Nezavisle ceske elektronicke noviny * December 1996
For Czech translation - click here
Madeleine Albright: a tough lady with guts
Josef Schrabal
It is very difficult to imagine Christopher during his four years of foreign policy of the United States even once to push forward his own opinion in the White House. A true diplomat educated as a business lawyer, always leaving the backdoor open for a compromise.
Total reverse is Madeleine Albright just nominated by president Clinton to be the leader of diplomacy of one of the most powerful nations in the world. During her four years as US Ambassador to the United Nations, while she was also a consultant to the president, she proved that the straight line is the shortest connection between two points. In mathematics we learned that only simplifying it can solve a complicated equation. This is exactly what critics are accusing Albright, that she first simplifies the problem and then she tries to push it most vehemently through.
"big daughter of the Czech nation and world's personality" Michael Zantovsky
"Why do we need the best military in the world if we don't want to use it", remarked Albright during the debate over Bosnia, when General Colin Powell was against using American troops. Powell won the debate but it was the idea of Albright to reach armistice by using the American airpowers.
Three days before Albright casted American veto in the Security Council of United Nations, blocking Butros Butros Ghali's second term reelection, she continued friendly relations with the Egyptian UN Secretary and was dining with him in his apartment at Sutton Place in New York. She was offering the diplomat help with organizing a foundation in Switzerland under his leadership while many papers called her "a barking dog"! They attacked her in the style remeniscent of words from the "Cold War".
"When he wakes up in the morning, his thoughts are not how to reform the UN" she was explaining why she doesn't want to support Ghali for reelection. The final decision resulted in sending a written veto as a result of an agreement between Congress and the White House.
While the American Congress, dominated by opposition republicans, was the biggest critic of Clinton's foreign policy, nomination of Albright as the leader of the American foreign policy will pass through Congress smoothly without any difficulties, predicted senator Jesse Helms, republican chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. "She is a tough lady with guts" declared Helms. (He knows her from the times when Albright was a liaison between Helms and Zbigniev Brzezinsky during Carter's presidency.). During Albright's confirmation proceedings will be discussed issues which will dominate the foreign policy of the United States despite that the policy is result of a team and not of any one person.
Also most of the UN diplomats accepted her nomination enthusiastically because she knows the UN well and will have confidence in the US Congress to have the changes carried through.
It's possibleto explain her toughness and strong opinions by the background of her entire life:
Born in Prague her father Josef Korbel for England left just before the Second World War for England. After the war diplomat Korbel was in Yugoslavia. And after the communist cup in 1948 the family left for New York where her father became a member of a UN Commission. (Later he was teaching at the Denver University.) She was eleven years old. Educated at Wellesley (1959) (just as Hillary Clinton ten years later), she continued hr studies at Columbia University in New York (1968 a 76). She worked for her professor Zbigniev Brzezinsky when he was consultant to president Carter. She was assistant to Senator Edmund Muskie. While teaching at the Georgetown University she was a consultant when Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis and Bill Clinton were candidates for the White house. She raised three daughters with husband Josef Albright, a journalist who divorced her in 1982.
Albright is proud of her Czech heritage and she understands the Czech foreign policy. She escorted President Clinton during his visit to Prague and introduced Hillary Clinton to her friend on the Prague's Castle who telephoned her shortly before his surgery. Karel Kovanda, Czech ambassador to the UN considers her "a star on our diplomatic sky " and just recently elected Czech senator Michael Zantovsky considers her as "big daughter of the Czech nation and world's personality".
Edited by Jeanette Morais
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