Interdepartmental tension may be coming to a head in the Bush administration. In "Bush at War," Bob Woodward examines the tension between Colin Powell and Donald Rumsfeld, which generalizes to tension between the departments of State and Defense. Even during Bush's presidential campaign and the early days of his presidency, Powell was careful to consult with his own PR staff before scheduling any joint appearances, as if to avoid tarnishing his own reputation by association with Bush. But Bush seems to encourage conflict among his cabinet members. There is a certain logic to this: constant arguments will expose the weaknesses of every proposal, and avoid falling into any "yes-man" patterns among top staff. The downsides of this high-strung environment are becoming more visible. The two departments are increasingly acting to undermine each other (not necessarily on purpose). Way back in early 2001, someone from Defense said that the US "is and has always been committed to military defense of Taiwan." This sent the State department scrambling to retract that message for the benefit of relations with China. Immediately after September 11, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz suggested taking action in Iraq. This was promptly cast aside by Powell and Rice. When Bush formally decided to remove Hussein, Powell was sent to present the US's case to the UN. The key evidence in Powell's case was a set of forged documents which were provided to Powell by the Defense Department. Powell was described as "apoplectic" when it was discovered that the documents were forged, and that Defense had somehow failed to scrutinize them before passing them to State. More recently, the State department has fired some shots back at Defense. A few weeks ago, State department sources indicated that they might contact Bush Sr. and request that he advise Bush Jr. against too much reliance on Rumsfeld. And today, Elizabeth Jones (US Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs) had this to say about Newt Gingrich:

"Newt Gingrich does not speak in the name of the Pentagon and what he said is garbage," US Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Elizabeth Jones told the Publico daily. "What Gingrich says does not interest me. He is an idiot and you can publish that," she added. Gingrich called on Tuesday for dramatic change at the State Department, which he accused of backing Middle East dictators and undermining the policies of President George W. Bush. [AFP]

Gingrich has been acting as a Defense Department advisor. Meanwhile, North Korea admitted it has nukes with a show of diplomatic bravado worthy of Dr. Strangelove:

The United States, for its part, had played down expectations before the meetings began, although Powell had said he welcomed North Korea’s willingness to meet in a multilateral setting. North Korea had been insisting on direct talks with the United States before agreeing to allowing China to participate. But the early hopes were quickly dashed last Friday when Pyongyang declared the nation was “successfully reprocessing” 8,000 spent fuel rods. After a brief flurry of controversy, the North Korean news agency issued a correction to assert that the reprocessing had not begun. U.S. intelligence officials said the reprocessing of the fuel rods would give the Koreans enough plutonium to manufacture five or six nuclear bombs. Adding to the debate — and North Korea’s suspicions about U.S. intentions — The New York Times reported this week on a Pentagon memorandum recommending that the United States join with China to press diplomatically for the ouster of North Korea’s leadership... The Times said the memo seemed at odds with the State Department approach of convincing Kim that Washington does not intend to oust him. Critics of the Pentagon approach say it is absurd to expect China, a traditional North Korean ally, to join a U.S.-led effort to topple Kim. Speaking on condition of anonymity, a South Korean official said Wednesday he was concerned that the memo report could undermine the talks in Beijing.[MSNBC]

Perhaps tommorrow's headline: "Pentagon and State departments obliterated in mutual nuclear strike against each other."