The Foreign Service Journal, September 2009

S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 9 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 17 congressional Middle East peace pro- cess support group. (After all, various senators have long been part of the U.S. arms control establishment, while oth- ers have gone on to prestigious diplo- matic posts such as Tokyo.) Trying to hide what is happening — or not hap- pening— from public scrutiny only in- vites other actors to go directly to Capitol Hill, without coherent execu- tive-branch rebuttal. Moreover, any final agreement will require U.S. fund- ing and hence congressional authoriza- tion. Even if the Obama administration takes all these steps, prospects for a breakthrough are not bright. But fix- ing the process will surely improve the odds of success in the long run. ■ David T. Jones, a retired Senior FSO, participated in a State Department study of the last two years of the Clin- ton administration’s Middle East peace process. He is the co-author withDavid Kilgour of Uneasy Neighbo(u)rs: Cana- da, the USA and the Dynamics of State, Industry and Culture (Wiley, 2007) and is a frequent contributor to the Journal . S P E A K I N G O U T Giving in to the desire for deniability only puts Washington at a severe disadvantage compared to those parties that did keep records.