BUSH ADVISER SILENCES CRITICS

WASHINGTON (--) When President Bush was assembling his foreign policy team
in December, Condoleezza Rice was both a shoo-in for national security
adviser and a bit of a question mark.

Could a 40-something black woman, known for her intellect but with only
three years of government experience, go toe-to-toe with male veterans of
bureaucratic battle such as Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State
Colin Powell and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld?

But as she enters her seventh month at the president's side, the
accomplished concert pianist has confounded her doubters and emerged as the
unquestioned conductor of U.S. foreign policy.

She played a crucial role in Bush's decision to reach out to North Korea
after first expressing doubts. Along with Powell, she overcame her initial
skepticism and pushed to continue U.S. military anti-drug programs in
Colombia that began under former President Bill Clinton.

But nowhere is her influence clearer than on Bush's signature international
initiative, his drive to junk the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty,
deploy a ballistic missile defense system and refashion relations with
Russia in the process.

The strategy has been crafted largely by Rice and her staff, according to
senior administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity, and it
reflects a deep skepticism of international treaties and arms control
agreements that has unsettled America's allies and drawn criticism from
Democrats.

When Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Italy on July 22, it
was Rice, who speaks Russian and is an expert on Russian political affairs,
who accompanied Bush. She flew on to Moscow and the Ukraine for follow-up
talks. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Powell was in Asia.

In an interview this week in her spacious West Wing corner office, Rice,
46, defended the administration against criticism that it is pursuing a
go-it-alone approach, using her trademark blend of graciousness and firmness.

"Apparently we haven't done as good a job as we could have" in explaining
why the United States has declined to join a series of major international
agreements, she said.

"We've been for a lot" of them, she said, citing Bush's commitment to free
trade. Rice challenged the president's critics to explain why that's less
important than supporting an agreement to limit global traffic in small
arms, which Bush refused to do last month.

"The president simply wasn't elected to sign bad treaties," she said,
adding that doing so could hamstring the administration and undermine the
public's support for an activist foreign policy.

Rice said she sees her role as coordinating the growing number of U.S.
government agencies involved in foreign policy and presenting the president
with the best policy options, not pushing her own views. "I really feel
strongly that this job, because it's down the hall from the Oval (Office),
there's a certain responsibility not to abuse that proximity," she said.

But it's that proximity that gives her much of her status and influence.
Rice, Powell and Rumsfeld confer by phone each morning and over lunch once
a week, but it's Rice who briefs the president daily, travels with him
often on domestic trips and is a frequent weekend guest at Camp David.

She chairs most Cabinet-level foreign policy meetings (Bush is usually not
present) and reports to the president on what was discussed and decided,
said a senior State Department official who asked not to be identified. The
senior members of Bush's foreign policy team have far less time with the
president than they did under his father, former President George Bush, the
official said.

Colleagues in and out of government say Rice has managed to command foreign
policy largely without offending or steamrolling her colleagues, as
predecessors such as Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski were known to do.

That's no mean feat. Individuals such as Cheney, Powell and Rumsfeld "don't
instinctively look for direction or coordination," said retired Gen. Brent
Scowcroft, who hired Rice when he was the senior Bush's national security
adviser.

Rice's style is to let everyone at the table have his or her say and then
gently but firmly steer the group toward a decision, said John Hillen, who
as a speechwriter has watched Rice coordinate the Bush campaign's foreign
policy team, members of which called themselves "the Vulcans" after the
Roman god of fire.

"It wasn't just her proximity to the candidate which made her a leader. It
was her style," Hillen said. "She had this amazing way, even if somebody
was out on the fringes with an idea that wouldn't work," of letting the
person be heard and including the least objectionable aspects of his or her
proposal, he said.

Rice has replicated that style in managing the National Security Council
staff, according to several NSC staff members who requested anonymity.

Orders went out early for officials to send copies of e-mails to any
colleague who might need to know their contents. Shouting is virtually
unheard-of. Unlike Clinton national security adviser Sandy Berger, "Condi's
very calm and relaxed," said one staffer who has worked for both.

Rice insists that her job isn't all that different from her tenure as
Stanford University provost, a job she held from 1993 to 1999. "It requires
working with people. It requires persuasiveness. It requires process," she
said. "I'm a big believer in process. It's the only way where everybody
gets heard."

The Bush team criticized the NSC under Clinton for being too large, too
involved in implementing policy rather than just coordinating it and too
ready to tread on the State Department's turf. Rice trimmed the staff and
promised she would stay largely behind the scenes.

That's changing, however. She is a frequent television talk-show guest and
is the administration's chief spokeswoman on missile defense.

"Condi is finding that the less-public role that she had hoped or thought
she was going to have is not possible in the 21st century," said Ivo
Daalder, who worked in the Clinton White House and is writing a book on the
NSC.

There were several early stumbles for the administration, including mixed
signals from the foreign policy team on China, North Korea and the Balkans,
and a Bush decision to reject the Kyoto Protocol treaty to reduce so-called
greenhouse gases, which stunned U.S. allies in Europe.

"Those kinds of things you have to learn (--) how to coordinate the
elephants so they don't trample the grass," Scowcroft said.