People of the Year 2004: Richard Clarke

When counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke published Against All Enemies last spring, he delivered a lacerating indictment of the Bush administration's national security policy. Clarke -- a thirty-year veteran of the intelligence community who served three presidents as a senior White House adviser -- recounted in devastating detail how Bush ignored his repeated and insistent warnings about the threat from Osama bin Laden. Clarke was one of the first senior officials to publicly blast Bush on Iraq, and his ringing apology to the 9/11 Commission in March ("Your government failed you . . . and I failed you") cemented his place in history. Now chairman of Good Harbor Consulting, a small risk-management firm in Virginia, he is at work on his second book, a novel.

Where do we go in Iraq now?

It's going to be damn interesting to see how they manage to pull off a credible handoff of power. They have a choice of living up to what they said they would do and staying in there until things stabilize or having some sham election and using that as an excuse to get out.

There are warnings of terrorists developing a dirty bomb. Do they have the capability?

Not at the moment. You can get medical waste with nuclear material in it relatively easily. But having highly radioactive material that can be easily dispersed and will last a long time, that's much more difficult.

What about Porter Goss as director of the CIA? What does that mean for the agency?

For an agency that was trying to avoid the reputation of politicizing intelligence to now be run by someone who has been a politician all his life is really unfortunate. It'll be much more of an organization that tells the president what he wants to hear.

You weren't surprised by the outcome of the election. How come?

They spent four years planning re-election, looking at every decision they made through that filter. And they told the American people that the war on terrorism and the war on Iraq are all one thing. They're not -- but if you say it from the White House and the Pentagon long enough, it sinks in.

What will Bush's second term bring?

I don't think his personal style is going to change. As he admits, he doesn't like to read the newspapers, doesn't like to read, period, and takes his advice from a close circle of people around him.

What is your novel about?

It'll be about the role of the United States in the Middle East, the role of oil in foreign policy and the way in which the U.S. government works. I think I can get my point across more successfully, and to a broader number of people, using the novel format.

Who's going to play you in the movie being developed of Against All Enemies?

I can't imagine.

Come on, you must wonder late at night.

Well, fear, more than anything else.

Next: Jamie Foxx