On April 27 the Department of State announced a fundamental change to its process for selecting new career Foreign Service Officers. Where candidates have long had to pass the written Foreign Service Test for consideration, that test would now be one of a number of considerations that would be considered by a panel. Exact criteria […]
The president’s instincts, to which he alone is privy, are responsible for cutting through endless reams of Washington analysis paralysis and contributing to the start of (hopefully) results-based diplomacy.
The United States Embassy in Havana in October. CreditYamil Lage/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images On January 9, U.S. Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson opened a formal inquiry into mysterious “sonic attacks” purportedly damaging the health of U.S. diplomatic personnel stationed at the American Embassy in Cuba. The first reports surfaced in December 2016, and since […]
“We’re going to have to send China a clear signal that, first, the island-building stops and, second, your access to those islands also is not going to be allowed.”
Under the U.S. Foreign Military Financing program, the Philippines is currently the largest recipient of U.S. funds in the Asia-Pacific region.
Despite concerns human rights violations in Vietnam, Obama opted to fully lift the arms embargo on lethal military equipment during his recent visit.
The U.S. State Department has issued a request for China’s navy to refrain from harassing fishermen of other countries in the disputed South China Sea.
Americans have long had a disdainful attitude toward diplomacy and diplomats, seeing the whole endeavor as something elitist, foreign, expensive, and possibly deceitful.
Kennan’s is considered the architect of the Cold War strategy. Today’s diplomats are still expected to provide the kind of expert advice that helps set the policy course for the nation.
Ever since 9/11, counterterrorism has permeated U.S. foreign policy. Throughout the world, American embassies have turned into fortresses, though diplomacy does not function in seclusion.
Diplomacy today is changing, especially with regard to technology and the availability of instant communication. Imagine how the Cuban Missile Crisis might have unfolded differently in our time.
The end of April marked the passing of United States Secretary of State John Kerry’s set deadline for negotiating an extension of peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians. Kerry told reporters during a press conference in Addis Ababa that for now the peace process is on pause and he hopes both sides will come back […]
Today Palestinian top negotiators will meet with United States Secretary of State John Kerry’s team in Washington to go over the U.S. position on all the issues that will be a part of a framework agreement that Kerry aims to share publicly in a few weeks. A senior Palestinian source told Haaretz, “we want […]
Countdown to the February 2nd Issa-Grassley hearing into Operation Fast and Furious is underway, and one of the biggest questions still unanswered is whether Congress will offer former AUSA Patrick Cunningham immunity for his testimony, and if Cunningham, so immunized, will shed any light on the parentage of an ATF operation that allowed roughly 2000 military-grade weapons to walk across the US-Mexico border and disappear, without a trace, into cartel arsenals.
Nobody seems to be holding his or her breath, but if Congress does pull an ‘Ollie North’ with Cunningham, or any of the witnesses it seeks to depose on Fast and Furious, expect the narrative to change. The irony alone, in a case that so closely resembles Iran-Contra, may provide the MSM with a much-needed jolt: Cunningham reprises North’s role when Congress, challenged by his close hold on the 5th Amendment, compels him to testify by granting him use or (less likely) transactional immunity.
Don’t remember the way it worked with North? Consider the following, pulled from court documents…
The fact that government outrage continues to provide the international media with grist for its insatiable mill is one of the great ironies in this scenario: perturbed at the site’s revelation of embarrassing diplomatic discussions and fumblings–tales only mildly interesting to the average reader–government officials are now in the process of creating a better, and far more spectacular story over First Amendment rights and the ‘treasonable’ activities of a Dutch citizen accused of committing “sex by surprise” (in Sweden?).
Even worse, the official call from some quarters for draconian regulation of the internet has given Russia (which suggests nominating Assange for the Nobel Peace Prize) and China, a human-rights violator of mammoth proportion, opportunities to ‘prove’ to an already hostile world that when Washington suddenly finds itself looking out through wall-to-wall glass, this nation of stone-throwers is no better than anyplace else.