be at the table. All of a sudden, Sarkozy said, “It has to be in New York! The crisis started in New York, so it has to be there!”

I was shifting in my seat. “You got something to say, Condi?” the President asked.

I was a little startled but plowed ahead. “New York isn’t the entire U.S. economy,” I said. “Maybe you should hold the meeting somewhere that doesn’t feel like a crisis.” Then I whispered to the President, “If you do it in New York, every out-of-work trader will be interviewed by the networks worldwide.”

“No kidding!” the President replied. He suggested that I mention the point to the French leader before dinner. When we broke for cocktails, I talked to him, making the point about the potential news coverage. The President was able to convince Sarkozy and in the end the meeting was held in Washington, D.C.

The crisis was evolving in the context of the coming election too. The President was careful to brief both John McCain and Barack Obama. The problem was obviously going to outlast our time in office. The fact of the impending change of power gave every decision a slightly surreal feel. I was increasingly aware that I was making choices that would condition the environment for whoever came after me. That was really the context of the election for me. Certainly, as a citizen—and political junkie—I watched the contest with interest. But I was secretary of state, and I didn’t want to become too emotionally involved in what was going on. And I’d been there at the beginning with George W. Bush. I had little energy left for politics.

The day after the election, I was sitting in my usual morning staff meeting. “Are you going to say anything about the election?” Sean asked.

“What do you mean?” I asked. “To whom?”

“To the press,” he said. “They will want to know how you feel about the election of the first black President.”

“Proud,” I replied. And so I hijacked the first minutes of Sean’s morning briefing and told the press what I was feeling. I explained that as an American, and as an African American in particular, I was especially proud because of the long journey our country had traveled in overcoming wounds regarding race. “One of the great things about representing this country is it continues to surprise; it continues to renew itself; it continues to beat all odds and expectations,” I said extemporaneously. “You just know that Americans are not going to be satisfied until they really do form that perfect union.”

THE DAYS WERE growing short for our administration as a new team prepared to take the reins. I wanted to ensure as orderly a transition as possible, something that is easier to do in the State Department than in the White House. When the presidency changes, even if there’s no change of party, the White House staff leaves en masse. But in the agencies, the career service carries on. This is tremendously beneficial to the country. For instance, Bill Burns continued as Secretary Clinton’s number three, able to bridge the two administrations.

I also wanted to make sure that my successor, Hillary Clinton, had all that she needed to get off to a good start as quickly as possible. We met several times, including at my apartment for dinner. Our relationship was—and is—an easy one, going back to the day she brought her prospective freshman daughter, Chelsea, to Stanford when I was provost. It helps too that there really is, even in difficult times, a kind of “fraternity” of secretaries of state. We all know what the job is like, its stresses and strains, and therefore there is great empathy among us. Perhaps now it would be better to call it a “sorority” since three of the four most recent secretaries—Madeleine Albright, me, and Hillary Clinton—have been women. Indeed, when Secretary Clinton finishes her term it will have been at least sixteen years since a white male held the office of secretary of state.

The transition was very smooth. But there is one source of awkwardness in the interim ten weeks between the election and the inauguration. Though there’s only one president at a time, it’s important to make certain that the incoming commander in chief is kept up to date on critical matters as they unfold.

There were a number of “hot” diplomatic issues, and the President and I decided that I would communicate with President-elect Obama directly. It wouldn’t have been appropriate to do so with Hillary because until a Cabinet officer is confirmed, the Senate frowns upon that person “acting in the role.” And so the President-elect and I spoke several times about the negotiations with North Korea, the Gaza problem, and—most urgently—the events that unfolded in South Asia in late November. We talked for the last time a few days before the inauguration. “Mr. President-elect,” I said, “this is probably our last conversation before you enter the Oval Office. I am proud of your election. Good luck and Godspeed.”