The State Department’s Poster-Clown (more thoughts on America’s diplomatic culture)
Jack Croddy ought to be the poster-clown for State Department reform.
Calling him a poster-child is simply an insult to children.
And perhaps I am insulting clowns. CLowns in Ringling Brothers’ circus have a lot of discipline and professional dedication.
Croddy is the State Department senior Foreign Service Officer who turned in a decidedly shoddy performance last Wednesday (October 31) at a State Department’s “town hall meeting” where the subject was “directed assignments.” Directed assignments is diplomatese for telling a State Department officer to a fill an empty job slot whether or not the officer wants the position.
Croddy is apparently one of those callow types who practices “selective job dedication” –he’ll go where he wants to go, not where his department sends him. At beest his is a tourist’s approach to diplomacy. At worst — well, it doesn’t get much worse, at least in terms of shameful behavior by a supposedly responsible government official.
From the linked AP article:
…”Incoming is coming in every day, rockets are hitting the Green Zone,” said Jack Croddy, a senior foreign service officer who once worked as a political adviser with NATO forces.”…”It’s one thing if someone believes in what’s going on over there and volunteers, but it’s another thing to send someone over there on a forced assignment,” Croddy said. “I’m sorry, but basically that’s a potential death sentence and you know it. Who will raise our children if we are dead or seriously wounded?”
His remarks were met with loud and sustained applause from the approximately 300 diplomats at the meeting.
Pathetic.
My column this past week (”A Diplomacy of Neighborhoods”) addressed the necessity of changing the State Department’s “culture”. I wrote it on Monday evening and sent to my editor on Tuesday (Octoebr 30), well before Mr. Croddy’s display. SO this post is a post-Croddy expansion on the subject.
Here’s the VOA report from Thursday, which reported Croddy’s statement and added part of the State Department’s official response to Croddy and other critics:
State Department Spokesman Sean McCormack said that since the U.S. embassy in Baghdad opened in 2004, more than 1,500 staffers have served in Iraq voluntarily, and that 94 per cent of the department’s Iraq jobs are currently filled, a higher proportion than many other overseas posts:
“In some of the reporting, just some of the reporting, I’ve seen the sense that somehow the foreign service is not stepping up to the plate, and that somehow people in the foreign service are turning away or trying to avoid service in Baghdad,” said McCormack. “Now every individual is going to make their own decisions about where they want to serve. But both the numbers, and some of these anecdotes, illustrate for you the readiness and the willingness of people in the State Department and the foreign service to step up to this duty.”
McCormack said that since the announcement of potential forced assignments, an additional 15 officers had volunteered for Iraq duty but said it is unclear whether they have the required skills and background.
Most of the nearly 50 vacancies are in provincial reconstruction teams, PRT’s, in which U.S. diplomats and civilian specialists work with local Iraqi officials on small-scale war rebuilding and development projects.
I respect American diplomats. They have a tough and often dangerous job– a very necessary job. In the 21st century that job has become even more difficult. Embassy cocktail party and headquarters assignments matter, but presence in the field — the land of work gloves and dirty boots– is the decisive mission.
Here’s how I expressed it in my column:
Twenty-first century diplomacy isn’t an office job. It is a demanding and, at times, a dangerous trade, one that requires accepting deprivation, running physical risks and hanging out in bad neighborhoods. If this echoes a field soldier’s job description, it’s not a coincidence.
I wouldn’t want a man like Croddy in my Area of Operations, no matter how intelligent or experienced he is. For that matter, I don’t want him in our State Department– he is a terrible example. Character and courage matter in diplomacy. Mr. Croddy exhibits neither. Rather, he is a profile in whining.
On Wednesday a State Department officer wrote me an email about “A Diplomacy of Neighborhoods” (he read it on line). Though he said he didn’t disagree with many of the points the column made, he argued “…It’s not mainly about changing the organizational culture. The crux of the problem is a mismatch between mission and resources at State…”
He has a very good point, a point John Naland, the president of the American Foreign Service Association, addressed in congressional testimony this past August.
Naland called for a
…re-balancing in the current 12:1 ratio of military spending to spending on diplomacy and foreign assistance. However, as things stand now, that imbalance is set to worsen. Consider the unmet need for 900 additional Foreign Service training positions. The U.S. Marine Corps alone – the smallest of the uniformed services – is slated to expand its active-duty ranks by 30 times as much (27,000) by 2011. The Army is slated to add 65,000 more soldiers to its permanent rolls. Thus, 900 new Foreign Service positions would total less than one percent of the planned military expansion – barely a rounding error when compared to additional resources being dedicated to the uniformed military. Please note that I am not saying that our military does not need to be larger. Rather I am saying that increasing Foreign Service staffing by the equivalent of the rounding error of the planned military expansion would pay dramatic dividends in terms of the ability of our diplomats to advance vital U.S. interests around the globe…
The column really didn’t ignore these valid points– to whit:
Changing organizational culture is, but that’s a job that takes time, training and sustained emphasis by senior leaders. It also takes increased pay to attract and keep talent.
They do deserve expansion, and I recommend reading Naland’s testimony in toto.
Some of the reporting last week (after the State Department announced it might order diplomats to serve in Iraq) was shallow. (Okay, what else is new.) State’s “directed assignments” are no draft. They aren’t a call-up, either.
The State Department certainly isn’t conducting a draft. Its diplomats and departmental specialists all accepted government jobs without coercion. “Call-up,” however, doesn’t really describe the situation, not with adequate precision. “Call-up” implies the use of reserves, of part-timers. Our diplomats aren’t reserve “weekend warriors” leaving jobs and businesses to pick up rifles. They are full-time professionals who know –when they sign on—that they have duty stations world-wide.
What is it? A deployment. I don’t see this as quibbling over words. Professional diplomats deploy. They aren’t draftees and they aren’t reservists.
If thehey don’t want to go where the work is, let them suffer the same fate as any other American worker…
Comment by jtb-in-texas — 11/3/2007 @ 9:30 pm
I was not suprised Croddy’s comments. Croddy was the face of the State Depsrtment in that meeting. Had never seen him…never heard of him but he was my picture of a mid-level diplomat. There are certainly some good ones…but they are in the minority or else the State Department would not be what it is. My son-in-law came home from Iraq last month. My Daughter will come home in December.(Army) They just didn’t get deployed…they wanted to go. If we are going to hire more bodies at State…we’d better raise the qualifications and committment…we don’t need more of what we have.
Comment by JC Dugger — 11/3/2007 @ 10:46 pm
@AB, Thanks for treating this issue with the thoughtfulness it deserves. There’s been far too much knee-jerk ignorance displayed throughout much of the “blogosphere,” especially since the Town Hall meeting and particulary in reaction to one, non-representative FSO’s over- publicized remarks. @jtb-in-texas, So far, not only have none of those identified as “prime candidates” for directed assignments refused an assignment (there’s a 10-day period during which they have to provide updated information such as their medical clearance status), but there’ve been neither resignations nor threats of resignations: only rumors of potential resignations. In fact, as of Friday morning, an additional 15 qualified volunteers have stepped forward, reducing the number of potential directed assignments to only 33, out of 252 Iraq positions coming open in 2008.
Comment by Consul-At-Arms — 11/4/2007 @ 2:54 am
Plenty of very qualified military officers will be available for the Diplomat jobs soon enough. As veterans they will get hiring preference. I can see the Democrats railing that Rove planned the militarization of the State Department all along.
Comment by Jim — 11/4/2007 @ 3:18 am
When I was in the Reserves There were A few People That Decided that when the Desert Storm Rolled onto the horizon that they were only there for the GI bill. or only there for the Money. These folks went to the desert because they were presented with a Choice. Fulfill your contract or We will have a Separation with other than honorable consequences that included the loss of the perk.
Comment by David Sullivan — 11/4/2007 @ 6:11 am
Is future promotion dependent on service in Iraq? Would that adjust their attitudes?
Comment by Bob Hawkins — 11/4/2007 @ 11:00 am
Throwing money at the State Department is only part of the problem. Sure, State needs more resources. Croddy’s comments clearly conveyed an inference that he dislikes the policy. If he can’t support the policy, he should look for another line of work. I should also point out that this is not the first time this business came up. A few years ago Condi Rice gave a speech about transforming the State Department. She talked about moving a number of State Department jobs out of Europe, to a number of other, shall we say less pleasant, places in the world. Almost instantly a number of State Department types went on background to Glen Kessler of the Washington Post, who then dutifully produced an article talking about why this was such a bad idea.
Comment by Rich — 11/4/2007 @ 12:33 pm
@Rich, And yet the jobs moved anyway. And that’s not the first time that’s happened. The last time, after the USSR broke up, embassies and consulates in over a dozen countries were established and staffed without adding a single new position to the Foreign Service. Did that give us a “hollow” Foreign Service? Yes it did, a circumstance corrected by former Sec. Powell’s “Diplomatic Readiness Initiative” but which is repeating itself again today, with a Foreign Service that is nearly one-seventh understrength. If they ever let the military get that below strength, there’d be blood on the walls at the Pentagon and on Capitol Hill.
Comment by Consul-At-Arms — 11/5/2007 @ 10:53 pm
Of course the military is useful and engaged. Not sure about some in the State Department.
Comment by AF Dad — 11/6/2007 @ 1:57 pm
Actually, at most a third of total military forces are ever “useful and engaged” at any one time. The remainder are training, refitting, training, re-equipping, training, &tc. That’s just how it works, if you’re fielding a sustainable military force. By comparison, two-thirds of the Foreign Service is deployed and working overseas at any given time. Not so many people (nor that much money) compared to DoD, but you get the idea. Bear in mind that none of the deployed Foreign Service was present at that Town Hall meeting, and only a fraction (300 out of perhaps 2,000) of those in the U.S. were actually there either.
Comment by Consul-At-Arms — 11/6/2007 @ 4:56 pm
Mr. Cruddy is a coward, pure and simple. “Who will raise our children if we’re dead or seriously wounded?” As with all of us, he could become dead or seriously wounded in a traffic accident at home. I hope for the sake of his children he has contingency plans for that. If not, he’s not much of a father, or much of a man. He should stop sniveling, and thank his lucky civilian stars that he has three choices in this matter. He can follow orders, he can take his marbles and go home, or he can get his whiny ass fired (and still get to keep most of the marbles). Even in our volunteer military, once the order is given, there are only TWO choices: go, or face serious legal consequences. There is absolutely nothing professional in Mr. Cruddy’s statement, and probably hot in his overall work ethic, either. The most honorable thing he could do is quit, and let a better person fill his chair.
Comment by Redleg Geek — 11/10/2007 @ 9:32 pm
If I may repeat some previously posted questions from another thread: Outside of the university programs, does the United States have a federal school equivalent such as Annapolis or West Point for either the Diplomatic Corps and the CIA and other intelligence services? I am not aware of any degree program not conducted by private or state universities. Specifically, a specialized national institution founded and run by the United States government with the purpose of testing and producing highly trained and loyal professionals for a specialized function which serves and protects the United States. Contrast West Point’s record of ingraining a sense of dedication to their country in its students to university preparatory programs often produce. It appears they have not only failed to encourage this attitude, but often create the opposite results. I don’t mean to paint with too broad a brush; but when many universities are so often dominated by a left-wing academic viewpoint, doesn’t this situation naturally work against producing graduates with a positive view of America’s role in the world? Instead, wouldn’t such an environment be likely to produce diplomatic or intelligence bureaucrats sharing their teachers’ rejection of their own country’s history, government and interactions with the world? The environment at the secondary and collegiate levels is often hostile to attracting and training the most qualified students. Yet, if there was some chance of still recruiting them in high school, often it is forever lost after they take history and government classes at the university level. Many top students are repulsed or discouraged by the anti-Americanism of the academics running the programs. Why pursue a career that requires you to serve what has been labeled the “forces of evilâ€. Too many members of the radical left are entrenched in tenured positions to change this situation. Why not establish a new national educational institution, recruit qualified faculty from other sources (think tanks) and use the West Point model to recruit high school candidates?
Comment by Ragnell — 11/12/2007 @ 9:50 pm
I have read this peice with great interest (wishing to go into the Foriegn Service myself upon graduation) and I cannot say I do not agree with you more. However, if any of you wish to see better defined reasons as to why the diplomats are so upset, I suggest you read the comments following this link: http://blogs.state.gov/index.php/entires/iraq_colleagues/ at the State Departmemnt’s official blog. Of particular interest to me was this reply to the FS officer’s post: “Tom in Virginia writes: I am a Civil Service Officer at the State Department who has had the privilege and honor working with Foreign Service Officers. All the FSOs I know are selfless, hard-working, courageous, and are willing to serve. From what I have seen and heard, the massive frustration concerning directed assignments to Iraq is a result of many factors. All the FSOs I know do not object to the idea of directed assignments. They all know that they are serving at the pleasure of the Secretary and the President, and will go where told. The mission in Iraq is causing many issues at State. There are serious management issues. Many offices and embassies around the world are short-staffed, mostly because they people they need are in Iraq. My office is currently short about 5, 6 FSOs, and this is causing most in our office to work longer hours and receive practically zero vacation time. Some offices are unable to perform their functions fully due to these shortages. (Shrinking State Dept. budget doesn’t help either) Additionally, many FSOs are unhappy with how the directed assignment policy was announced. The e-mails and cables were sent out on a Friday night, meaning State Department employees found out about the announcement in the press. It was a pretty sleazy and disrespectful way to notify the Foreign Service. I�m sure soldiers in our military would be very unhappy if they learned about their deployments from the newspaper and not from their commanding officers. Some people question why the Embassy in Baghdad is the largest in the world, when there are many places around the world we need a large amount of skilled and experienced FSOs (Beijing, Brussels, etc.) Then there are the stories of FSOs who have come from Baghdad (not the PRTs), stating they did very little meaningful work. Who would want to work in a bunker that�s attacked almost daily doing work that could probably be done somewhere else? People need to believe that their work will be meaningful and important. At least six FSOs from my office are �prime candidates� for the unfilled positions in Iraq. None of them have any Middle East experience. None of them speak Arabic. How are they the best people to send to Iraq? What good will they do, especially if they will only get two weeks of training? No one can learn the intricacies of Iraqi culture and politics in two weeks. For those criticizing the Foreign Service as a bunch of martini-sipping, overpaid elitists afraid to do hard work, get the facts straight. FSOs continue to volunteer to work in places like Afghanistan, Sudan, Chad, Pakistan, and Yemen. Particularly in the Middle East, FSOs are continuously the targets of terrorists and extremists. The FSOs, and particularly their families, sacrifice a lot. Over 80% of the posts in Iraq have been filled with volunteers. Most embassies and offices in DC would be extremely happy to have 80% of their positions filled. ” Of course, this ignores the fact that these were not the points Mr. McCormack made, neither were they the points the diplomats were applauding to. However, the FSO’s posts on the site are food for thought.
Comment by T. "Chimpy" Greer — 11/12/2007 @ 10:55 pm
Mr. Croddy’s comments bring some old hands back to a familiar refrain: Since the 1970s American diplomacy has been implemented by a diplomatic corps that has cast off professionalism and become openly partisan. They will support policies they personally favor, oppose those they disfavor, even sabotage them. The problem lies in the Department’s culture — not its size or resources. I was a foreign service officer for 27 years and watched that culture operate, often to the detriment of our national interest and policies set out by elected representatives. Once more gaining control of our diplomacy will not be easy — or peaceful. So far, there is no evidence that Executive Branch leadership is willing even to take on the fight, let alone sustain it for the years necessary. This dust-up over assignments is just one more proof.
Comment by Smykket — 11/14/2007 @ 6:24 pm