The Foreign Service Journal, March 2022

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | MARCH 2022 47 cooperation can fall victim to competing priorities. Not so at the safe havens. All of us, from numerous federal agencies, huddled together, often in a big tent, worked long hours, sometimes seven days a week, to provide the guests with adequate and culturally appropriate care. Sleeping quarters—huge tents and barracks— were kept cool and then, as the months went by, warm. Halal food was prepared, and makeshift mosques were cre- ated. Resettlement information, legal advice, and English and cultural orientation classes were offered. There were recreational activities: movies for children; yoga classes for women; chess, volleyball and cricket for men. At Afghan music events, separate groups of men and women danced their hearts out. More than 40 percent of arriving Afghans are children, and it was always a joy to see their happy, playful faces. Their drawings of the U.S. flag surrounded by hearts were on display in class- rooms, and wherever we went, we were greeted by their bright smiles, fist bumps and “Hello! What you name?” A new genera- tion of Americans, full of hope for the future. In the 1980s, I worked for nine years in Southeast Asian refugee camps in another PRM-funded program. The contrast between then and now is striking. Then, well-staffed resettle- ment agencies had time to prepare for the newcomers. Today, after years of sharp reductions in refugee admissions and at a time of shortages in affordable housing, severely understaffed resettlement agencies have very little time to prepare for the sud- den arrival of tens of thousands of Afghans. And just when resettlement agencies were beginning to rebuild under a revitalized global U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, they face the daunting task of resettling thousands of additional Afghans, anxious to find work so they can send money back to relatives who remain behind in a country on the brink of economic col- lapse. There remains much to be done to help these future Americans successfully adjust to their new lives. As three resettlement agency CEOs put it in a Washington Post op-ed, “This is an all-hands-on-deck moment for refugee resettle- ment in this country.” When refugees fled Viet- nam, Laos and Cambodia, our government and the American people did the right thing, warmly welcoming them into homes and communities across the country. It is my fervent hope that we will continue working with the same generosity and sense of responsibility in support of our Afghan allies. Kathleen M. Corey, a reemployed annuitant on loan to the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration from the Foreign Service Institute ’s Leadership and Management School, worked at “safe haven” bases during Operation Allies Welcome. In the 1980s, she worked in Southeast Asian refugee camps with a PRM-funded English-as-a-second-language / cultural orientation program for U.S.-bound refugees. The views expressed are the author’s and not necessarily those of the U.S. government. Building Safe Havens for Allies DULLES, FORT DIX, FORT PICKETT John Wecker I watched the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban in August with a broken heart. It unfolded as I was taking the Foreign Service Institute’s two-month job search program, preparing to retire fol- lowing a 30-year career as a Foreign Service officer and three tours in Afghanistan. When I saw the department’s call for volunteers to respond to the crisis, I, along with 25 colleagues in the retire- ment course, immediately signed up, choosing to spend the last five weeks of our course time helping our Afghan friends wherever and however we could. My first volunteer assign- ment was to Dulles Inter- national Airport, helping to set up a facility for relocated Afghans entering the country. We were in a rush to secure everything from space to food, to information, so we could be prepared to welcome Afghan families to our country. Large groups of new arrivals poured off the buses from the airport into our makeshift facilities, all after fleeing for their lives from the chaos and danger in their home country. A women’s cricket match at Fort Pickett in Virginia. JOHNWECKER