Chief US Department of State spokesman P.J. Crowley quit on Sunday after causing a stir by describing the US military’s treatment of the suspected WikiLeaks leaker as “ridiculous” and “stupid,” pointed words that forced US President Barack Obama to defend the detention as appropriate.
“Given the impact of my remarks, for which I take full responsibility, I have submitted my resignation” to US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, a department statement attributed to the office of the spokesman said.
In a separate statement released simultaneously, Clinton said she had accepted the resignation “with regret.”
Crowley’s comments about the conditions for Private First Class Bradley Manning at a Marine Corps brig in Quantico, Virginia, reverberated quickly, from the small audience in Massachusetts where Crowley spoke to a White House press conference Friday, where Obama was asked to weigh in on the treatment of the 23-year-old believed responsible for the largest leak of classified US documents ever.
Manning is being held in solitary confinement for all but an hour every day, and is stripped naked each night and given a suicide-proof smock to wear to bed. His lawyer calls the treatment degrading. Amnesty International says the treatment may violate his human rights.
Crowley, who retired as a colonel from the Air Force in 1999 after 26 years in the military, was quoted as telling students at a Massachusetts Institute of Technology seminar on Thursday that he did not understand why the military was handling Manning’s detention that way, calling it “ridiculous, counterproductive and stupid.”
Crowley also said: “Manning is in the right place” in military detention.
A day later, Obama was asked about Crowley’s remarks at a press conference. He replied that he had asked the Pentagon whether the confinement conditions were appropriate and whether they met basic standards.
“They assure me that they are,” the president said.
He declined to elaborate when pressed on whether he disagreed with Crowley’s assessment.
Crowley’s resignation statement said that his comments about Bradley’s pre-trial detention “were intended to highlight the broader, even strategic impact of discreet actions undertaken by national security agencies every day and their impact on our global standing and leadership. The exercise of power in today’s challenging times and relentless media environment must be prudent and consistent with our laws and values.”
In her statement, Clinton said Crowley, 59, “has served our nation with distinction for more than three decades, in uniform and as a civilian.”
She said his service was “motivated by a deep devotion to public policy and public diplomacy.”
Although Clinton had warm words upon Crowley’s departure, he never got along with the secretary’s inner circle. He was well-liked by the press corps, but his often unusually blunt remarks from the Department of State podium got him into trouble and he had not traveled with Clinton on overseas trips in more than a year.
His departure had been expected in the coming months, but officials said the fact that the president was asked about his comments on Manning led the White House to push for him to go sooner. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity.
Crowley will be replaced by Mike Hammer, a foreign service officer who recently finished a stint as the National Security Council spokesman at the White House and was serving as Crowley’s deputy. The department is expected to look for a new full-time spokesman to serve as the face of US diplomacy, the officials said.
“Mike Hammer will do a great job as my successor at State,” Crowley wrote on Twitter on Sunday.
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