The Foreign Service Journal, May 2017

14 MAY 2017 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL Veterans Writing Project and FSO Ron Capps Receive Award O n April 5 the Veterans Writing Project and its founder, U.S. A rmy veteran and retired FSO Ron Capps, received the 2017 Anne Smedinghoff Award. The annual prize is dispensed by the Johns Hopkins University Foreign Affairs Symposium in honor of Anne Smeding- hoff, a Foreign Service officer, graduate of Johns Hopkins and member of the For- eign Affairs Symposium who was killed in a suicide bomb attack in Afghanistan in 2013. The award committee recognized Capps as “an individual who has dedi- cated his life to service, social justice and a commitment to others” and stated that the VWP’s commitment to veteran aware- ness “would most fittingly honor Anne’s memory.” The VWP provides no-cost writing workshops for veterans and their family members, and publishes their writing online and in print. Working with part- ners it provides workshops and seminars across the country. The project’s literary journal, O-Dark- Thirty , publishes works of fiction, poetry, memoirs and plays by veteran and family member authors. The VWP also serves wounded war- riors at the National Intrepid Center of Excellence, the Defense Department’s premier research and treatment facility for post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury. “We’re honored to be recognized for the work we’ve done supporting veterans and their families,” Capps said on receiv- ing the award. “Much of what we do echoes Anne’s interests in education and outreach to underserved areas.” Capps, who has served as a soldier TALKING POINTS If you want to be peaceful here, if you want to preserve our way of life, you better be involved over there. The only thing I can tell you after 15 years of being at war, we are never going to win this war all of us staying over here. And the best and brightest among us are not just our soldiers, it’s the people in the State Department and the NGOs who go and represent American val- ues without carrying a gun. I am a pretty hawkish guy but I’ve had the pleasure of seeing our State Department in action, our NGO community in action, and I believe we would be wise to invest in them just as we would be wise to invest in our military. —Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), speaking with U.S. Institute of Peace President Nancy Lindborg at the USIP’s “Passing the Baton” event on Jan. 10. Contemporary Quote and a Foreign Service political officer in Rwanda, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Darfur region of Sudan, founded the VWP in 2011 while a student in Johns Hopkins University’s graduate writing program. His memoir , Seriously Not All Right: Five Wars in Ten Years , was published in 2014 and reviewed in the June 2014 FSJ . —Susan B. Maitra, Managing Editor Where Are the Ambassadors? A s has been noted by commenta- tors and the press, the pace of President Donald Trump’s transition has been unusually slow, especially when compared to many of his predecessors. Important assistant secretary and under secretary positions remain unfilled, months into the new administration. But it is not only Cabinet appointments that are moving at a snail’s pace. By early April, the Trump White House had made only five nominations for ambassadorships—former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley for the United Nations, David Friedman for Israel, Iowa Governor Terry Branstad for China and career FSOs Todd Haskell for Republic of the Congo and Tulinabo Mushingi for Senegal and Guinea- Bissau. Of the five nominated, only Ambassadors Haley and Friedman have been confirmed. The press has floated names for such prestigious ambassadorships as the United Kingdom, Ireland, Austria, Italy, Spain, Japan and the Dominican Republic. But at press time, nothing was official. Traditionally, many of these embas- sies are headed by politically appointed ambassadors rather than career mem- bers of the Foreign Service. As we have done since the 1970s, AFSA is keeping track of these nomina- tions, as well as those for senior posts at the foreign affairs agencies. A list of current U.S. ambassadors is available through the AFSA website at www.afsa.org/ambassadorlist, as well as President Trump’s nominations at www.afsa.org/trump. —Theo Horn, Communications Intern