The Foreign Service Journal, February 2008

based on hideously erroneous intel- ligence. The consequence of this failure will redound for decades within the intelligence community. As the most recent National Intel- ligence Estimate about Tehran dem- onstrates, who dares argue with the same conviction about the conse- quences of a hypothetical Iranian nuclear program as was done for the putative existence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction? Admittedly, our secondary object- ive in Iraq, after having discovered no WMD, is noble: the creation of a stable, multiethnic democratic state to serve as a catalyst for democracy elsewhere in the region. Indeed, it is an objective potentially more com- pelling that the reflexive anticom- munism of the 1960s — even if the current president as its spokesman is less evocative than JFK. But we have failed in Iraq. Now that we have fought there for longer than in World War II, the U.S. population no longer believes we can achieve even limited success within an acceptable timeframe given exist- ing force constraints. Indeed, we voted to accept defeat in the 2006 election (and will affirm that decision next year in the presidential election). Current domestic politics are an exercise in maneuvering to affix blame and responsibility on the other guy or gal. Implicitly, Americans are willing to accept the 21st century’s version of the domino theory: great- er sectarian slaughter; a “balkanized” Iraq in multiple pieces coincident with regional war; even a resurgent state sponsor of terrorism. Indeed, it is not hard to visualize our multi- million-dollar Baghdad embassy ablaze as helicopters vanish into the distance with the last of our Marine guards aboard. If the burning twin towers of 9/11 were one bookend for an era, the destroyed embassy would be another. Should something less horrific eventuate — e.g., the “surge” works, sectarian violence declines (if only because of semi-voluntary ethnic cleansing), and the various political Sunni-Shia-Kurdish “horses” learn to talk — that will be fine, but Ameri- cans won’t bet their Social Security checks on a sanguine outcome. The decline in domestic debate reflects casualty reductions, not any percept- ion that “exit” is no longer the proxi- mate objective. As our bottom line, we will claim that we eliminated an odious dictator — and take satisfaction in the likelihood that Iraq will never have WMD. Or we will shrug that we led Iraqis to democracy, but they declined to drink. Either way, we will let historians do the cost/benefit analysis. Debased Coinage For the Foreign Service, it is brutally clear that the king’s shilling is debased coinage in today’s State Department. When, at one point in the autumn of 2007, 98 of 106 mid- level slots were reportedly unfilled in Baghdad, the Foreign Service rank and file said, “Hell, no, we won’t go.” Or, at least, we won’t go voluntarily. The wide circulation of a satirical “New FSO Exam” that suggests anyone with Arabic-language skills will be immediately accepted — and equally immediately dispatched to Iraq — suggests a widespread attitude change within the Foreign Service. The last generation “drank the Kool-Aid,” but this generation has learned that “fool me twice, shame on me.” In their eyes, not only don’t those in charge know best, but they are dunces. Indeed, so far as Iraq is concerned, at this juncture, all of the “boy scouts” who genuinely believed in the mission have already served there. And the careerists who viewed Iraq as a ticket in need of punching for the upward trail already have their T-shirts and have moved on. So far as the rest of the Service is concerned, the bribes to serve in Iraq are not large enough, the implicit promises of professional preference are not assured, and the mission looks like a failure with which they have no desire to be associated. Consequent- ly, for the first time in my professional memory, the specter of directed as- signments has been bruited about. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice insists that meeting this need is a top priority but career professionals have their doubts. In the midst of the controversy, AFSA President John Naland issued a riposte to those outside the depart- ment critical of Foreign Service at- titudes. He mounted a statistical case to demonstrate that State is pulling its weight, noting that our personnel strength is tiny (there are more mem- bers of military bands than State De- partment diplomats), widely dispers- ed among 267 embassies, consulates and missions, and largely assigned overseas — many of them hardship posts. That is all true, yet the re- sponse falls into the “protest too much” category. Obviously, beneath the perception that we are not pulling our weight — a view reinforced by the desperate F E B R 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 13 S P E A K I N G O U T It is brutally clear that the king’s shilling is debased coinage in today’s State Department.