Condoleezza Rice: Bush deserves some credit for Gadhafi

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in a report published Monday by USA Today that the Bush administration deserves part of the credit for Arab Spring and the fall of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.

"The change in the conversation about the Middle East, where people now routinely talk about democratization, is something that I'm very grateful for and I think we had a role in that," Rice said.

Rice credited former President George W. Bush with leading the way into “uncharted territory” in the Middle East, as well as the agreement with Gadhafi to give up and turn over material from his nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs in 2003.

"[I'm] grateful we disarmed [Gadhafi] of his most dangerous weapons. Sitting in that bunker, I'm pretty sure he would have used them," she said, adding that Gadhafi "wasn't totally sane."

She pushed back against the idea that the U.S. intervention in Iraq following the 9/11 attacks could have taken a similar form to the U.S-backed NATO intervention backing the Libyan rebellion. Libyan rebels ultimately ousted Gadhafi and reported his death earlier this month.

"It would be a mistake to make the leap of faith that this would somehow have worked in Iraq," she said. "I do think that an Arab spring in Iraq would have been unthinkable under Saddam Hussein."

Rice also said she thinks people are starting to understand “the things that [the Bush administration] tried to do in really uncharted territory and under unbelievably difficult circumstances after 9/11.”

Rice is making the media rounds this week to publicize Tuesday’s release of her new memoir, No Higher Honor. Rice has not always been so available to the spotlight, and she told USA Today that she is “happy to be away” from Washington, D.C., and its politicians.

Rice’s book also details how she handled Gadhafi’s apparent fixation on her and her conflicts with Bush and with Vice President Cheney during her time in office.

"We were all working under enormous pressure. It was tough. We didn't always agree, and everybody's human," she said.

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