Was the work not of the Bush Administration, but of the democrats who didnt want to be seen as being soft on terrorism, and we still live with the consequences of that, those particular decisions. As the director of dni, he was heavily involved in an intelligence estimate of iran which forecast, quite accurately, that iran was not going to develop Nuclear Capability before the end of the first bush the second Bush Administration. And this was very unpopular with a number of people in washington, including Vice President cheney, but it proved to be entirely accurate. He left as director of National Intelligence under circumstances that havent been fully explained. His main interest as director of National Intelligence was in advising the president who he felt, i think, needed advice at that point. He and gates and Condoleezza Rice supplanted the influence of people like Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz during the last two with years of the second Bush Administration. But one consequence of his devoting himself to the giving of advice was that he had less time to give to management, and he was criticized for this. And whether his replacement was due to the advice that he gave or the need for more management is unclear. But in any event, he accepted the job of deputy secretary of state where his achievements were, essentially, two. First, he pressed hard for elections in pakistan which ultimately were won by the civilian with parties which had the effect of delegitimizing the more extreme islamists and even though they were immediately followed by the assassination of benazir bhutto. And his second achievement was the deepening of relations with china. There were several dozen working groups established that hadnt previously existed that joint meetings of all kinds of american and chinese officials that were, essentially, his accomplish bement and that of secretary of the treasury paulson who was very interested in deepening the relationships with china. And at the close of his tenure, the close of the second Bush Administration, he almost certainly would have been secretary of state had Condoleezza Rice, apparently or according to her memoirs offered to resign in his favor and was told that the white house that the Bush Administration wouldnt do it. And so she remained until the end of the administration. So he has retired. He does consulting work for mclarty and associates, and he teaches one day a week at yale. I dont think his career is over. Its hard to say. But it does exem exemplify the influence a relatively clearsighted diplomat can have on a variety of events. And the book, which as was said earlier is called the last american diplomat, can be ordered from all sorts of sources, and the paperback edition costs 24 if anyone wants to order it. Ill now, im now glad to take any questions. Ive gone on for too long, but 50 years is a long career, and abbreviating it into 50 minutes isnt too easy. Thank you. If you have a question to ask, we have about five minutes remaining. If you could come up to the microphone. Thank you. First of all, good evening. Very good presentation. I had a question. If master negroponte, as you know, hes still up at yale once a week, what advice would he give to future students that are involved in studying International Relations . Its such a complex, huge experience of 50 years. What would he say . He could say anything, but what would be his best advice . I dont want to put views in his mouth, and ive tried to be careful on that because our views dont correspond on all things. I think he would advise history rather than international theory. Thats the sense i would have. I think he also doesnt hold to the view that we are the hyperpower. He has a sense of history and of the rise and fall of nations and of the limitations on american power, and when he was ambassador to the u. N. He, at least in my view, came closer than anyone else who has been there to realizing the original design of the u. N. As seen by roosevelt; namely, as and churchill and stalin also as a concert of the great powers, not as a parliament of the world. But as a means whereby the five permanent members could adjust conflicts, at least conflicts not involving themselves. And thats a vision that really hasnt prevailed. He was on very good terms with the parish and french ambassadors the british and french ambassadors and the chinese and russian ones also. And if it had been left to greenstock and negroponte, there would not have been an iraq war. Im quite sure of that. Okay, thank you. Any other questions . Yes. [inaudible] the big one . This one . Two questions, kind of. How old is he now . Thats my first question. Hes almost exactly my age. Hes 73 or 76ment 75 or 76. And it sounds like an italian name. No, hes greek. Well, his family has an interesting background. They were natives of the island of chios which was the scene of a masser of greeks by the massacre of greeks by the Ottoman Turks in the 1830s, massacred about 90 of the population. Thereafter they became, essentially, wandering refugees. The family was in odessa for a while, it was in switzerland. His father wanted to join the greek diplomatic service, and they wouldnt let him because hed been educated, he hadnt been educated in greece. And his father was a small scale ship owner who left london at the outbreak of the Second World War and came to new york. His wife, whos a decade or two younger than he is, is an english woman who is the daughter of a quite prominent anglocatholic family and whose mother, who was a belgian aristocrat, had been part of the resistance during the war, and is one of Queen Elizabeths closest friends. So he has an interesting family background. The other peculiarity thats quite remarkable is that when he was in honduras, he and his wife adopted two honduran children, and after they left honduras, they adopted three more of them. So he has five adopted honduran children, some of whom are still in school and college. So he has an interesting, a very interesting family. Because i know a lot of that name just like a it sounds italian. Negro means black. There is a negroponte street, for what thats worth. And the second question was i grew up in the vietnam era, so its a lot of bad memories of that time, but i didnt know the bombing [inaudible] we didnt, was it successful to well, this is negropontes great frustration, that at the time it stopped the north vietnamese were down to their last three surfacetoair missiles. So they were totally open at that moment. It would have been a turkey shoot. Thats why negroponte thought we could have gotten an agreement that would have required withdrawal from south vietnam. And this was the view of sir Robert Thompson also, and it was the view of general hague. Now in kissingers defense, there are a few things to be said. One of them is the bombing, that sort of bombing had been considered earlier during the johnson administration, and it had not been done, and the reason it hadnt been done was that the memories of the retreat from the chosen reservoir in korea were still fresh, and there was fear that it would provoke chinese or russian intervention. And the reason that the bombing was done in 73 when it wasnt done previously was that both the chinese and the russians wanted things from the united states, and kissinger was confident that they would not intervene if we bombed. What the chinese wanted at that point was protection against the threat that the russians would bomb their nascent nuclear program. The chinese were just developing their nuclear program, and there was the russians were rumored to want to put a stop to it. But the russians wanted at that point primarily american wheat, which we supplied in large quantities and which they had desperate need of. Now, by the time of the ultimate collapse in 75, both those conditions had disappeared. But there was this rather narrow window of opportunity when we could bomb with