The Foreign Service Journal, September 2020

62 SEPTEMBER 2020 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL FEATURE Holly Adamson is a crisis management officer with CMS. She joined the Foreign Service in 2009 and switched to Civil Service in 2019. She has served in Conakry, Tel Aviv, Bangui, on the Line and with the Deputy Secretary for Management and Resources. Major Fany Colon de Hayes is a crisis manage- ment officer with CMS. She joined the U.S. Air Force in 1997 and currently serves as a Political and Strategic Fellow. She has served in Cuba, Colom- bia, Germany, Portugal and Qatar. L ike everyone else in the world, we in the State Department Operations Center’s Office of Crisis Management and Strategy are asking ourselves: “What’s next, 2020?” Since Dec. 31, 2019, CMS has established, managed and contributed our diverse profes- sional expertise to four 24/7 task forces: the first one to respond to violence in the Middle East and the next three to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. These task forces harnessed State’s collective expertise to ensure an efficient and successful response. As of June 5, more than 102,000 Americans had been repatri- ated with State Department assistance on more than 1,100 flights BRINGING ORDER OUT OF CRISIS Behind theScenes of aTaskForce Chris Meade is a crisis management officer with the State Department Operations Center’s Office of Crisis Management and Strategy. He joined the Foreign Service in 2009 and has served in Kabul, Sydney, Juba and Addis Ababa. Merlyn Schultz is a watch officer in the State Department Operations Center. She joined the Foreign Service in 2011 and has served in Mexico, Cameroon and Costa Rica. Seen through the lens of perhaps the greatest crisis response effort ever— the 2020 Repatriation Task Force—this look into how the State Department organizes emergency responses is an eye-opener. BY CHR I S MEADE , HOL LY ADAMSON , MERLYN SCHULTZ AND FANY COLON DE HAYES frommore than 139 countries. Even considering our massive evacuation conducted in World War II, this State Department– led, whole-of-government effort was unprecedented. For many Americans, it was their first exposure to the State Department, and we’re proud that so many citizens were able to see the tireless energy, commitment and courage of the countless diplomats across the world who worked to get them home. It was an oppor- tunity for State employees to view the department differently, too, by working directly with a task force and seeing firsthand the global effort that ensured the full U.S. government rose to a historic challenge. This article pulls back the curtain on CMS’ role managing crises through the prism of this extraordinary year. For CMS,