The Foreign Service Journal, September 2021

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | SEPTEMBER 2021 27 Although the multilateral diplomacy that had fallen by the wayside with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991 came back into currency, the comeback was only partial. Our forays into, first, Afghanistan, then Iraq, came at a huge cost. Our shortcomings and abrupt departure from Afghanistan now will cause foreign decision-makers to reconsider aligning them- selves with us again. Moreover, the emergence of “fortress embassies” in response to Washington’s increasing aversion to physical risk and Dip- lomatic Security’s expanded influence on policy and over- seas operations since 9/11 has left our diplomats physically and psychologically isolated from the societies they have to influence, and playing catch up in public diplomacy. Today, as we are tested by the People’s Republic of China and its predatory foreign policy, as well as a series of problems that require global solutions supported by a stable, rules-based international order, we are scrambling to recoup. From Multilateral to Bilateral In the years between the fall of the Berlin Wall and 9/11, the Cold War mentality of reliance on international alliances and “one team, one global fight” morphed into country-specific stovepipes. Per American political scientist Francis Fukuyama, “history ended” in December 1991 with the presumed eternal triumph of liberal democracy. Colleagues may disagree, but the reality I experienced is that many members of the Foreign Service who joined after 1991 came with a different set of expectations for what they were there to do. This “interwar” decade was a period of euphoric exuber- ance, the dawn of American hubris, aka Pax Americana. In those 10 years, American embassies and diplomats went from being aligned globally in containing and confronting the USSR to focusing largely on single-country, bilateral diplomatic efforts. This was accompanied by the fragmentation of foreign policy and the growth of single issue / special interest envoys and offices that number around 55 today. In an example of the absurdity of this period, as deputy chief of mission (DCM) in Copenhagen in 2000 I invested substantial time trying to implement my then–chief of mission’s campaign to reimagine how an embassy does business, protesting the Danish government’s treatment of Scientology and coping with local derision of the annual Human Rights Report blasting Denmark for failing to have a 50-50 gender balance in its parliament. This kind of to-do list was not unique to Denmark. Whether counting our peace dividend chickens before they hatched, or blithely expand- ing NATO (a suddenly obsolete organization in search of a reason to persist) eastward to avoid a political and security vacuum in the former Warsaw Pact space, we were blindsided by the Rwandan genocide, civil war in Somalia, the breakup of Yugoslavia and the rise of global religious extremism. And seeing how ineffective the United Nations was in responding to inter- national crises—Bosnia being the most extreme—we doubled down on U.S.-led bilateral efforts. That changed on 9/11. In Copenhagen, I watched the TV in my office in real time as the second aircraft hit the second World Trade Tower in New York. My staff panicked. We closed the embassy early that day. The next day, Danes arrived in growing numbers to light candles and place flowers and teddy bears. The queen presided over a moving memorial service at a local church for us. Until then, American foreign policy had been widely unpopular among ordinary Danes who strongly opposed our many interventions in places such as Vietnam and Central America. In an instant, all was forgotten. The legacy of our Cold War multilateral diplomacy was now paying dividends, with our allies and friends rising to the occasion with words and deeds. Back to Multilateralism, Sort of Global wars require partners and alliances. We refocused on reengaging and reenergizing alliances and kludging together coalitions to deal with al-Qaida globally. After a decadelong hia- tus, we were all rowing in the same direction. At the same time, however, because the cooperation we sought was strictly, even The legacy of our Cold War multilateral diplomacy was now paying dividends, with our allies and friends rising to the occasion with words and deeds.