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"I've just not seen, and you almost never see, filibusters used against uncontroversial items to use as leverage against controversial items. It's one thing to filibuster an issue straight up. It's some other thing to use it in this way," said Ornstein.

"The caveat to that is, we've often seen instances where you're right at the end of the year and there's must-pass legislation, and individual Senators will hold them up as hostages to get things done," said Ornstein. "A pet issue or a state thing -- but a party to use a filibuster in this way, it's not anything I've seen."

After the meeting, Hadley wrote up a brief memo that came to be known as Hadley's Rules:

If a state like Syria or Iran offers specific assistance, we will take it without offering anything in return. We will accept it without strings or promises. We won't try to build on it.

"States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world."

The Iranians had been engaging in high-level diplomacy with the American government for more than a year, so the phrase was shocking and profound.

After that, the Iranian diplomats skipped the monthly meeting in Geneva. But they came again in March. And so did Mann. "They said they had put their necks out to talk to us and they were taking big risks with their careers and their families and their lives," Mann says.

The secret negotiations with Iran continued, every month for another year.

Leverett plunged right into a dramatic new peace proposal floated by Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. Calling for "full normalization" in exchange for "full withdrawal" from the occupied territories, Abdullah promised to rally all the Arab nations to a final settlement with Israel. In his brand-new third-floor office at the Old Executive Office Building, a tiny room with a very high ceiling, Leverett began hammering out the details with Abdullah's foreign-policy advisor, Adel Al-Jubeir. When Ariel Sharon said that a return to the '67 borders was unacceptable, Al-Jubeir said the Saudis didn't want to be in the "real estate business" -- if the Palestinians agreed to border modifications, the Saudis could hardly refuse them. Al-Jubeir believed he had something that might actually work.

But the White House wasn't interested. Sharon already rejected it, Rice told Leverett.

At the Arab League meeting, Abdullah got every Arab state to sign his proposal in a unanimous vote.

The White House still wasn't interested.

Powell was furious, Leverett remembers. "What is it they're afraid of?" he demanded. "Who the hell are they afraid of?"

"I don't know sir," Leverett said.

Abdullah stood up. "That's it. This meeting is over."

No Arab leader had ever spoken to Bush like that before, Leverett says. But Saudi Arabia was a key ally in the war on terror, vital to the continued U.S. oil supply, so Bush and Rice and Powell excused themselves into another room for a quick huddle.

"Because one Israeli politician told you it's going to make things politically difficult for him, you don't put it out? Do you realize how hard that makes things for all our Arab partners?"

Rice sat impassively behind her broad desk. "If we put the road map out," she said, "it will interfere with Israeli elections."

"You are interfering with Israeli elections, just in another way."

There was also an awkward scene with the secretary of defense. They were in the Situation Room and Leverett was sitting behind Rice taking notes when suddenly Rumsfeld addressed him directly. "Why are you laughing? Did I say something funny?"

The room went silent, and Rumsfeld asked it again.

"Why are you laughing? Did I say something funny?"

"I'm sorry Mr. Secretary, I don't think I know what you're talking about."

"It looks to me like you were laughing," Rumsfeld said.

"No sir. I'm sorry if I gave that impression. I was just listening to the meeting and taking notes. Didn't mean to disturb you."

The fax was from the Swiss ambassador to Iran, which wasn't unusual -- since the U.S. had no formal relationship with Iran, the Swiss ambassador represented American interests there and often faxed over updates on what he was doing. This time he'd met with Sadeq Kharrazi, a well-connected Iranian who was the nephew of the foreign minister and son-in-law to the supreme leader. Amazingly, Kharrazi had presented the ambassador with a detailed proposal for peace in the Middle East, approved at the highest levels in Tehran.

A two-page summary was attached. Scanning it, Mann was startled by one dramatic concession after another -- "decisive action" against all terrorists in Iran, an end of support for Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, a promise to cease its nuclear program, and also an agreement to recognize Israel.

A few days after that, a terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia killed thirty-four people, including eight Americans, and an intelligence report said the bombers had been in phone contact with Al Qaeda members in Iran. Although it was unknown whether Tehran had anything to do with the bombing or if the terrorists were hiding out in the lawless areas near the border, Rumsfeld set the tone for the administration's response at his next press conference. "There's no question but that there have been and are today senior Al Qaeda leaders in Iran, and they are busy."

Colin Powell saw Mann's memo. A couple weeks later he approached her at a State Department reception and said, "It was a very good memo. I couldn't sell it at the White House."

In response to questions from Esquire, Colin Powell called Leverett "very able" and confirms much of what he says. Leverett's account of the clash between Bush and Crown Prince Abdullah was accurate, he said. "It was a very serious moment and no one wanted to see if the Saudis were bluffing." The same goes for the story about his speech in Israel in 2002. "I had major problems with the White House on what I wanted to say."

They called on Wednesday and told him that there was nothing classified in the piece as far as the agency was concerned, but someone in the West Wing wasn't happy with it and would be redacting large sections.

"You're the clearing agency," Leverett said. "You're the people named in my agreement."

They said their hands were tied.

After consulting a lawyer, Leverett and Mann and a researcher worked through the night to assemble a list of public sources where the blacked-out material had already been published. They also took out one line that might have been based on a classified document.

But the White House wouldn't budge. It was a First Amendment showdown.

Bush accused Iran of "providing material support" for attacks on U.S. forces, a formulation that suggested a legal justification for a preemptive attack.

Senator Jim Webb of Virginia pushed through an amendment requiring Bush to get congressional authorization for an attack.

Colin Powell broke his long silence with a pointed warning. "You can't negotiate when you tell the other side, 'Give us what a negotiation would produce before the negotiations start.' "

Even Henry Kissinger started giving interviews on the need to "exhaust every possibility to come to an understanding with Iran."

“All government property in sight.”

The culture of the military is to make chicken salad out of chicken poop. The culture of the military is, “Yessir, three bags full sir. I’ll get it done.”The culture of the military is embraced as far as I’m concerned in the most positive way by the first general order of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps (different from the Army), which cautions a sentry to take charge of all government property on this post, and that includes people. And that’s frankly how Powell and I viewed the State Department—all government property at post. So that’s their going-in position, whether they’re a private or a colonel.

“They’re not armed”

[W]e were at the State Department—we weren’t seized with the mission; we don’t have enough folks. USAID [U.S. Agency for International Development] isn’t the USAID you joined because it has been whittled away so much.

Two summers ago, a girls' school in the village of Lalander, Afghanistan, received written warnings from the Taliban. Then
came death threats. They culminated in a dozen men ransacking the school and warning that if any girl or family member returned,
they would face severe consequences.

Angered, the schoolmaster rode his bicycle 20 miles to alert the presiding tribal elder, who had a daughter attending a similar
school. The elder responded, Mortenson says, by having the equivalent of "a local posse" round up the offenders. A few were
killed. Armed guards were then assigned to protect the school around the clock. Not only did the threats disappear, but support
for the school grew stronger.

"There are many different kinds of Talibans, some extremist, some not," says Shoukat Ali, a former Taliban who teaches at
one of Mortenson's schools in Pakistan. He joined the Taliban as a teenager to fight against the Indian Army in the disputed
region of Kashmir. He was enticed because he had no job.

"The extremists are small in number," Mr. Ali says. "They can be minimized. If the people have opportunities for jobs, to
own land, and go to school, most of the problems with the Taliban will go away."

If Mortenson has any advice for Mr. Obama, it would be to call together a large gathering of shuras and listen to them.

"It would do more good than spending another $1 billion on combat operations or foreign aid. He would ingratiate himself,
help calm down some of the lingering hostilities, and probably save some soldiers' lives," Mortenson says.

Mortenson says his respect for US commanders has grown immeasurably. Half a decade ago, he wrote a scathing op-ed article
excoriating the way that former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was conducting the war.

"Our military is now actually ahead of the curve, not behind it," he says. "When you hear the expression 'All politics is
local' in this country, people get it. Well, in Afghanistan, all politics – as well as culture, cooperation, and the hope
of any progress – is local, too."

In September, Mortenson joined Afghan clerics in building a school in Deh Rawod, in the desolate Oruzgan Province in south-central
Afghanistan, a region that has provided a haven for Taliban leader Muhammed Omar. The clerics wanted first to visit another
school to get an idea of its possible impact, so they went with Mortenson to an existing school in a neighboring village.

They strolled out into the school playground, which had a swing set, says Mortenson, showing photographs of clerics swinging
and their usually stern faces smiling as their robes flapped in the breeze. "In that moment they discovered something else
that schools can be, something they didn't have as children," Mortenson says. "It was like a light bulb went on."