The Foreign Service Journal, January 2008

was predictable. The informed analysis of experts in the State Department was ignored — in fact, it was hardly even solicited — and cast aside in favor of political expediency, in favor of the agenda of an administration that had already decided to march on Baghdad. And now members of the Foreign Service are being coerced to serve in Iraq in an attempt to clean up a mess they predicted would come. And they’ll serve amidst gunfire, roadside bombs, family separation and psycho- logical stress, knowing that if the honest, accurate assessment of the state of play in Iraq by proud, patriotic Foreign Service officers, who had this country’s best interests at heart, had been listened to, they wouldn’t be there in the first place. This is the salt in the wound, and this is what the DG either doesn’t understand or refuses to acknowledge. Matthew E. Keene FSO & AFSA Post Representative Embassy Sofia Institutional Discipline I am writing to express my strongest disapproval at the appalling behavior of certain colleagues, and my union, AFSA, at the Oct. 31 town hall meeting. Let me be clear. This is not about AFSA’s mission to defend the Foreign Service, which I wholly support. Nor is it about the administration’s Iraq policy, which most of us know in our heart of hearts to be a failure of our elected leader- ship and their lack of vision at virtually every step en route to the current fiasco. No, this letter is about institutional discipline. AFSA’s failure to explicitly distance itself from the outrageous remarks of certain colleagues ended up implicitly endorsing ideas that are totally incompatible with our profes- sional obligations. Our AFSA repre- sentatives John Naland and Steve Kashkett sophomorically threw in irrelevancies like overseas compar- ability pay and the Secretary’s stand- ing in an employee poll. (As if being any U.S. diplomat, let alone the Secre- tary of State, is a popularity contest.) In an explosive situation, the first duty of leaders is to calm the situation and return the debate to the issue at hand. Our AFSA leaders instead fanned the flames and cast discredit on us all. J A N U A R Y 2 0 0 8 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 19 L E T T E R S