The Foreign Service Journal, January-February 2022

90 JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2022 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL and we kept the peace.’ Carter liked to add, ‘We championed human rights.’ On one level, this might seem a low bar by which to judge a presidency. But few of Jimmy Carter’s predecessors or successors in the White House could boast that they had not lied, broken the law or taken the country to war. By this standard, Carter’s presidency was exceptional, even stellar.” To Carter’s own review of his presi- dency I would add, “We brought the hostages home safely.” Read this illuminating book. It is most timely after the recent turmoil and amorality of the Trump administration. It even turns out that Trump mentor, the infamous Roy Cohn, had manufac- tured one of the scandals of the Carter administration—charges that aide Hamilton Jordan had snorted cocaine at Studio 54 in New York. It is also timely reading among the ongoing tragedy of Afghanistan, which some have traced to Brzezinski’s rigid anti-Soviet views and his ill-considered support for extremist Afghan mujahed- din in 1979 and 1980. Kudos to the author for bringing to life the dramatic events and people of four decades ago. If we need reminding, in politics, values and character still matter. John Limbert is a retired Foreign Service officer, an academic and an author. Dur- ing a 34-year diplomatic career, he served mostly in the Middle East and Islamic Africa (including two tours in Iraq), was ambas- sador to the Islamic Republic of Mauritania and, in retirement, was brought back to serve as the first deputy assistant secretary of State for Iranian affairs. He has authored numerous books and articles on Middle Eastern subjects. He and his wife, the former Parvaneh Tabibzadeh, reside in Long Island City, Queens, New York. A History of Freewheeling American Envoys Rogue Diplomats: The Proud Tradition of Disobedience in American Foreign Policy Seth Jacobs, Cambridge University Press, 2020, $34.99/hardcover, e-book available, 408 pages. Reviewed by Joseph L. Novak Rogue Diplomats opens a new window on American diplomacy. The deeply researched book curates six case studies of envoys who disobeyed explicit orders and, in the process, helped shape the course of American history. In exploring these acts of insubordination, Rogue Diplomats is noteworthy for its acuity, verve and elegant craftsmanship. The author, Seth Jacobs, is a professor of history at Boston College. His previous books have focused on U.S. policy in Indo- china and included The Universe Unravel- ing: American Foreign Policy in Cold War Laos (2012). Rogue Diplomats is part of the Cambridge Studies in U.S. Foreign Rela- tions series. The book’s first case study focuses on the U.S.-British negotiations that ended the Revolutionary War in 1783. Jacobs deftly describes how U.S. negotiators Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and John Jay disobeyed their orders from the Conti- nental Congress by not obtaining consent to the peace deal from France, the pivotal American ally in the war. Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris in 1784. Many U.S. political leaders were enraged, however, that the team had not followed its specific orders pertaining to France. Alexander Hamilton assailed “the conduct of our ministers.” Secretary of Foreign Affairs Robert Livingston joined in the criticism ( Rogue Diplomats also relates how, 20 years later, Livingston himself acted without authority while negotiating the Louisiana Purchase). Dodging the incoming flak, Franklin, Adams and Jay went on to further fame and influence. Their performance in Paris has reaped accolades in retrospect, with eminent historian Samuel Flagg Bemis calling it “the greatest victory in the annals of American diplomacy.” Biographies of Franklin (Walter Isaac- son, 2003), Adams (DavidMcCullough, 2001) and Jay (Walter Stahr, 2005) serve to confirm Jacobs’ emphasis on the decision to defy orders as decisive in making the Treaty of Paris a reality. Another illuminating case study reads like a surreal story told by Nikolai Gogol. As engagingly chronicled in the book, the James K. Polk administration dispatched Nicholas P. Trist, a State Department official, to Mexico City to lead the negotia- tions to end the Mexican-American War. Trist succeeded in spectacular fashion, with Mexico agreeing in 1848 to turn over vast tracts of land that encompassed much of what is now the American Southwest. While he had success with the Mexicans, Trist, whom Jacobs describes as “self-dramatizing,” managed to alienate Washington to the maximum. Jacobs, a brilliant raconteur, recounts how Trist bombarded Washington with missives containing incendiary pronouncements like: “Infallibility of judgement ... is not among the attributes of the president of the United States.” President Polk was incandescent with rage and ordered Trist to quit the talks and leave the country. Instead, he tenaciously pursued negotiations until sealing agree- ment with the Mexicans. On orders from Washington, the U.S. military ultimately forced Trist to depart Mexico “under armed escort, like a criminal.” In a book focused on insubordination,