R. James Woolsey, Jr.

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name = Robert James Woolsey, Jr.


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Robert James Woolsey Jr. (born September 21, 1941) is a foreign policy specialist and former Director of Central Intelligence and head of the Central Intelligence Agency (February 5, 1993 - January 10, 1995).

Early life

Woolsey was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he graduated from Tulsa Central High School. In 1963 he received his AB from Stanford University (Phi Beta Kappa), and in 1965 his MA from Oxford University — where he was a Rhodes Scholar — and an LLB from Yale Law School in 1968.

Career

Woolsey has been known primarily as a neoconservative Democrat — hawkish on foreign policy issues but more liberal on economic and social issues.Fact|date=March 2007 He has endorsed Senator John McCain for president and serves as one of McCain's foreign policy advisors. [cite web
url=http://www.newsweek.com/id/139898/output/print
title=McCain's Brain Trust
last=McMahon
first=Robert
publisher=Newsweek
date=2008-06-03
accessdate=2008-06-18]

Woolsey has held important positions in both Democratic and Republican administrations. His influence has been felt during the administrations of Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton. Woolsey is known for clearly articulating the national security argument in support of moving away from fossil fuels and towards distributed generation.

Woolsey has served in the U.S. government as:
*Advisor (during military service) on the U.S. Delegation to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT 1), Helsinki and Vienna, 1969-1970
*General Counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services, 1970-73
*Under Secretary of the Navy, 1977-1979
*Delegate at Large to the U.S.-Soviet Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START) and Nuclear and Space Arms Talks (NST), Geneva, 1983-1986
*Ambassador to the Negotiation on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE), Vienna, 1989-1991
*Director of Central Intelligence, 1993-1995

He is currently a member of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP) Board of Advisors, Advisor of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, Founding Member of the Set America Free Coalition, and a Senior Vice President at Booz Allen Hamilton for Global Strategic Security (since July 15, 2002). [ [http://rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/1391 Right Web | Profile | James Woolsey ] ] . He is a Patron of the Henry Jackson Society, a British think tank based in Cambridge. He was formerly chairman of the Freedom House board of trustees.

Woolsey is also a member of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) and was one of the signatories to the January 26, 1998 letter sent to President Clinton that called for the removal of Saddam Hussein. [ [http://www.theindyvoice.com/pnac/ Project New American Century : The Indy Voice - “Be the change you want to see in the world…” ] ] That same year he served on the Rumsfeld Commission, which investigated the threat of ballistic missiles for the US Congress.

Within hours of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Woolsey appeared on television suggesting Iraqi complicity. [ [http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0109/12/ltm.13.html Former CIA Director Asserts Iraq May be Behind Terrorist Attacks] CNN September 12, 2001] In September 2002, as Congress was deliberating authorizing President Bush to use force against Iraq, Woolsey told "The Wall Street Journal" that he believed that Iraq was also connected to the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City and the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993. [cite news |url=http://online.wsj.com/article_email/article_print/SB1031184073773956835-.html |title=The Iraq Connection |last=Morrison |first=Micah |publisher="The Wall Street Journal" |date=2002-09-02 |accessdate=2008-06-29] In July 2006, he called on the US to bomb Syria.

Relationship with President Clinton

As Director of Central Intelligence, Woolsey is notable for having a very limited relationship with President Clinton. According to journalist Richard Miniter:

Never once in his two-year tenure did CIA director James Woolsey ever have a one-on-one meeting with Clinton. Even semiprivate meetings were rare. They only happened twice. Woolsey told me: "It wasn't that I had a bad relationship with the president. It just didn't exist." [ [http://www.nationalreview.com/interrogatory/interrogatory091103b.asp Q&A with Richard Miniter on Osama bin Laden on National Review Online ] ]

Another quote about his relationship with Clinton, according to Paula Kaufman of "Insight on the News":

Remember the guy who in 1994 crashed his plane onto the White House lawn? That was me trying to get an appointment to see President Clinton. [ [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_20_18/ai_87460042/pg_5 Woolsey wary of more attacks; former CIA director James Woolsey says the U.S. could ensure a more peaceful world by toppling Iraq's Saddam Hussein and ceasing its toleration o... ] ]

David Halberstam notes in "War in a Time of Peace" that Clinton chose Woolsey for CIA director because the Clinton campaign had courted neoconservatives leading up to the 1992 election, promising to be tougher on Taiwan, Bosnia, and human rights in China, and it was decided that they ought to give at least one neoconservative a job in the administration.

U.S. energy policy

Woolsey was a keynote speaker at the EELPJ symposium on wind energy and biofuels in Houston, Texas on February 23, 2007, during which he outlined the national security arguments in favor of moving away from fossil fuels. [ [http://www.law.uh.edu/eelpj/symposium/symposium2007.html EELPJ Symposium] February, 2007] In a July 2007 interview with "The Futurist" magazine he argued that U.S. dependence on Middle Eastern oil ranks "very high" as a national security concern. [ [http://www.wfs.org/futintervja07.htm Ending the Oil Era] "The Futurist" July, 2007]

Woolsey is featured in Thomas Friedman's Discovery Channel documentary [http://times.discovery.com/convergence/friedman/addictedtooil/addictedtooil.html "Addicted to Oil"] , and in the 2006 documentary film "Who Killed the Electric Car?" addressing solutions to oil dependency through the development of the plug-in hybrid electric vehicle and use of biomass fuels such as cellulosic ethanol. He is a founding member of the Set America Free Coalition, dedicated to freeing the United States from oil dependence. He is also on the board of directors for the electric vehicle advocacy group Plug In America and an advisor to The Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, which promotes the Robert Zubrin plan for the elimination of tariffs and subsidies related to ethanol, sugar, and corn, and the Flex Fuel Mandate.

Woolsey also wrote the foreword to "50 Simple Steps to Save the Earth from Global Warming" (Freedom Press, 2008).

Criticism

Steven Clemons, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation think tank, has accused Woolsey of both profiting from and promoting the Iraq War. [ [http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/000775.php Woolsey Needs to Make a Choice Between Being a War Profiteer or War Pundit] The Washington Note July 10, 2005]

McCain adviser

John McCain has hired Jim Woolsey as an advisor on energy and climate change issues. [ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/uselection2008/johnmccain/2169365/John-McCain-hires-former-CIA-director-Jim-Woolsey-as-green-advisor.html John McCain hires former CIA director Jim Woolsey as green advisor - Telegraph ] ] .

References

ee also

* Project for the New American Century
* Committee on the Present Danger
* Henry Jackson Society
* World Affairs Council of Washington, DC

External links

* [https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/directors-and-deputy-directors-of-central-intelligence/wools.html Biographical information] CIA.org
* [http://energy.nationalreview.com/post/?q=OTlmMjFjYWRjOWI3ZGI0MzUxZDJjYTBlMmUzOTc2Mzc= Turning Oil into Salt] by R. James Woolsey & Anne Korin]
* [http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=James_Woolsey SourceWatch Profile]
* [http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/2002/021116-ww4.htm World War IV] speech by James R. Woolsey
* [http://www.newsmeat.com/washington_political_donations/R_James_Woolsey.php Woolsey's political donations]
* [http://www.setamericafree.org Set America Free Coalition]
* [http://www.thepolitic.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=62&Itemid=39 James Woolsey's interview with "The Politic"]
* [http://www.setamericafree.org Set America Free] .