The Foreign Service Journal, December 2021

26 DECEMBER 2021 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL partnership with the traditional foreign intelligence agencies. We especially strengthened the National CounterterrorismCenter (NCTC), which was very important at the time. I think the DNI has played a positive role as manager of the IC. And for me personally, it was an honor and pleasure to participate in the president’s daily intelligence briefings. President Bush was, as they say in the IC, a good customer! FSJ: What were some of the challenges you faced as Deputy Secretary of State, and what are you proudest of accomplishing as D? JDN: Being Deputy Secretary is an all- consuming job. There was no second deputy, as there is now. So I worked on both the diplomatic and management issues. I had a “portfolio” of issues, if you will, that I worked on. The U.S.-China Strategic Political Dialogue, for example, was extremely interesting. I also dealt with Pakistan, plus various problems in Asia, the Middle East and Latin America. On management, I was fortunate to have as a colleague Ambassador Patrick Kennedy, who always succeeded in making many of these issues seem easier than they were. We ramped up Foreign Service recruitment to a high pitch. We continued to staff the ongoing efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. We tried once again, unsuccessfully, to get the Law of the Sea Treaty (UNCLOS) ratified by the Senate. I was the lead State Department witness, along with the Deputy Secre- tary of Defense and the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It is an effort near and dear to my heart and high on my list of the department’s unfinished business. Drawing on my extensive network of friends throughout the Bush administration, I think I succeeded in consolidating very good relations with the key Cabinet departments. My counter- part at Treasury, Bob Kimmitt, and I successfully revived the Treasury Attaché Program, which had been allowed to atrophy during the Clinton administration. And Gordon England over at Defense and I succeeded in making our bilateral monthly meet- ings something much more action-oriented, so much so that assistant secretaries were eagerly seeking to join us. But the bread and butter of the job was, quite simply, running the department and getting done whatever the Secretary needed done, and there was a steady streamof challenges every single day. THE FOREIGN SERVICE CAREER FSJ: When did you join AFSA? In your view what should AFSA’s top priorities be? Where can AFSA add the most value? JDN: I joined AFSA early in my career. Then, at some point, I allowed my membership to lapse. I rejoined in 2007, when I became Deputy Secretary. Negroponte, then U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, with Secretary of State Colin Powell outside the Security Council chamber at the U.N. in New York City, 2003. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte speaks to State Department employees in January 2008. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is at left; at Amb. Negroponte’s right is his wife, Diana Villiers Negroponte. ZAIDZAID/COURTESYOFJOHND.NEGROPONTE U.S.DEPARTMENTOFSTATE