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TOPIC: In nuclear negotiations, more women at the table for U.S. (WaPo 8/21/10)

Jen the Michigander

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Date: Aug 22, 2010

In nuclear negotiations, more women at the table for U.S. (WaPo 8/21/10)	Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/21/AR2010082102600.html When Rose Gottemoeller began negotiating the new nuclear treaty with Moscow, the U.S. diplomat got questions on the usual topics: missile defense, warheads, inspections. And then there was this one from the Russian generals: "How come you've got so many women?" To the Russians' astonishment, an array of American women faced them across the negotiating table. Gottemoeller led the American team during the negotiations, which concluded in March. Her deputy was Marcie Ries, another diplomat. The top two U.S. scientists were female. And helping to close the deal on the New START agreement was Ellen O. Tauscher, a State Department undersecretary and former congresswoman. The U.S. delegation reflected a little-noticed shift in the tough-guy world of national security. Twenty-five years after White House aide Donald Regan famously opined that women were "not going to understand throw-weights," American females clearly get nuclear policy. They also run it. Or a lot of it, anyway. Women hold senior nuclear positions at the Pentagon and White House. Search out the old office of Gen. Leslie R. Groves, the Manhattan Project's "Indispensable Man," and you will find a woman. She is Karin Look, who helped oversee the dismantling of Libya's nuclear weapons program. "From me to the secretary, it's all female," said Look, a senior verification official whose chain of command extends up to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. The nuclear experts are indicative of an expanding cast of top female national security officials. Women occupy between 21 and 29 percent of the senior positions at the State Department, USAID, the Pentagon and other national security and foreign policy agencies, according to a recent survey by Women in International Security, a professional group. About 13 percent of the Senior Intelligence Service is female, it found. Despite their advances, American women are still nowhere near equality in terms of their share of senior national security jobs. The recent report by Women in International Security noted that female professionals "have remained acutely aware of their minority status in many international security environments." And many of the women interviewed for the study "pointed to a need to establish credibility quickly, especially in the defense, intelligence and law enforcement areas, and acknowledged that this was sometimes difficult." In addition, women faced "unique challenges" balancing work and family, it said. Gottemoeller said her most difficult years professionally were when her two children were growing up. In 1993, after the election of Bill Clinton, she was offered a job on the National Security Council, which is famous for its grueling hours. Her husband, also a State Department employee, agreed to pick up more of the parenting responsibilities. "My husband and I had a deal. He said, two years in the NSC. And that's it. And I said okay. It worked for us," she said. "Luckily in those two years we were able to get the deal struck where we were able to get nukes out of Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus" after the collapse of the Soviet Union." During the latest negotiations, Gottemoeller noted that the Russian Foreign Ministry actually included a few young women in its delegation. "Things are changing," she said, "even in their government." __________________ Nobody puts THIS baby in the corner!

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