Transcripts For BLOOMBERG The David Rubenstein Show Peer To

David i dont consider myself a journalist. And nobody else would consider myself a journalist. I began to take on the life of being an interviewer, even though i have a day job of running a private equity firm. How do you define leadership . What is it that makes somebody tick . We are here today at city college, a place that you graduated from a number of years ago. Colin thank you, david. David why did you pick city college . Colin i was accepted at ccny. And i was accepted at nyu. The reason i went to ccny is nyu was charging 750 a year. I couldnt handle that. My family could not handle that. I went to ccny because it was free and because it was easy to get to. I heard a lot about it. David you grew up in the bronx . Colin i was born in harlem, about a mile from here, and i grew up in the south bronx, the hunts point section. David your parents were immigrants from jamaica. Colin yep. David growing up in new york, did you enjoy new york as a young boy . Colin i thought it was a wonderful place to be a kid. It was such a diverse place. It really bonded on me that this is what the world is, people of different backgrounds, cultures, colors, you name it. And of course, ccny replicated that perfectly. I learned a little bit of yiddish working for six years in another corner of the south bronx, a place which sold juvenile furniture, carriages, and toys. He was a russian jew. There was me, an irish driver, and an italian salesman in the store. And one story i love to tell is after i had been doing this for a couple of years with jay, he came up to me and put his arm around my shoulder, and said my name, using the yiddish diminutive, i dont think you can stay at the store. This will go to my daughters and to their husbands. I want you should get your education and go somewhere and do something. I had no intention of staying at that store and being somebody that just dragged boxes around. Everybody knows what schlep means. It touched me so deeply that i remembered it for the rest of my life and wrote about it in my memoir. He thought enough of me to tell me that i should get my education and move up, and that is what i did. Ccny was the source of that education. David did you ever think you would one day be the chairman of the joint chiefs and the secretary of state to the United States . Colin no. People ask me that all the time, and it usually starts out with , what year did you graduate from west point . I did not go to west point. I could not have aspired to go to west point. Well, did you go to citadel, or did you go to texas a m, Virginia Military institute . I said, no, they wouldnt let black guys in then. It was beyond any possible level of aspiration or expectation, but it happened. Why did it happen . Because i got a Quality Public School education that i did not know was that highquality at the time. Elementary school, junior high school, high school, and then ccny let me in with my modest average. Then it was rotc and ccny that really made the difference. David you were a geology major. Did you think you are going to you were going to go into the geology world . Colin no, i was the geology major because i busted out of civil engineering. Now you know. [laughter] colin that did not need to come up, david. Thank you very much. David when you graduated, you are in the rotc, you have an obligation to go into the military. You went to the south for training. Colin i graduated in 1958 and went to fort benning, a segregated state in a segregated city, columbus, georgia. So i knew well on post i was like anyone else, but when i left post, there were places i could not go and i was thrown out of hamburger joints in columbus, georgia. David they would just say, we dont serve you . Colin it was even worse than that. I stopped at a little hamburger joints late one night and i knew i could not go in, and i went to the window and asked for a hamburger, and this nice white lady from new jersey said i am sorry, i dont know why, but i cant serve you. You can go around the back. I said, no thanks. So i went back on to the base, and that was early 1964, and then the Civil Rights Act of the of 1964, the accommodations act was signed in july, just before july 4. On july 5, i went back to that hamburger joint, and they served me. What america discovered is that segregation was not just a burden for blacks. It was a burden for whites. We are living in a crazy system. David you went to vietnam and you were injured. Colin yeah. David and you came back to the states and went back again to vietnam. Colin about five years later, i went back and got injured again. David and when you came back, your career took off a bit. You became a white house fellow. Colin i did. I was one of about 15 people who would serve one year in washington in one of the offices of the cabinet. In my case, i worked in the office of management and budget, and i learned a lot about government in that year. Colin after your white house fellowship, you did what . Colin i went to korea. To command a battalion, an Infantry Battalion in korea. It is one of the most rewarding years ive had in the army. We were just starting out in the volunteer army, and it was my opportunity not only to train these young people, but to give them a ged education and english as a second language. David you eventually went to europe. Colin i was in europe as a young lieutenant for two years. And then, the period you are talking about, i worked for cap weinberger. David the secretary of defense . Colin the secretary of defense, and i was his military assistant, senior military assistant. And we became exceptionally close. And after two years, it was time for me to move on and get back in the army. And they got me an assignment in germany where i was going to take command of a division. I was now a two star general. And one day the chief of staff walks in and says, we have changed. Sir . The family is packed. We have the house, the stuff is moving. Mr. Weinberger wants you to stay here for another year. I said, and not take a division . Thats right. Then he said something which is quite right. He says, just remember, colin, you are here to serve. You serve where we need you. I can find Division Commanders anywhere. Mr. Weinberger, secretary of defense, wants you to stay longer. Yes, sir. And then i went in that evening to see secretary weinberger. He knew i was kind of disappointed. So he looked at me and said, well, you know, colin, youre not going to get a division now, and i know that disappoints you, but next year you are going to get a corps, and that is two divisions. A corps is a much larger organization. 70,000 people in the fifth corps. A year later he let me go and i went to germany and took command of the fifth United States rps headquartered in frankfurt, guarding a gap that was one of the invasion routes week expected the russians to use. David that was a great job. Colin it was a great job. It lasted four months. David there was the irancontra scandal, new National Security adviser wanted you as his deputy. Colin i said, frank, it cant be that important. He said it is that important. I said, ok, see if you can risk your entire risk your entire career by saying the next sentence well, frank, if it is that important, why doesnt the president call me . Half hour later david you get a call from . Colin [impersonating ronald reagan] hello, general powell. This is ronald reagan. Yes, sir. [laughter] colin i really, really want you to come back here. Hes reading the talking points that frank gave him. I want you to come back here and be the deputy for National Security. Yes, sir. I will be right there. David so you went back . Colin yes. Frank gots later, assigned to be the secretary of defense and i said, good, i can go back into the army now. One day i was chairing a National Security Council Meeting and suddenly the door opens and the president walks in. He sits at the head of the table. Frank comes around to the side, and while the meeting is going on, frank rips off a piece of paper, scribbles something on it, and he sends it down the table to me. And i open up the little piece of paper and it says, you are now the National Security adviser. No interview, no nothing. So the last year and a half of my time in the white house was with president reagan, became an extremely close and strong relationship. David when the administration ended, you went back into a military position, but not that long afterwards, president George Herbert walker bush, the president of the United States right after ronald reagan, said i need you to be chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. Colin i am in atlanta, georgia with a great command, beautiful house, nice headquarters, and im at a conference in the Baltimore Area with all the army senior fourstars and i get a call. Secretary cheney, now secretary of defense, wants to see you. And so i said, uhoh. So i go to the pentagon in chinos and a polo shirt and go into his office and he says, president bush wants to make you the chairman. David all of a sudden when youre doing your book tour, people said this man should be president of the United States. Colin it had never occurred to me. And then suddenly the book came out, and it caught media attention, and lots of people were coming to me saying you need to run. David any regrets about not having run . Colin no. Why . David well, some people say it is a great job. [laughter] david no . Colin prove it. [laughter] david early in the bush administration, Saddam Hussein invaded kuwait, and was it clear to you that we should go in and try to kick him out . Colin well, it was clear to me that this is a horrible invasion that could not be allowed to stand, and the first challenge was to make sure he did not go south to saudi arabia. So general schwarzkopf was the commander in this region, and he and i were pretty close. We talked about all of this. David you invented something known as the powell doctrine. Colin not quite. It was invented by a Washington Post reporter who came to see me one day and said, i am writing an article about the powell doctrine. I said, great, what is it . [laughter] colin he said what you always say and what you did when we invaded panama and took out manuel noriega, one, make sure you go to war after all diplomatic and political possibilities have been dealt with, and there has to be a clear political objective, not just a military objective. And then the second part of the powell doctrine is i used overwhelming force once, but i have always said is decisive force, so you dont have a gazillion people. Just have what you need to have a divisive outcome. David you get the order from the president to kick Saddam Hussein and his troops out. Colin when that decision came down that we could not find a diplomatic solution, i received the order, and i gave the order to norm, and we were ready. David there was a famous military maneuver, instead of going directly, you went around. Whose brilliant idea was that . Colin any infantry captain could have figured this out. It did not take a general. Several generals made claims. David for it . Ok. Colin its the only conflict i have ever been in or ever read history about where i could say to the president of the United States that there is no doubt about the outcome. The iraqis had made several horrible mistakes. They put their line of soldiers right on the border with saudi arabia, and they were stuck and they could not move. Airpower would not let them move. And they had four divisions along the coast. And they were very light. All we had to do was fix these two forces in place and go around them, the left hook, and that is what we did. But to my surprise the night we launched the ground attack after the air attacks for several weeks, and i was expecting that the marines, who were right opposite the iraqis, were told, and i told them, attack, but dont get decisively engaged. I dont want to lose a bunch of marines. I just want you to freeze the iraqis in place. Same thing on the coast. Amphibious operations, but youre not going onshore. Just freeze them. Because we are going to go around them all. But the marines being marines, they did what they were told, but some soldiers in the marines they are marines found ways to penetrate the fire barriers they put in place, the fire trenches, the barbed wire, the minefields, and cut a path right through the iragi army facing us. And so when that happened, military doctrine says exploit a success like that. So we told the marines, go, and they burst right through the iragi forces, and they were headed into kuwait city before we launched the left hook. David the war is over and you decide to write a book about your life, my american journey. All of a sudden when you are doing your book tour, people said this man should be president of the United States. Colin it had never occurred to me, and then suddenly the book came out, and it caught media attention. And lots of people were coming to me saying, you need to run. Well, i did not ever think of running, and i have no passion then to run, but i felt an obligation to consider the matter, and so i did. I am a service man, and i try to do what i think is right. Most of the Republican Party did not want me to run as republican. They even put out statement saying they did not want me in the party. David because you were too moderate . Colin i was too moderate. David any regrets about not having run . Colin no. Why . [laughter] david some people say it is a great job. Colin prove it. [laughter] david you stayed in the private sector, and then george w. Bush is elected president and calls you and says, i would like you to be secretary of state. Colin i sensed he was the kind of republican i would want to be, so i was pleased to go back into the government and serve. David so you are secretary of and 9 11 happens. When did you realize you would have to be involved and the government would have to be involved in some kind of military confrontation . Colin you cant let Something Like that go by without doing something about it, and my job was not to immediately get involved in military matters, but to pull the International Community together. And it was a very rewarding experience. For the first time in natos history they invoked what is called article five, which said if any member of the alliance is attacked, we are all attacked, so they were all on our side. David subsequently, we turned our attention to iraq, and president bush decided we would do an invasion of iraq to go after Saddam Hussein. Colin what i said to the president before that was, mr. President , you need to understand that if you take out this government, you become responsible as the new government. You become responsible for 27 million iraqis who will be standing there looking at us. You take on great responsibility, and you are sure you understand that and want to do it . And we were private when we were having this conversation and he said, well, what is the alternative . I said, the alternative is to have the u. N. Be in the first position. They are the ones whose resolutions have been violated, so lets have a diplomatic approach. David president bush said i agree with your idea of going to the United Nations and convincing them. Colin he did. Before taking military action, he wanted to present our case to the United Nations publicly. And so on a thursday afternoon, i was with him and he said, would you take the case . David you made the case that we thought Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. When it turned out he didnt, do you think you were embarrassed by that, or do you think that the u. S. Was embarrassed, or had we known he had not had weapons of mass distraction, president bush would have gone ahead anyway . Colin no, he would not have gone ahead, and i asked him that specific question when we were going through this. I asked him, mr. President , Saddam Hussein can prove he has no weapons of mass destruction, then you do not have basis for war. Are you prepared to accept that, even if it means Saddam Hussein will stay in place . Hesitantly he said, yes, i will accept that. So that is why i went forward. So i went out and spent three days at the cia with the intelligence communities and prepared the document i would present, and every word in there was approved by the cia, was written by the cia. And so we went. I gave the presentation. It seemed to go well. I was confident that it went well, but then within a few days or a couple of weeks, it started to fall apart, so yes, i was more than embarrassed. I was mortified. Because even though the president had used the same information, congress had used the same information, secretary rumsfeld, condoleezza rice, all of us were using the same information, but im the one who made the biggest presentation of it, so it all sort of fell on me. That is show business . David today in hindsight, would you say the invasion was a mistake . Colin i would say the execution of the invasion was not done properly. We abandoned the army without any discussion back in washington, and then we abandoned something worse, the baath party, and said anybody who worked in the baath party could not work in the new government. Those were two monstrously bad strategic decisions, and we did not have enough force in there to do what we wanted the iraq army to do, and the place fell apart. Now, right now, iraq has a democracy. It is tricky, but it is a democracy. They have elections, and they are trying to restore order in their country. If they do all that, i think it is bad we went about it in such a terrible way, in my humble judgment others will not agree with me that if they come out through this difficult process right now as a democracy, no weapons of mass destruction, no Saddam Hussein, then i think you would have to judge this differently than it is being judged in now. David what is it, in your view, that makes a person a great leader . Colin a person who understands that they are leading followers. A person who understands that they are there