THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2025 23 with the clear “lanes” of functional bureaus like International Narcotics and Law Enforcement or Population, Refugees, and Migration. CSO’s unpredictability, however, was its greatest strength. It was a multi-tool, not a screwdriver or wrench, providing smaller and more targeted interventions optimized for the challenge at hand. Capable people put into harm’s way with a sound plan need resources both to support their own logistics and to engage and build capacity with their local partners, many of whom will be people previously unknown to the U.S. government, with needs that can be learned only by meeting them. Any capacity the department retains for stabilization and expeditionary efforts will depend on some form of flexible funding unconstrained by congressional earmarks or annual funding cycles—not necessarily a large account, but a carefully stewarded and regularly maintained one. A Learning Organization Better training and security culture matched with better planning and flexible resources will deliver many of the capabilities embodied in CSO and S/CRS—but not well enough. No one claims that State does not need the Bureau of Consular Affairs because every officer has done a consular tour, or that we do not need the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs because we have an economics cone. Unifying conflict capabilities in a single bureau created a virtuous cycle for a learning organization that could iterate and improve better than can be expected from a mishmash of DS training, regional bureau responses led by a seventh-floor planning team, and funds presumably managed by the director of foreign assistance. But maintaining these disparate capabilities in any form is much better than losing them entirely. Retaining these capabilities in any form creates the hope that, when the next challenge arises, the department will not need to start from zero again, with the waste, dangers, and disappointments caused by our lack of preparedness in the days before CSO. n
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