he confirmed that indeed andy car and steve hadley two of the president's top lieutenants had tried to recruit him to be the director of national intelligence. i think this is an interesting contemporaneous view of the statute immediately after past and indeed was looking down the road to some of the problems we had in the first years. he gave me his e-mail said he sent to the white house in december and january of 2004 and 2005 trying to lay out some of the conditions he would ask president bush for for him to even consider him. secretary gates and i have this in the book described the new law as quote strange. he said the president needs to make clear that at the new director of national intelligence is the head of the intelligence community, not some near budgeteer or coordinator who just has common denominator the ability to convene people and only hash out the common dominator about the policies and directives affecting the u.s. intelligence community. eventually secretary gates turned down the offer. he said sort of to me that hadley and car made a mistake that a neophyte car sal

this is condoleezza rice and steve hadley and bob gates.hat is the difference between that and going to work for a major defense contractor? shouldn't they be allowed to do that? >> relatively little. it is difficult to prohibit people, but they all want to stay in the game and make money off their government service. that is fine but it is fine for me to call out and say that there are conflicts of interest involved. contractors are now taking over the government. constitute a larger and larger percentage of the actual workforce, as the government itself tries to downsize and outsource personnel. thousands of contractors in the building, does the dog wag the tail or does the tail wag the dog? >> let's go back to the conversation that bob gates had -- do you know what that is? >> it is one of those enormous armored vehicles with a v-shaped bottom to deflect roadside bomb blasts. >> it costs $500,000 apiece. let's watch what he had to say. series ina newspaper the washington post that put me on to the problem with wounded warriors. it was a

one of the arguments for dni and something that my old boss steve hadley advances one of the reasons he and condoleezza rice supported the dni was that they work colored by their experience in iran where they believed that the cia's information, the cia's intelligence was considered too heavily, was weighted too heavily against other dissenting views across the intelligence community, of course namely the department of energy's intelligence office so i think they saw that the dni and others have seen this as a benefit as well, the dni is able to marshal all the intelligence, all the information from across the community and not just look at the cia. i think the cia plays the most prominent role and they have among them the most brilliant analysts that we have in the country and certainly in the government but i think that is one benefit of the dni is that the dni is able to bring together all of the points of view so that we might have a completely balanced assessment on important questions. >> right so when a national intelligence estimate is written the dni is now coordinating that

steve hadley, congratulations on taking over the board chairmanship. i know those of us that have worked here and are proud of this institution are thrilled with you stepping up to do that. jim dobbins is someone that has taught us now i won't say how long but going on at least 15 years about how we need to think about peace and security and the u.s. involvement. so the fact that you have stepped up to the school there couldn't be a better person and perspective and i want to acknowledge bill taylor who i saw walking in. bill is also -- i met bill first in afghanistan in 2002 and he remains one of the best examples of a diplomat and boss that i've ever had. when i traveled to afghanistan for the first time 21 years ago, i would come to witness what i believe is one of the greatest foreign-policy mistakes that our country has ever made and that was the abandonment of afghanistan and the gradual or sometimes not gradual distraction to afghanistan, its communities, its infrastructure, its relationships with its neighbors that we are still climbing out of

he confirmed that indeed andy car and steve hadley two of the president's top lieutenants had tried to recruit him to be the director of national intelligence and i think this is very interesting contemporaries contemporaries -- contemporaneous view immediate after it passed and look down to the sum of the problems he would have been his first years. he gave me his e-mails that he sent to the white house in december and january of 2004 and 2005 critiquing the law and some of the conditions that he would ask president bush for him to even consider. secretary gates and i have this in the book describes the new law as quote strange. he said the president needs to make clear the new director of national intelligence is the head of the intelligence community not some mere budgeteers or coordinator who just has common denominator, the elegy to convene people and only hash out the common denominator about the policy and directives affecting u.s. intelligence community. eventually secretary gates turned down the offer. he said sort of to me that hadley and car made a mistake that the neophyte

my name is steve hadley. i am chairman of the board of the u.s. institute of peace. i want to thank you all for coming, and welcome you all to u.s. ip -- usip. usip is a congressionally-created an congressional organization. as we see every day in the public media, the world is full of sources of conflict, religious differences, ethnic differences, and tribal differences. usip believes that these sources of conflict do not need to descend to armed conflict, and then there are methods and processes that can prevent conflicts from becoming armed conflicts. , our job is to identify, teach, and train people in these methods and processes, and then to apply them on the ground in conflict zones to prevent, mitigate, and resolve conflict. our program today focuses on one afghanistan, -- where usip has been involved for over a decade, helping to develop policies, practices, and -- seek that she to and to end the conflict and bring peace. our program will end with a ambassadorress by james dolmens, who is the special representative for afghanistan and pakistan within the u.s.