Guy?
Maybe, before posting, try reading past the headline?
Posted on 11/30/2017 1:20:30 AM PST by Oshkalaboomboom
PARIS -- Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has been working the plunger on the overseas branch of the Washington swamp's public relations department, also known as the U.S. State Department. Some of the swamp critters are now to the point of flushing themselves down the drain, either out of honor or frustration or both.
Tillerson has shaken up his department this year, according to the New York Times, dismissing numerous staffers and forcing many others into early retirement. Meanwhile, diplomats are "sounding the alarm," the Times reports, evoking the specter of Benghazi and framing their own plank-walking as a potential threat to national security.
Oh dear. Let's walk back the hysteria, shall we?
Living abroad, I run into current and former State Department officials on a fairly regular basis. Some take a fairly pragmatic "realpolitik" view of world affairs when speaking off the record, but it's a different story when they step onto a stage or stroll into a cocktail party and many of them suddenly turn into talking-point-spewing automatons.
Recently, during one such interaction, an official seemed genuinely interested in my analysis of Russian President Vladimir Putin's remarks during a lengthy press conference that I had attended. However, on the public stage, it was like a switch had flipped and the official had morphed into a Magic 8 Ball, spouting prefabbed demagogic talking points straight out of the Cold War playbook.
While the talking points may be aligned with the views of the Washington establishment and a certain segment of the mainstream media, they aren't aligned with the agenda of President Donald Trump or the will of the voting base that elected him.
If your job as an official in the government's foreign PR department is to carry out the vision of a commander in chief elected democratically by the people you're serving, and you feel that it's in conflict with how you personally view your role, then, by all means, give yourself a good flush, because you're at the very epicenter of the obstructionist deep state.
In questioning the frequency and duration of security briefings allowed by Tillerson, the Times article brought up the deadly 2012 terrorist attacks in Benghazi that took place during former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's watch. It's possible the Benghazi annex was targeted because CIA operatives there may have been shipping weapons to Syria.
"I do believe that the CIA annex in Benghazi was procuring weapons, some of them to get them away from the jihadists in Libya. But some of it to ferry those weapons through Turkey, into Syria," Republican Sen. Rand Paul, a member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, said in a Fox News appearance last year.
Maybe Tillerson is simply trying to curtail the underhanded activities of State Department and CIA operatives who use the department as official diplomatic cover overseas.
The Democratic Party seems particularly disturbed by Tillerson's shakeup of the State Department -- which is hardly surprising given that department members are predominantly Democrats. Earlier this month, the Democrats on the House Foreign Relations Committee wrote Tillerson a letter noting a 60 percent reduction in the number of career ambassadors and a 42 percent decrease in career ministers.
While career diplomats can indeed leverage an invaluable wealth of experience to tackle complex challenges, it's only of value if they aren't running around undermining the agenda of the president, fancying themselves some kind of underground resistance as they carry out official duties.
How many of the career diplomats who were dismissed were fully committed to carrying out Trump's vision, regardless of their own? If Tillerson observed that sort of disconnect, nothing prevents him from filling the ranks of ambassadors with outside appointees. There's no shortage of businesspeople with international experience (in the mold of Tillerson himself) who haven't spent a lifetime doing the backstroke in the swamp. Such people may have a less ideological and more pragmatic view of current challenges.
"With the range of crises, war and humanitarian disaster around the world, slashing our diplomatic corps is downright dangerous," House Democrats wrote in their letter to Tillerson.
Here we go again with the fear-mongering. Are we really supposed to believe all that's standing between order and chaos everywhere in the world are a bunch of Washington civil servants?
In fact, it would seem that the world has calmed down significantly since Tillerson began downsizing the State Department. The Islamic State is nearly wiped out. Conflict in the Middle East is being addressed by countries that are located in or near the region. Problems related to North Korean belligerence have been punted to China.
If the current pace keeps up, the State Department may be reduced to meeting in a phone booth, but the world might just be better off.
whoever said it was? Buy this guy a clue.
>noting a 60 percent reduction in the number of career ambassadors and a 42 percent decrease in career ministers.<
A glorious start.
Merry Christmas!
In cleaning house and streamlining the State Department, Tillerson and Trump are accomplishing an objective that eluded Eisenhower, Nixon, and Reagan. For decades, State’s bloated and entrenched bureaucracy has provided a comfortable living and foreign travel for Leftists, chiselers and frauds, Democratic partisans, and do-gooder goofballs. Since this crowd was protected by friendly Democrats in Congress and by the news media, even a determined conservative reformer like Reagan found that it was easiest to get their people in place in the State Department while leaving undisturbed the often hostile or uncooperative permanent workforce. Not Tillerson and Trump. With the backing of a GOP Congress, they are giving the Department of State a once in a century cleanup and doing so with businesslike energy and efficiency. The wails of the losers tell us that MAGA is underway at State.
IMHO - For the most part the State Department is a meddlesome bunch of arrogant globalist elites who create more problems than they solve.
On July 25, 1990 April Glaspie, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, met with Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.
She told him “We [the USA] have no opinion on your Arab – Arab conflicts, such as your dispute with Kuwait”.
So, thinking the US would turn a blind eye, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait eight days later.
But April Glaspie wqs mistaken and the US demanded that Hussein withdraw from Kuwait.
Saddam refused and that lead to the 1991 Gulf War (Operation Desert Shield).
That eventually led to Gulf War-2. the invasion of Iraq in 2003 (Operation Desert Storm).
That lead to the endless fighting in Iraq and Syria that is still going on today.
So far hundreds of thousands have died in the endless mid-east fighting and the US has spent trillions of dollars and
suffered the lost of thousands killed in action and many more wounded.
And all April Glaspie had to say to Saddam Hussein in 1990 was “Don’t invade Kuwait or we will kick your butt.”
And just think - if she had done that there probably would never have been a US president named Barack Obama.
April Glaspie, what a total disaster.
Drain the Swamp, Donald!
Those complaining seem to be living in the 1970’s or earlier. Where communication could be difficult. Where the wrong word usage may take days or weeks to straighten out (if you believe them that this used to happen).
With email, phones, voice conferencing, and all of the other technology available almost anyone in DC can communicate with almost any peer in developed nations in minutes if needed (though not at a cocktail party unless travel is involved which is easier than in the 1970s). And if a situation needs to be bumped up all the way to Tillerson or even Trump, it can be done quick. The staff on the ground is not needed anywhere near as much as they were 50+ years ago.
Marvin Kalb wrote a book on Kissinger in the 70’s. Kissinger wanted to downsize big time.
The bureaucracy quickly learns how to game the system for their personal gains. The result quickly becomes a bloated budget. It is quite amazing how an ordered budget cut, along with a hiring freeze forces the deadwood out, and waste to be gone. The bureaucracy 'gamers' still operate in a way to maximize their own situation. During the 'lean' years, this simply means running their operations in a lean and efficient manner. That's exactly what's needed in the federal bureaucracy.
Guy?
Maybe, before posting, try reading past the headline?
I have always found April Glaspie’s actions very similar to Dean Acheson’s excluding Korea from the US defense perimeter in a very public speech in January 1950, and the Korean War breaking out a few months later.
LOL, Wikipedia denies this by stating “...As Soviet archives opened in the 1980s, however, research found that the speech had little if any impact on Communist deliberations...” but it is good to keep in mind that these are the same people who, even in the face of overwhelming evidence from those same Soviet archives to the contrary, continue to say to this day that there is doubt about Alger Hiss’ status as a Soviet Agent.
As far as I am concerned, the State Department can be whittled down to a skeleton, and the benefit to our country will far outweigh the damage they do every day.
I can understand the desire to downsize. But don’t we still need ambassadors to places like Australia, Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, South Korea, Turkey, and Syria? Or are ambassadors irrelevant now?
Yes, having ambassadors is good; however, I bet there are hundreds (if not thousands) of “support” employees. Most of these people are parasites and could easily be riffed without much effect on anything (except for the budget). I would pose that most government employees are UNessential.
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