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MORE THOUGHTS ON REFORMING STATE – PART I.

Link Preface:

” State Sanity I ” – Caerdroia (Jeff)

“State Sanity II” – Caerdroia (Jeff)

“What should (and won’t) happen at the State Department” – Glittering Eye

” On Diplo Services and Reform” – Lounsbury

“Yet Another Missed Opportunity“- Whirledview (PHK)

“A State Department Worth Creating” – Zenpundit

I’ve been pondering the reforming of the State Department in light of these posts ( and comments made on the posts) and will try to clarify a couple of points:

a) Regarding why the deep expertise advocated by myself, Col and PHK is a good thing in a FSO.

b) The nature of State ” obstructionism” that Dave, Jeff and I have decried and how reform might mitigate it.

Deep expertise in a foreign nation or region – where somone has effective mastery of language, cultural and social nuances, history, religious traditions and politics plus a network of personal connections – is an invaluable platform for making informed policy choices. It also takes at least a decade to cultivate, including academic study plus considerable periods of time of immersion ” in-country” but this can be regarded as an investment in a FSO will will have an effective 25 -35 year career. The current rotation policy for FSO’s makes this kind of knowledge acquisition very difficult without bringing any tangible benefits to the United States ( except perhaps for the Chiefs of Mission who can send troublesome or subpar functionaries into somebody else’s bailwick).

Ironically, in the unenlightened days before WWII, the State Department had, relative to its total number of employees, many ” old hand” experts of this type. The combination of high prestige and miserly government salaries tended to attract a lot of wealthy Wall Street lawyers and international bankers ( or their sons) to the Foreign Service. These predominantly WASP Ivy leaguers usually started out politically connected ( The Dulles brothers for example had Secretary of State Lansing as an uncle) well-travelled, multi-lingual and arrived with a set of interests in a foreign land or two that they continued to develop.

Having these ” old hands” kind of FSO’s like George Kennan, Chip Bohlen and Joseph Grew around provided the Secretary of State and the President with a source of informed and coherent advice at critical moments in American history. Grew was partly responsible for the policy of co-opting Hirohito as an adjunct of the Occupation, sparing the United States the costs of a massive occupational garrison and frequent bloodshed. Old Hand expertise was not always a guarantee of sage advice- the ” China Hands” who were persecuted by McCarthy had understood China well but badly misjudged Communism as a revolutionary ideology. Mao was no agrarian reformer nor could he and Chiang have built a coalition regime.

On the other hand, Right-wingers getting rid of State’s China experts ended up blinding successive administrations to the Sino-Soviet split and aggravated problems during the Korean and Vietnam wars. Likewise, leftists and fellow travellers in the Roosevelt administration who successfully intrigued to abolish State’s Russian division in 1937 and destroyed State’s files on the Stalinist terror deprived FDR of realistic advice regarding the USSR, Stalin ( which of course was their intent) and State’s own internal security. The only clear-headed advice Franklin Roosevelt received on Stalin came from Winston Churchill and Henry Stimson, not his State Department with pro-Soviet functionaries like Winnant, Davies and Hiss in the driver’s seat.

End Part I.

MANLY ARTS OR HORS DE COMBAT ?

Dave Schuler of the Glittering Eye had an unconventional post ” The Best Weapon is a Trained Mind” last week on his philosophy of self-defense that was sparked by a discussion at
Dean’s World:

“First, let me establish some credentials. I’ve studied martial arts longer than many of my readers have been alive. My first Judo instructor was a U. S. national champion. My second Judo instructor and Taekwondo instructor was the head instructor at the most prestigious martial arts school in South Korea (the name escapes me at the moment). My kendo instructor was the head kendo instructor with the Japanese Imperial Army in Manchuria (he didn’t spread it around too much for obvious reasons but odd things come out in post-practice drinking sessions). I’ve also studied aikido and fencing. I used to be a passable shot with both gun and bow.

I taught judo for six or so years and women’s self-defense for five years. I received thank you notes for several years thereafter from women who’d successfully used the training I gave them.

I’ve found myself in situations in which I was compelled to use my training, successfully, a couple of times.

…However, I don’t think that’s quite the whole story. I think that it doesn’t matter a great deal if you’re empty-handed or whether you go out with a machete in one hand and a howitzer in the other. The only genuine weapon is the mind. Armies train for reasons and among those reasons is that it takes training to overcome the reflexes and inhibitions that prevent effective response to attack. Regardless of how determined you may be when fighting actually starts without serious training it’s pretty likely you’ll just freeze.

The most effective form of self-defense is recognizing dangerous situations and avoiding them.
Failing that the very first line of self-defense should be flight. Preferably yelling or screaming your head off, blowing a whistle, and generally making a ruckus.

Avoid being the first one to resort to violence. If your opponent is bigger or more skilled than you are you may be in for a world of hurt. And the instinctual response of your opponent to attack may be fight rather than flight. Or freezing.

…Avoidance is best. Then flight. “


Smart advice. Miyamoto Musashi would have no doubt approved.

Generally, in civilized societies you can walk around, even at night, without fear of being accosted. Unfortunately, most places in the world aren’t quite up to that standard and that includes many neighborhoods in Chicago to say nothing of regions of the world where the police might be more dangerous to encounter than the criminals.

Compared to Dave’s expertise, my martial arts skills are rudimentary. I studied Northern Shaolin Kung-fu for a couple of years and some kickboxing as well. I coached wrestling for a number of years and while my skills are certainly decent, a national collegiate champion managed to tie me into a pretzel in about a minute despite my being far stronger.

I’m better with firearms. I’m a crack shot with a rifle, having shot competitively through my adolescence in a club that produced two national champions. I’m also pretty good with a pistol though I have not practiced in ages and don’t own one anymore. My real area of accomplishment though is in the weightroom. Depending on the grip used, I’ve benched 485 -545 without using any drugs, bench shirts, elbow wraps or any other training supports other than a belt. My other lifts are heavier than that and while I have made an effort to cut back a bit in terms of size ( buying suits was expensive) I’m still about 230 and that scares away a lot of potential miscreants and my strength means that when I have sparred I hit harder and tired less easily.

None of that really matters though. Anyone taken by surprise no matter how strong or skilled is in serious trouble and you have probably only a few seconds to make a life-altering or life-saving decision. Getting the hell out of there, as Dave suggests, is still the best option – even if the opponent has a gun because most people can’t shoot straight beyond five to ten feet or will hesitate to shoot at all.

If you can’t get away though you need to upset the opponent’s game plan in some way to introduce uncertainty, the more the better. Noise, the unexpected action, fight dirty and then get away. Standing there and going toe to toe – when you can get out of there – just to make a point by kicking ass is to look for trouble which can easily find you. All the moreso if you are introducing a firearm into the situation. Anybody who carries a gun without getting the proper training is a goddamned fool and what legally constitutes a righteous act of self-defense in Texas may get you an involuntary manslaughter charge in Illinois. I favor conceal and carry laws but I favor even more people knowing what they are doing if they opt to have a deadly weapon on hand.

Real life ain’t the movies.

POSTING STATUS

I should have a heterogeneous mix of subjects up today, plus a continuation of the ” reforming State” discussion going on below (Dave, Collounsbury and Jeff have made a few remarks already this morning but I will address them fully later ). The children need to be hustled out the door to their activities as I have a workman coming this afternoon.

A STATE DEPARTMENT WORTH CREATING: GETTING INSTITUTIONAL CLARITY AT FOGGY BOTTOM

The Bush administration announced today an intention to perform a major overhaul of the State Department ( hat tip Combat Boots). This move ( assuming it results in real reforms) will not be welcomed by many members of the Foreign Service who are already balking at the strategic objective/mission/task orientation demands of the Bush White House. Nor will it be welcomed by many liberals or Democrats who will no doubt suspect a purge is in the offing, motivated by Republican partisanship against a bureaucracy widely ( and correctly) perceived as leaning liberal and dovish.

Both groups may be correct to worry but it is also true the State Department is in dire need of reforms as its antiquated regional desk structure, byzantine personnel assignment policies and insular culture are inadequate to meet the challenges of a radically different world from the Cold War era. I would also add that State and its Foreign Service officers need not just a new culture but more resources in order to do their jobs – sometimes dangerous jobs I might add- effectively. The historic pennypinching of Congress, to nickel and dime common sense requests from State, line by budget line, while at the same time appropriating megabillions of pork for the district back home has to end. It impacts our national interests and even our national security.

In what way should the State Department be changed ? A few suggestions:

Outreach: The Department needs to be deeply engaged in public diplomacy and connecting with the American public about the importance of foreign affairs. It’s great to build embassies that cannot be easily blown up by terrorists, not so great if diplomats do not leave their desk located in what amounts to a nuclear war bunker built to look like a suburban community college campus. Might as well stay in Georgetown. If we aren’t mingling with ordinary locals as well as host government officials we can hardly be aware of what is really going on ” in -country”.

Strategic Thinking: George Kennan and Paul Nitze attempted in the 1950’s to reverse State’s intrinsic love affair with crisis management, muddling through and a day to day time horizon in favor of long-term strategic planning. While they instituted strategic policies they never managed to inculcate strategic thinking.

While you might disagree with the Bush administrations ” transformationalist” priorities, getting State Department personnel habituated to think and act in terms of a set of strategic priorities is a good thing. The age of ad hoc, seat of the pants, diplomacy has to go and the State needs to reorg an internal structure that perpetuates empire-building and encourages end-runs around the president’s stated policy or the Secretary of State’s instructions.

Depth: FSO’s should not rotate everywhere without rhyme or reason. Their regional area/major nation should be their career so true depth can be cultivated. Yes, I realize ” clientism” would be a problem. My answer to that is it is a problem now except, on average, it’s a less-informed clientism than if someone spent say, thirty years as a Sinologist.

Secondary areas of expertise for FSO’s should be non-regional – economics, business and international finance, IT, counter-terrorism, intelligence, military affairs, public health, management, law and so on. Real expertise here as well should be the goal.

Jointness: State, the IC and the Pentagon need to learn operational ” jointness” in foreign affairs the way the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines had to adapt to planning, buying and executing missions in the field in unison ( actually the military is still learning…but they’re better at it than they used to be).

This is going to take some time and new blood to achieve but America needs more of a team and fewer prima donnas in foreign policy.

THE FIRST WAR ON TERROR

I’ve been reading Tom Holland’s well-received Rubicon – best described as a ” retro history” with modern America as the model for understanding the late Roman Republic. This technique violates major precepts of the historical profession but it also makes Rubicon a very refreshing read. The stuffiness and pomposity that are germance to classical history as a field are absent from Holland’s prose.

Holland took special delight in drawing the following parallel with the Pirate chiefdoms of the Mediterranean sea:

“THE WAR AGAINST TERROR

…Calculated acts of intimidation ensured that they could extort and rob almost at will. The scale of their plundering was matched by their pretensions. Their chiefs claimed for themselves the status of kings and tyrants, and for their men, that of soldiers, believing that if they pooled their resources they would be invincible.

…The shadowiness of the pirate’s organization, and their diffuse operations, made them a foe unlike any other.’ The Pirate is not bound by the rules of war, but is the common nemy of everyone” Cicero complained. ‘ There can be no trusting him, no attempt to bind with him with mutually agreed treaties’. How was such an adversary ever to be pinned down, let alone eradicated? To make the attempt would be to fight against phantoms.’ It would be an unprecedented war, fought without rules, in a fog’: a war that appeared without promise of an end”.

What happened ? Much dithering and desultory, half-hearted campaigns, turning a blind eye to increasing pirate outrages by the Roman elite, until the populace made its will felt.

“…it was a Tribune, in 67 BC who proposed that the people’s hero [ Pompey] be given a sweeping license to deal with the pirates. Despite an impassioned appeal from Catalus not to appoint a ” virtual monarch over the empire’ these citizens rapturously ratified the bill. Pompey was granted the unprecedented force of 500 ships and 120,000 men, together with the right to levy more, should he decide that they were needed. his command embraced the entire mediterranean, covered all its islands, and extended fifty miles inland.”

The result ?

“As it proved, to sweep the seas clear of pirates, storm their last stronghold, and end a menace that had been tormenting the Republic for decades took the new proconsul a mere three months…Even the Romans themselves appeared to have been a little stunned.”

A lesson for today ? Maybe. But the ancient world also offers the lesson of the expedition to Syracuse, an undertaking of similar magnitude in which the Athenians fared not quite so well as did Rome.