John Negroponte

Ambassador to Honduras (1981–1985)

From 1981 to 1985, Negroponte was the U.S. ambassador to Honduras. During this time, military aid to Honduras grew from $4 million to $77.4 million a year, and the US began to maintain a significant military presence there, with the goal of overthrowing the revolutionary Sandinista government of Nicaragua, which had overthrown the Somoza dictatorship in a civil war.

In 1995, The Baltimore Sun published an extensive investigation of U.S. activities in Honduras. Speaking of Negroponte and other senior U.S. officials, an ex-Honduran congressman, Efraín Díaz, was quoted as saying:^[7] "Their attitude was one of tolerance and silence. They needed Honduras to loan its territory more than they were concerned about innocent people being killed."^[8]

Substantial evidence later emerged to support the contention that Negroponte knew serious violations of human rights were being committed by the Honduran government, yet did not recommend ending U.S. military aid to Honduras. Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, on September 14, 2001, as reported in the Congressional Record, aired his concerns on the occasion of Negroponte's nomination to the position of UN ambassador:

Based upon the Committee's review of State Department and CIA documents, it would seem that Ambassador Negroponte knew far more about human rights abuses perpetrated by the Honduran government than he chose to share with the committee in 1989 or in embassy contributions at the time to annual State Department Human Rights reports.^[9]

Dodd cited a 1985 cable sent by Negroponte that made it clear that Negroponte was aware of and urged for reform to address the threat of "future human rights abuses" by "secret operating cells" left over by General Gustavo Álvarez Martínez, the chief of the Honduran armed forces, after he was forcibly removed from his post by fellow military commanders in 1984. The cables reveal that Negroponte repeatedly urged for updates to the Honduran criminal code and justice system to replace arbitrary measures taken by the Honduran government after events such as the destruction of the nation's main power plant at Tegucigalpa and the abduction of the entire business establishment of San Pedro Sula, Honduras' second largest city, in 1982.^[10] The previous U.S. ambassador to Honduras, Jack Binns, who was appointed by President Jimmy Carter, made numerous complaints about human rights abuses by the Honduran Army under the government of Policarpo Paz García. Binns later acknowledged that the Honduran Army was supported by military assistance from the Argentine junta and the CIA during the Carter administration, and that neither the Honduran government nor the CIA kept the embassy informed of what it was doing.^[11] The scale of the carnage in Honduras was limited to less than 300 'disappearances' during the five years of the Negroponte and Binns ambassadorships as compared with 70,000 lost lives as a result of civil war and repression in El Salvador, notwithstanding that Honduras was involved in a low-level civil war punctuated at times by invasions of its territory.^{[citation needed]}

In April 2005, as the Senate confirmation hearings for the National Intelligence post were held, hundreds of documents were released by the State Department in response to a FOIA request by The Washington Post.^[12] The documents, cables that Negroponte sent to Washington while serving as ambassador to Honduras, indicated that he played a more active role than previously known in managing US efforts against the leftist Sandinista government next door in Nicaragua. According to the Post, the image of Negroponte that emerges from the cables is that of an:

exceptionally energetic, action-oriented ambassador whose anti-communist convictions led him to downplay human rights abuses in Honduras, the most reliable U.S. ally in the region. There is little in the documents the State Department has released so far to support his assertion that he used "quiet diplomacy" to persuade the Honduran authorities to investigate the most egregious violations, including the mysterious disappearance of dozens of government opponents.^[12]

The New York Times wrote that the documents revealed:

a tough cold warrior who enthusiastically carried out President Ronald Reagan's strategy. They show he sent admiring reports to Washington about the Honduran Army chief, who was blamed for human rights violations, warned that peace talks with the Nicaraguan government might be a dangerous "Trojan horse" and pleaded with officials in Washington to impose greater secrecy on the Honduran role in aiding the contras.

The cables show that Mr. Negroponte worked closely with William J. Casey, then director of central intelligence, on the Reagan administration's anti-Communist offensive in Central America. He helped word a secret 1983 presidential "finding" authorizing support for the Contras, as the Nicaraguan rebels were known, and met regularly with Honduran military officials to win and retain their backing for the covert action.^[13]

Negroponte was opposed to early drafts of peace settlements on grounds that they would have left undisturbed the threat of expansion of the Nicaraguan armed forces with Soviet and Cuban aid. Negroponte also tried to undermine efforts by Costa Rican president Oscar Arias's Contadora peace initiative (for which Arias won a Nobel Prize).^[14] In his tenure in Honduras, Negroponte steered a middle course between State Department and journalists who favored a policy of nonresistance to the militarization of the Sandinista regime to power Nicaragua and its aid to rebel movements in Honduras and El Salvador and 'hard line' persons within the Reagan administration who would have involved the United States in Central America through actions such as blockades, bombing of Nicaraguan airfields, provision of offensive weapons, and installation of permanent military bases. However, a study of American policy has noted that

the United States had a great deal to do with the preservation of Honduran stability. Had it not been for U.S. enticements and pressures, elections probably would not have been held in 1980 and 1981. The perpetuation of the military dictatorship would have undermined the legitimacy of the political order, making it far more vulnerable to revolutionary turmoil. By the same token, strong North American opposition to President Suazo's attempt to remain in power in 1985 helped preserve the fragile legitimacy that had been built over the preceding five years ... massive economic aid prevented the economy's collapse ... without the United States, it might well have disintegrated into chaos."^[15]

Following Bush-Gorbachev meetings beginning in 1986, both the U.S. and the Soviet Union ended military support for 'proxy wars' in Central America, and free elections in Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador followed. Senator Bill Bradley regarded the whole episode as "a minor issue--the supply of arms to the Nicaraguan contras, a policy that took on monumental proportions inside the Beltway and upon those liberals who saw another quagmire in every exercise of military power."^[16]

Assistant Secretary for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries (1985–1989)

In this posting, Negroponte together with Ambassador Richard Benedick negotiated the Montreal Protocol on Ozone, the most successful modern environmental treaty, overcoming opposition from Europe, Russia, and China and from some Reagan administration officials.^[17] He also fostered scientific cooperation with the Soviet Union, clashing with 'hard liners' like Richard Perle, as well as two treaties relating to cooperation in dealing with nuclear accidents in the wake of the Chernobyl disaster.^{[citation needed]}

Ambassador to Mexico (1989–1993)

During Negroponte's tour as US Ambassador to Mexico, he was instrumental in persuading the Bush administration to respond to a Mexican initiative by negotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) despite initial opposition by the U.S. Office of Trade Representative. His tenure in Mexico was thus the most consequential of any modern American ambassadorship.^[18] Another commentator noted the subsequent proliferation of Negroponte's vision in other free trade agreements.^[19] He officiated at the embassy where he liberalized visa practices.

Ambassador to the UN (2001–2004)

President George W. Bush appointed Negroponte to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in February 2001, and after substantial opposition from Senate Democrats, the nomination was ratified by the Senate on September 15, 2001, four days after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. In the New York Review of Books, Stephen Kinzer reported that a State Department official told him that "Giving him this job is a way of telling the UN: 'We hate you.'"^[20] Negroponte, however, warned the Bush administration about the adverse consequences of intervening in Iraq.^[21]

Later, in April 2004, Negroponte "was instrumental in winning unanimous approval of a Security Council resolution that demanded Saddam Hussein comply with U.N. mandates to disarm".^[22]

Ambassador to Iraq (2004–2005)

On April 19, 2004, Negroponte was nominated by U.S. President George W. Bush to be the United States Ambassador to Iraq after the June 30 transfer of sovereignty to the new Iraqi government. He was confirmed by the United States Senate on May 6, 2004, by a vote of 95 to 3, and was sworn in on June 23, 2004, replacing L. Paul Bremer as the U.S.'s highest ranking American civilian in Iraq. He advised the Bush administration that security had to precede reconstruction in Iraq, organized a peaceful election, and gave advice, equally unwelcome to Secretary Rumsfeld and Democrats in Congress, that a five-year commitment would be required.^[23]

Director of National Intelligence (2005–2007)

On February 17, 2005, President George W. Bush named Negroponte as the first Director of National Intelligence, (DNI), a cabinet-level position charged with coordinating the nation's Intelligence Community.^[24] On April 21, 2005, Negroponte was confirmed by a vote of 98 to 2 in the Senate, and subsequently sworn into the office that was called "substantially stronger" than its predecessor position, the Director of Central Intelligence.^[25] Part of its power stemmed from the ability to "determine" budgets, prompting President Bush to remark, "That's why John Negroponte is going to have a lot of influence. He will set the budgets."^[26] The budget of the Intelligence Community was estimated at $40 billion.^[26]

A memorandum in the Federal Register signed May 5, 2006 by President Bush states that Negroponte, as intelligence czar, be delegated the authority to exempt companies from accurate accounting standards, a power previously reserved for the chief executive under the 1934 Securities Exchange Act.^[27]

Reaction in the intelligence community to Negroponte's nomination was, according to Newsweek, "overwhelmingly positive" because he had "earned the respect of many intel professionals since those early days of the Reagan counterinsurgency."^[28] The Times noted, "if anyone can bring a semblance of unity to America's bewildering network of competing spy agencies, it is John Negroponte."^[29] According to John MacGaffin, the CIA's former associate deputy director for clandestine operations, "This is a guy who plays hardball. He's a man who understands the whole range of counterintelligence, intelligence and covert action. They're all parts of foreign policy and protecting ourselves."^[28]

Congressional reaction from Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), then-vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA), then-ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee was positive.^[30]

As DNI, Negroponte, "embarked on an impressive array of reform efforts," with "perhaps the most transformational work ... [involving] the effort to retool the creaky electronic infrastructure of the intelligence community."^[24] One of Negroponte's first tests was on an over-budget satellite system. The $25 billion system, called the "Future Imagery Architecture," was created as the "foundation for the next generation of America's space-based surveillance efforts." The reality was quite different, as it became, "a managerial nightmare – five years behind schedule and billions over budget. Poor quality control and technical problems raised questions about whether the system would ever work properly." Negroponte jettisoned half the classified project.^[24]

Negroponte also appointed "mission managers" – intelligence professionals focused on America's hardest targets and most looming threats. The mission managers are focused on counterterrorism, counterproliferation, counterintelligence, Iran, North Korea, and Cuba and Venezuela.^[31] According to John McLaughlin, former Deputy Director of Central Intelligence (DDCI), the mission manager concept would likely facilitate integration of analysis, collection of information, and other intelligence activities.^[32] The mission manager concept was found to be beneficial during potential crises, such as in the days immediately following North Korea's 2006 nuclear test.^[24]

Progress made included the White House approval of more than 30 DNI recommendations on improving the flow of intelligence and terrorism data to state and local authorities; requiring intelligence agencies to accept each other's clearance; efforts to prevent groupthink; creation of an analytic ombudsman position; establishment of an Open Source center; and more "red teams" to challenge conventional thinking.^[24] The President's Daily Brief, the highly classified report given to the President each morning by Negroponte, once prepared solely by the Central Intelligence Agency, is now compiled from intelligence agencies across the government.^[24]

In spite of his progress leading the Intelligence Community, though, Negroponte wanted to return to the field in which he spent 37 years – the State Department and Foreign Service.^[33] On January 5, 2007, Negroponte announced his resignation as DNI and move to the State Department to serve as Deputy Secretary of State.^[34]

According to Newsweek, "Under Negroponte, the intel czar's office was praised by both congressional and executive-branch officials for greatly improving—via its National Counterterrorism Center—the sharing among relevant agencies of intelligence reports about terror threats."^[32][35]

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State (2007–2009)

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Negroponte was sworn in as U.S. Deputy Secretary of State by President George W. Bush on February 27, 2007.^[36] He served in that position until the end of the Bush administration on January 20, 2009.

Later career

Negroponte joined McLarty Associates, an international strategic advisory firm headquartered in Washington, D.C., in 2009.^[37] He serves on the Leadership Council of Concordia, a think tank based in New York City focused on promoting effective public–private collaboration for greater sustainability.^[38]

Opposition to Trump

Negroponte was one of 50 signatories of a statement concerning 2016 Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in which Trump was called "reckless" and stated that he would "put at risk our country's national security and well-being."^[39] In 2020, Negroponte, along with over 130 other former Republican national security officials, signed a statement that asserted that President Trump was unfit to serve another term, and "To that end, we are firmly convinced that it is in the best interest of our nation that Vice President Joe Biden be elected as the next President of the United States, and we will vote for him."^[40]