The Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan, also known by the informal expression War Czar, is a position the George W. Bush administration created to oversee the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan with authority to issue directions to the Pentagon, the State Department, and other agencies.
Previous to the creation of the 'war czar' position, Deputy National Security Advisor Meghan O'Sullivan was primarily responsible for White House programs related to the war, under the direction of the National Security Advisor, Stephen J. Hadley and without authority to issue interagency orders. O'Sullivan's resignation allowed the administration the opportunity to reorganize. The position was offered to three retired generals, John J. Sheehan, Jack Keane, and Joseph Ralston, before the appointment of Lieutenant General Douglas Lute in May 2007; Lute was confirmed by the Senate on June 28, 2007, and reported both to the President and the National Security Advisor with the rank of full "Assistant to the President." He has continued to hold this position in the Barack Obama administration. Under President Obama, he now answers to new National Security Advisor Thomas E. Donilon.
Famous quotes containing the words president, deputy, national and/or security:
“We must choose. Be a child of the past with all its crudities and imperfections, its failures and defeats, or a child of the future, the future of symmetry and ultimate success.”
—Frances E. Willard 1839–1898, U.S. president of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union 1879-1891, author, activist. The Woman’s Magazine, pp. 137-40 (January 1887)
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Can wash the balm off from an anointed king;
The breath of worldly men cannot depose
The deputy elected by the Lord.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“It is accordance with our determination to refrain from aggression and build up a sentiment and practice among nations more favorable to peace ... that we have incurred the consent of fourteen important nations to the negotiation of a treaty condemning recourse to war, renouncing it as an instrument of national policy.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
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—Willa Cather (1876–1947)