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>These six axioms of Casper Weinberger eventually morphed into what is now called the Powell Doctrine with the addition of the mantra: “If you break it you have to fix it.”
The Pottery Barn rule is an American expression alluding to a policy of "you break it, you bought it" or "you break it, you buy it" or "you break it, you remake it", by which a retail store holds a customer responsible for damage done to merchandise on display. It generally "encourages customers to be more careful when handling property that's not theirs". It is an analogy often used in the political or military arena to suggest that if an actor inadvertently creates a problem, the actor is obliged to provide the resources necessary to correct it
Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry cited the rule and attributed it to Powell in debating Bush on policy on the Iraq war during the first debate of the 2004 Presidential election:
KERRY: Secretary of State Colin Powell told this president [Bush] the Pottery Barn rule: If you break it, you fix it. Now, if you break it, you made a mistake. It's the wrong thing to do. But you own it. And then you've got to fix it and do something with it. Now that's what we have to do. There's no inconsistency. Soldiers know over there that this isn't being done right yet. I'm going to get it right for those soldiers, because it's important to Israel, it's important to America, it's important to the world, it's important to the fight on terror. But I have a plan to do it. He [Bush] doesn't.[6]
Powell denies using the term "pottery barn rule", but stated:
It is said that I used the "Pottery Barn rule." I never did it; [Thomas] Friedman did it … But what I did say … [is that] once you break it, you are going to own it, and we're going to be responsible for 26 million people standing there looking at us. And it's going to suck up a good 40 to 50 percent of the Army for years. And it's going to take all the oxygen out of the political environment …"[7