“The real question is, Who has the responsibility to uphold human rights? The answer to that is, everyone.”
– Madeleine K. Albright (1937-2022)
This is a sad day for me. The death of Madeleine Albright, brought me back in time to 2005, to the boardroom of the National Democratic Institute (NDI) in Washington, D.C. Madeleine Albright, the Chair of NDI, was walking right up to me, and I couldn’t believe it.
I had just had my visa revoked by the government of Tajikistan in response to my work as NDI Country Director, including working with Tajik women’s civic society non-governmental organizations, political parties, and producing a television program and other media. Madeleine Albright, an American hero, and a hero of democracy and fierce opponent of dictators, was making sure to talk to me, and could not have been more supportive.
My boss, Nelson Ledsky, the legendary Chargé d’affaires in Berlin when the Berlin Wall came down in 1989, with whom Albright was very close, had announced at the end of this Annual Board Meeting, that I had done a good job there, but had gotten the boot by the Tajik government, and humorously noted that I was available and “on waivers”.
It was this that prompted Albright to chat with me after the meeting. She wanted me to know that she had my back.
I only now realize how Nelson Ledsky choosing two strong and brilliant women, Laura Jewett and Katie Fox, to oversee our team, the Eurasia Region section of NDI, must have delighted Madeleine Albright, who had a lifelong committment to knocking down barriers to women’s participation in governance and civil society.
NDI was an amazing place to work, and one of the reasons, I more fully realize now, was the tone set there by Madeleine Albright: working in democratic development work, we had to have each others’ backs.
I was the Program Manager for a small, poor, former Soviet Republic in Central Asia filled with a people with hearts of gold, the Tajiks. But Albright wanted me to know that my work mattered to her.
Today, now that she is gone, we are all being reminded how, not surprisingly, and unlike many, she understood the smallness of Vladimir Putin almost immediately, noting his “reptilian” persona. This is, after all, a refugee from Nazism and then Stalinism who literally wrote the book on “Fascism”.
Rest well, Secretary Albright.
“FREEDOM” comes from the Medieval / German word meaning: “BE LOVED.”
All free people around the world love Secretary Albright and I’m proud to be one of them.
Thank you, Terry McGinty, for sharing such a moving tribute to your friend and mentor, Madeleine Albright.
To quote Jeffrey St Clair:
“ The tributes to Madeleine Albright, who died this week at 84, are sickening to read. The lede for her obituary should read very simply: Chief architect of a sanction regime that killed 500,000 Iraqi children, whose deaths she said were ‘worth it.'”
Every government official of Albright’s level could be prosecuted for war crimes if there was actually justice in this world. She may have been a kind and decent person in her private and public life but the policies that she enacted resulted in many excess deaths, whether she liked it or not.
If you want to be a Secretary of State or Defense or the President, you are volunteering to be a war criminal. That’s the reality of politics.
We know that Richard Cheney and George W. Bush ordered policies of kidnapping, torture, and abuse from the Oval Office.
I view those as qualitatively different from whatever Madeline Albright did or did not do. I have seen zero evidence that Ms. Albright directed US military forces to waterboard anybody.
Any contemplated criteria that lumps Barack Obama into the same category as George W. Bush is fatally flawed.
By the standard you imply, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Joe Biden are each war criminals. I do not see that as “reality”, I see it as unconstructive cynicism.
“War criminal” is pretty much in the job description for any Cabinet level and above official, if we want to be honest about the reality of the world. Even Jimmy Carter could be called before the dock for war crimes and I believe him to be the best human being ever to become President in my lifetime.
I don’t see this as cynicism. I see it as reality and an antidote to the hero worship and “star fcking” too often part of USAmerican politics. I don’t want to “have a beer” with the person who’s President. I don’t believe a person elected to office is anything but a politician and a flawed human being, as flawed a human as I am. I will never “love” an office-holder unless I know them personally and intimately and for themselves, not for their power or political stance.
To say that when you engage in war, rightly or wrongly, you become, almost inevitably, a war criminal is akin to saying we’re all bound to die and should face that harsh reality without phony sentimentality.
Madeline Albright was, by all reports, a good friend and mentor with a kind heart but, as she so forcefully stated once upon a time, the deaths of 500,000 Iraqi children were “worth it.” They were, sorry to say, insignificant to her.
Mourn her as you want to but my belief is that the only thing our dead want from us is to be remembered well, and that should include their mistakes and transgressions, not to excoriate their memories but to learn from them. Those who have earned being remembered after death, I believe, would want us to learn from their mistakes.
You can call that “unconstructive cynicism” as much as you like.
Perhaps “cynical” is inaccurate.
It sounds as if you’re condemning Jimmy Carter and every other US president as a “war criminal”.
If so, then I suggest you’ve diluted the meaning of “war criminal” to the point where it is meaningless.
Once again, if you want to be the President or a Cabinet Secretary like Defense or State, part of the job description is the probable inevitability that you will be responsible for a war crime, the death of innocents, however good your intentions.
This has little to do with the individual or their character or personality. It’s the reality of power and the exercise thereof. People should grow up and leave hero worship back in kindergarten.
PS: I have no power or right to “condemn” anyone but I can express my personal opinion and attempt to stay real. Harry Truman knew this reality because he’d seen combat and remembered it saying, “If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.” If you don’t want to injure innocents, commit the crimes of war, then don’t aspire to such power.
President Zelenskyy can also be creditably accused of war crimes although we can wish (and believe) that the degree of his and his country’s soldiers’ criminality is less than Putin’s.
You wade into that river of blood, you gonna get bloodstained. Madeline Albright waded into that river of blood of her own free will. So did Jimmy Carter. They may have done their best to do the least amount of damage but the damage was done and they have to live with it, as do we in whose name those deeds were done.
Don’t paper it over with “good manners.”
You apparently have your own private definition of “war crime”. You apparently also have your own definition of “responsible”.
No Secretary of State makes policy decisions. A Secretary of State makes policy recommendations to a President.
Insulting people who disagree with you doesn’t make your argument more persuasive.
I said nothing about “good manners”.
This is what I said:
Your additional commentary only confirms that you view every president as a war criminal.
It is neither childish nor unrealistic to reject this conclusion.
I don’t want to have a beer with my Presidents either, but I do believe it is appropriate in most cases to honor rather than denigrate their service (and that of other high-ranking officials) in the immediate aftermath of their passing.
It is not denigration to point out the uncomfortable obvious that almost all of us refuse to see. As I wrote, if you want to be a President or a Cabinet official, committing war crimes is part of the job description.
Sad but accurate, in my view, but then I try not to wear rose-colored glasses.
You’re repeating yourself.
Just don’t direct that toward the recently deceased while their body is still warm, is all I’m asking.
Obituaries and discussions of public figures never omit the failures and crimes — at least not out of delicacy. Sometimes the news is slanted and for political reasons inconvenient facts are left out, but that’s true of all kinds of stories.
Spare me the bathos, Christopher. You’re not the next of kin.
Obituaries and discussions often omit failures and crimes.
Your criticism of Ms. Albright is simply incorrect — whether offered now or later.
Most obits I read do not dwell on the negative. Plus this post was a personal tribute. I try to adhere to the Latin maxim, “Nihil sed bonum mortui” (Nothing but good of the dead). Even those about whom I have primarily negative opinions (a category that certainly does not include Albright), for a little while post mortem I adhere to the maxim “If you can’t say something nice…”
War is a nasty business. Robert E. Lee once said, “It is well that war is so terrible lest we grow too fond of it.” Albright was Secretary of State, which is not a position that could give combat orders. It was noted at the time that she and SecDef Cohen had opposite temperaments relative to their job titles. I just really hate this insistence some have to dump on the recently deceased. The comment above yours criticized her support for sanctions, but would people prefer either the more violent alternative or no consequences for Iraq at all?
If the alternative to killing children is “do nothing.” I would say do nothing.
The headline for this post is demonstrably false. It shouldn’t go unchallenged.
You are writing a comment on an anecdote describing a first-hand encounter with a world-renown celebrity who was the first woman to be confirmed as Secretary of State. That means something. The headline for this post is entirely appropriate and surely refers to the author of the thread-starter. We at BMG are fortunate to have such insight.
Your “challenge” is yet another expression of the cynicism that you so frequently express here.
If your intent is to assign responsibility for the needless death of Iraqi civilians — including half a million Iraqi children — then Madeline Albright is relatively far down the list of likely suspects.
George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld — even Colin Powell — surely bear greater responsibility for war crimes that the US committed in Iraq. Ms. Albright did not set the policy, did not start the war, and was not responsible for the tragedy you lay at her feet.
Your harsh attack on Madeline Albright is uncalled for.
Albright was responsible for the deaths of thousands of civilians during the sanctions in Iraq. When asked if this was worth it, she replied yes. To demand that we ignore all this because she is “far down the list” of war criminals is the height of cynicism.
Cite or link please. I want to see context and the St. Clair quote in your first comment is inadmissible hearsay.
Roaming Charges: Both Ends Burning – CounterPunch.org
This is just a link to the opinion piece from which the above snippet was taken. I want to see Albright herself quoted, preferably in context.
Madeleine Albright’s legacy is a reminder that Clinton’s Iraq policy was murderous too – Mondoweiss
Ok, finally got the quote. Problem is the counterfactual is hard to determine. IOW, do we know for sure that a different course would not have had an even worse outcome?
Sheer inanity. Not killing those children might have led to a “worse outcome. “
Almost as “inane” as observing that attempting to impose a “no-fly” zone over Ukraine is very likely to lead to a “worse outcome” than what is already happening.
Repeating your passionate belief only communicates how passionately you hold them. We already know that.
60 Minutes – Punishing Saddam: Too Good to be True | 1997 duPont-Columbia Award Winner on Vimeo
You’ve offered no evidence that Ms. Albright gave any orders or made any policy decisions that caused anybody to die — never mind qualifying as war crimes. No Secretary of State has the authority to issue orders to military or security personnel.
There is nothing cynical about asking to see evidence before agreeing that somebody has committed a serious crime.
Albright was Secretary of state. That’s a position of some authority. But even if she could have claimed to be “just following orders ” that’s not really much of a defense.
The phrase “just following orders” is your own invention.
While Secretary of State has “some” authority, that authority does extend to ordering war crimes. You’ve offered no evidence that it does, because there is no such evidence.
Verbally defending the policy of a President is different from executing that policy.
Let’s see how far we’ve come. This post started out with the false statement “no one was insignificant to Madeline Albright”.
Now we’re at a point where you are indignantly demanding additional proof that she actually was at the very top of the chain of the command which ordered and implemented .the sanctions on Iraq.
After all, she was only Secretary of State, a totally decorative position. Aside from saying something nice to Terry at a party, she had no responsibilities at all.
“Indignant”? “Very top”? “Totally decorative”? “she had no responsibilities at all”?
All your own invention, all over-the-top invective.
You’re apparently arguing with some figment of your own imagination.
If you continue to vandalize the site, you will be banned.– SomervilleTom
Thank you, Somerville Tom, for such a thoughtful and appropriate comment regarding Secretary Albright’s role or lack thereof, regarding the implementation of sanctions on Iraq.