The Foreign Service Journal, December 2005

D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 5 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 7 Bias Against DS As a Diplomatic Security agent, I often find cause to disagree with arti- cles presented in the Foreign Service Journal . Many times I have picked up my pen (or keyboard) to write you, only to end up scrapping the message for fear of appearing petty. I have even considered resigning my mem- bership in AFSA over some of the more anti-security positions it has held over the years. So imagine my surprise when I opened my copy in September to see a whole issue dedi- cated to the Bureau of Diplomatic Security! However, upon reading the issue, my previous opinions were validated, as your editors found it necessary to trot out critics of DS even in an issue designed to highlight its contribu- tions. This type of criticism is not included when the Journal highlights other bureaus, and betrays what I per- ceive to be the deep-seated biases of your editorial staff and, indeed, some members of the Foreign Service. I question the appropriateness of including an essay about Overseas Buildings Operations by Jane Loeffler, in an issue supposedly meant to tout DS. Ms. Loeffler is a longtime critic of DS, and it appears that no amount of security included in embassy design would be acceptable to her. She con- tinues to cling to the past, when aes- thetics were the only concern and award-winning architects were com- missioned to produce buildings that looked good, but wasted space, cost inordinately too much and were unsafe for our employees. A discussion of the Office of Overseas Buildings’ standard embassy design program has no business in an issue dedicated to DS. This program was put into place by OBO to save money and reduce project timelines, and has next to nothing to do with security. Congress continually criti- cized the former Foreign Buildings Office for overspending on extrava- gant designs and for taking too long getting embassies built. The result was reduced funding for new embassy construction. Say what you will about OBO’s chief, retired Gen. Charles E. Williams, but at least he fixed the problem and got the funding spigot turned back on. Perhaps Ms. Loeffler is prepared to “err on the side of open- ness” and have hundreds of our fellow officers die in the process. Out of nine articles on security, one was neutral (Honley), four were negative (Jones, Loeffler, Hannon and Anonymous), and four were positive (Griffin, Whitelaw, Johnson and Ren- zuli). Not surprisingly, DS employees wrote most of the positive ones. The sad thing is that this percentage prob- ably reflects the attitudes of your edi- tors and readership. Is it any wonder that DS employees feel alienated from the Foreign Service in general, and AFSA in particular? DS does its best to safeguard the lives of our fel- low employees under difficult circum- stances and to create a safe and secure environment for the conduct of diplo- macy. Like no other federal security agency, it does so in a way that is sen- sitive to foreign culture and the need to conduct business. Instead of criti- cizing DS, I would recommend that the Journal do something to highlight the lives of the two agents who lost their lives in service of their country this year in Iraq. These DS employ- ees were killed while protecting oth- ers so that critical Foreign Service objectives could be met. In the mid-1990s, there was a move orchestrated by high-level offi- cials within our own department to cede most DS responsibilities to another federal agency. I would ven- ture to guess that the department would be remembering DS with fondness today if that had been allowed to occur. The bureau’s employees will never feel fully inte- grated as part of the Foreign Service team until biases like the ones pre- sented in the September issue are corrected, and the brave professionals that staff DS are made to feel that their contributions are valued. Frank DeMichele Regional Security Officer Embassy Lusaka Editor’s Note: As with all topics the Foreign Service Journal covers, our intent was neither to “tout” the Diplomatic Security Bureau’s accom- plishments nor to condemn its short- L ETTERS