The Foreign Service Journal, September 2021

14 SEPTEMBER 2021 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL Contemporary Quote Now, President Biden has made clear that the United States will lead with diplomacy. And the Department of Defense will be here to provide the resolve and reassurance that America’s diplomats can use to help prevent conflict from breaking out in the first place. As I’ve said before, it’s always better to stamp out an ember than to try to put out a blaze. —Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III, giving the 40th Fullerton Lecture at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Singapore, July 27. device or catching culprits in the act and things like that.” CIA Director William Burns told NPR on July 22 that he is redoubling the agency’s efforts to determine the cause of the mysterious illnesses. He appointed a veteran of the CIA’s hunt for Osama bin Laden to head a task force looking into the matter. “We’re throwing the very best we have at this issue, because it is not only a very serious issue for our colleagues, as it is for others across the U.S. government, but it’s a profound obligation, I think, of any leader to take care of your people,” Burns said. In March, the State Department appointed Ambassador Pamela Spratlen to head a taskforce to investigate the ill- nesses. In late July, Congress was working on bills that would improve support and access to care for those affected by the syndrome. Afghans Who Helped the U.S. Seek Evacuation N early 20,000 Afghans who served as interpreters for the United States during its war in Afghanistan have applied for evacuation, according to a July 16 Agence France-Press report. The interpreters, who have already applied for special immigrant visas (SIV) under programs established by Con- gress beginning in 2006 to help Iraqi and Afghan partners, are considered at risk as the United States withdraws from the country and the Taliban seeks revenge against them and their families. The SIV programs have been mired in bureaucratic opacity and delay for more than a decade. A June report from the Congressional Research Service cites State Department figures showing that through March 2021 almost 100,000 Iraqi and Afghan individuals (two-thirds of them family members) have been issued SIVs abroad, or been adjusted to lawful permanent residence status in the U.S. On July 23 President Joe Biden autho- rized up to $100 million to meet “unex- pected urgent” refugee needs for the Afghan interpreters, the Voice of America reported. As part of a program called Operation Allies Refuge, the administration began flights July 29 to evacuate interpreters and other Afghans who helped the U.S. war effort to an American military base. The flights are to be coordinated by the State, Defense and Homeland Secu- rity departments. FSO Tracey Jacobson, a former ambassador to Kosovo, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, will oversee the State Department effort. Modernizing the State Department E xperts and former State Department officials told a Senate Foreign Rela- tions Committee Subcommittee on State Department and USAIDManagement, International Operations, and Bilateral International Development on July 20 that State must address long-termworkforce and diversity challenges if it wants to improve morale among its rank and file. In the hearing, “Modernizing the State Department for the 21st Century,” former Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun, Ambassador (ret.) Marcie Ries and New America CEO Anne-Marie Slaughter dis- cussed ways to improve the department. Ries, a senior fellow at the Future of Diplomacy Project at Harvard Ken- nedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, described the findings of the center’s November 2020 report, “A U.S. Diplomatic Service for the 21st Century.” “Our conclusion was that the For- eign Service was facing a crisis that has been developing over multiple years and through successive administrations,” she said. “Specifically, we assessed our career diplomats lacked the support, funding, training, flexibility and leadership devel- opment opportunities they needed to be as effective as they should be in policy development at home and in represent- ing and assisting the American people abroad.” Biegun, the Deputy Secretary from December 2019 to January 2021, testified that midcareer FSOs had raised issues of concern with him, including the pace of rotations, accountability for poorly behav- ing managers, barriers to diversity, and the challenges of balancing career and family needs. Biegun called for enhanced workforce training, adding that about 15 percent of the department’s workforce should be in training at any one time. Slaughter called for sweeping changes to the Foreign Service. “A congressionally