12 JULY-AUGUST 2025 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL than precipitously. And I wonder about the implications of this destruction for the future recruitment of Foreign Service officers. I write this letter after spending several weeks agonizing over what an 80-year-old man like me could possibly do. I am writing this letter to express my pain and to call on others to join me in disagreeing with the actions of the current administration. Nationwide protests show me that many people share my views. I believe that if we fight together, we can right this situation. We may have to buckle down for years to repair the damage already done, but we must remain steadfast in our determination to correct this unprecedented dire situation. We must not lose hope that better days are ahead. I call on all of you to fight as long as it takes to right the democratic ship of State. Mark G. Wentling Senior FSO, retired Lubbock, Texas Did Khomeini Block a U.S. Visitor? The letter by Ambassador John Limbert that was published in the March 2025 edition of The Foreign Service Journal suggests that the Iranian leader Khomeini blocked Amb. Bill Miller and former Attorney General Ramsey Clark from visiting Tehran in November 1979. In fact, Ramsey, with whom I worked for about two decades, knew Khomeini well. The two had mutual respect for each other. According to Ramsey, it was the U.S. government that stopped him from visiting Tehran, not the Iranian government. Several times Ramsey recounted to me that when he was stopped from continuing to Tehran after having already landed in Europe, he reached out to the Iranian government to confirm that he was still welcomed and was told that he was. Nevertheless, the U.S. government refused to allow him to continue. Curtis Doebbler Research Professor of Law University of Makeni Makeni, Sierra Leone Khomeini: The Author Responds Professor Doebbler’s (and Ramsey Clark’s) account (above) is new to me. I suspect two possible explanations for the varying stories. Khomeini was a master of telling people what they wanted to hear and assuring them he supported their position. In Paris in 1978-1979, for example, he convinced Western journalists and Iranian nationalists that he supported free speech, freedom of the press, women’s rights, and had no interest in exercising political power. Once in Tehran, however, his actions were far different. In November 1979, he issued a categorical statement forbidding contact with the Clark-Miller mission, and in June 1980, when Clark did come to Iran for a conference, the two did not meet, and Khomeini allowed the state media to attack Clark in the most vitriolic terms. A second explanation is that someone in the Carter administration, for reasons of their own, was working to sabotage the mission. It seems far-fetched, but stranger things have happened. John Limbert FSO, retired Long Island City, New York n Share your thoughts about this month’s issue. Submit letters to the editor: journal@afsa.org
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