Rice answers anger over Iraq service (by cable)

[maddezmom]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is moving to quell a revolt among U.S. diplomats angry over moves to force foreign service officers to work in Iraq under threat of dismissal.

Rice plans to send a cable to all U.S. embassies and missions abroad on Thursday explaining the rationale behind the decision to begin the largest diplomatic call-up since Vietnam, a U.S. official told The Associated Press. The effort comes after a contentious "town hall meeting" at the department on Wednesday in which diplomats expressed serious concerns about being forced to work in Iraq.

Rice, who did not attend the meeting, was making clear in the cable that foreign service officers have a duty to uphold the oaths they took to carry out the policies of the government and be available to serve anywhere in the world, according to the official.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the cable has not yet been sent. It was expected to be released through the department's internal messaging system before Rice leaves on a trip to Turkey and the Middle East later Thursday, the official said.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071101/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_iraq_embassy

[Hand]

1. "Lie down with dogs, wake up with fleas."

I imagine that's the message. Of course, it'll drive a lot of talented people out of the State Dept., but hey, history? We'll all be dead. :grr:

[Supersedeas]

17. here come the resignations of some very competent professionals b/c of incompetent Condi

[Demeter]

2. How Can Anyone Rationalize A Death Sentence?

And so it ends, not with a bang, but with a whimper...

When Condi goes home to spend more time with her family, then it will be officially over. May that day come soon. Before Christmas, preferably!

[Toots]

19. How many American Diplomats have been killed in Iraq?

I wouldn't exactly call it a death sentence but it sure would be unpleasant duty. 130 degrees and no real entertainment of any sort..

[Ilsa]

21. 3 according to cnn. But I don't think many have gone there, either.

I don't understand why they want to staff up those jobs while the country is still not secure.

[calimary]

24. What family? Her parents?

I mean, she can't spend the rest of her life in the bushes' guest room no matter how much of a soulmate she feels she is with georgie. laura just won't have it.

[paparush]

3. Pot To Kettle - "Duty to uphold oaths they took.." OMFG! How can this woman utter these words?

[mlevans]

15. How can this woman utter these words?

In much the same way that her boss insisted that the Iraqi government must fulfill its obligations...obligations laid on them by someone else.

[rodeodance]

28. Do as I command, NOT as I do!

[Supersedeas]

29. as if oaths mean anything -- when they can refuse to take them when it counts

[NanceGreggs]

4. That's right. Condi!

"Foreign service officers have a duty to uphold the oaths they took."

Just as those who took an oath to uphold the Constitution have a duty to do so.

[underpants]

5. I still think this reaks of house clearing so they can stack State like they did Justice

Conservatives HATE the State Department in a way only rivaled in their hatred for the Dept. of Education. They could very well be aiming to run everyone off (will they lose their pensions too?) and put their people in place. This way they can undermine any future POTUS foreign policy or bring the whole department to its knees.

Two things people:

1.THEY operate on the margins-where you and I jump over to get to rational evaluation of choices
2.Don't be afraid to be wrong-it does happen from time to time but THEY aren't worried about being wrong mostly since they have been so consistently and because they are more focused on selling their version of the truth to the masses. Don't be afraid to be wrong.

[Trillo]

9. Pull your pants up and open your eyes.

The Department of Education creates more conservatives, who later in their lives go on to lie, cheat, and steal in top positions of government and business, than any other Executive Branch agency.

[Trajan]

26. Up until 15 years ago

The Department of Education was one of the most worn out whipping boys of the conservative right ....

It may 'create' more conservatives now (Perhaps it actually just channels already existent RWers), but it was despised for decades ....

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

11. I agree. It's a house clearing. Yep! nt

[pwb]

6. Rice doesn't want to reduce her blackwater thugs

She wants them to stay so they can create more violence in Iraq. i say reduce backwater, not make work for them with more diplomats to protect. I consider blackwater and all the other mercenary contractors to be a terrorist organization within the bush administration, and Candi is behind it all. She is causing the violence in Iraq more than stopping it, but hey its the only war the neocons have? for now.

[saigon68]

7. She loves her Mercenaries to kill islamics

She is as sick as her leader

[pwb]

8. And every man woman and child they kill

are labeled al qaeda.? sound familiar,???

[mlevans]

16. We could always just turn them over to the Iraqis...

Who would most likely try them and execute them, probably by hanging. At that I expect they'd still have a better chance than the people they gunned down.

[BonnieJW]

10. So here are all these repugs supposedly in the State Dept.

and when faced with going to Iraq they cry Wee! Wee! all the way home. They are chicken shits.

[Roy]

14. I suspect these would be mostly career empoyees....

I doubt they would even consider forcing right wing types to go to a dangerous place.
They know very well the people that support repubs won't put themselves in harms way, they send others and smear thore who call them on the waste of lives.

[Hekate]

18. Career employees like our federal Civil Service:not political appointees,but dedicated &knowledgable

Such people are the bones and institutional memory of government, serving from one administration to another...and it is a travesty when they are abused, disrespected, and forced out.

Hekate

[billyoc]

12. "Come ON people, what are you worried about?!"

[beltanefauve]

13. More on this

from Juan Cole: http://juancole.com/

Juan basically talks about why the Iraq embassy should be closed, period.

"Closing the embassy and ceasing to force foreign service officers to go to Baghdad against their will not prevent the US from brokering political and diplomatic deals. Most deal making is done in Amman as it is, and that has long been the case. The ambassador and a small number of volunteers could still fly out to the Green Zone and hammer out agreements. Indeed, closing the embassy would force the Bush administration to use State Department personnel for diplomatic purposes instead of as cannon fodder in a desperate offensive.

Bush is dragooning these career diplomats into dodging bombs and bullets, which is not their job. He is trying to create them as a shadow colonial administration of Iraq, which is not their job. The US embassy in Beirut was closed during the Lebanese Civil War. There is still no US embassy in Tehran. Tehran is a hell of a lot safer than Baghdad. Keeping the US embassy in Baghdad open is a political and military decision on Bush's part, which flies in the face of precedent and good sense. "

And this:

"The Jesse Helms Right always hated the State Department, because it is about compromise and finding peaceful solutions, whereas the US Right is about war, violence and imposing its will on people. But is is the State Department that, despite some lapses over the decades, generally embodies the best of what America is abroad.

The guerrillas in Iraq constantly target the Green Zone and US diplomatic personnel there with mortar and rocket fire. State Department personnel sleep in trailers that are completely unprotected from such incoming fire. At several points in the past year, they have been forbidden to go outside without protective gear (as if outside were more dangerous). The Bush administration has consistently lied about the danger they are in and tried to cover up these severe security precautions...


There is, in addition to the daily danger, no good escape route for civilian personnel from Baghdad. The troop escalation will be reversed by next year this time, and as the US draws down, the Green Zone is in danger of being overwhelmed by the Mahdi Army. The State Department employees sent there for two year missions are the ones who may end up in secret JAM prisons, as happened in Tehran in 1979."

[Acadia Blue]

20. These people are careen nonpartisan people who just have jobs,

and most of them are very ethical. I don't blame them for not wanting to go into death's door. Most have kids and wives. They should just quit and find other jobs.

[iverglas]

22. and some have husbands ;)

They should just quit and find other jobs.

Nuh uh! They should ...



... but I gather they can't, in the US.

The foreign service union in Canada would walk over this, and they'd win.

[cal04]

23. Rice defends forced diplomatic assignments to Iraq

By Sue Pleming

SHANNON, Ireland, Nov 2 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Friday defended her decision to force U.S. diplomats to serve in Iraq and said they had an obligation to take on such difficult assignments.

Many diplomats are incensed following a U.S. State Department decision last week to identify "prime candidates" who may have to accept compulsory one-year tours in Iraq or risk losing their jobs.

In her first public comments on the staffing directive, Rice conceded it was a "sensitive issue" but said people must serve where they were needed and Iraq was a priority.

"In a sense, the fact that so many people have volunteered and have served, I would hope others would think about their obligation not only to the country but to those who have already served to make sure that these difficult assignments are shared across the service," Rice told reporters traveling with her to Turkey where she will attend a conference on Iraq.


http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N01510817.htm

[calimary]

25. For crying out loud - now she's using the same lame excuse that

other chickenhawks use for keeping the war going - we can't possibly stop the war! If we don't keep sending more of our troops over there to die, it might mean that those who died before them died in vain!

[fasttense]

27. Every US career diplomat Rice cakes forces into Iraq

will be a prime kidnapping target. What, they don't trust a group of seedy mercenaries to protect them? I wonder why?