Expect Lots Of "Dead Time" At The Baghdad Embassy

by John Brown

One of the better known secrets of the Foreign Service is the amount of dead time imposed on its officers. Dead time waiting for congressional delegations to arrive at the airport. Dead time attending overlong meetings to coordinate embassy activities. Dead time handling the advance teams sent to posts by the White House to arrange for presidential visits. Dead time dealing with a ludicrously complicated personnel system in Washington.

Lots and lots of dead time which keeps Foreign Service Officers (FSOs) from doing what the taxpayer pays them to do while abroad: look out for American interests, observe the society around them, keep in touch with its most important elements, provide fresh information and new ideas with which policy can be formulated, and negotiate with the host government on bilateral or multilateral issues.

True, FSOs in the administrative "cone" of the State Department focus on internal embassy management and personnel matters. But their work aims to abolish dead time, not expand it. In Baghdad, they're facing an uphill battle to control this grave impediment to foreign service work -- as are their colleagues in the political, economic, consular and public diplomacy cones.

Based on over twenty years of experience in the Foreign Service, I see several reasons why the American mission in Baghdad -- which will cost in 2005 up to $1 billion to operate, not including the construction of a new embassy -- will create a dead time environment that will complicate if not denigrate the work of the 140 Foreign Service Officers assigned to it by the end of the year.

First, take the sheer size of the Embassy. It will have a staff of 1,500, including over 500 Iraqis designated as Foreign Service Nationals (FSN). Such a large number of people -- more than half civil servants -- will inevitably demand enormous personnel coordination and organization. With so many bodies around, it'll be difficult to determine exactly who does what, and an inordinate amount of dead time will be spent deciding upon assignments and responsibilities. Even Ambassador Francis Ricciardone, who set up the Baghdad embassy, acknowledges "there are technical problems, issues of different management cultures, different ways of keeping records and communicating and doing money and assigning people," while diplomatically stating that "the two lead agencies -- Defense and State -- have been really partnering.wonderfully." (Federal Times, June 28).

Second, the tour of duty for FSOs in Iraq lasts only one year. It includes a vacation every three months and a trip home twice a year (Boston Globe, June 26). How much real work can an FSO accomplish in one year? It's a rule of thumb in the Foreign Service that it takes several months at least to get accustomed to a new posting, no matter how much "training" is provided in Washington prior to the assignment.

Third, given the rush to staff the mission, it is doubtful that many FSOs at the new embassy, no matter how dedicated they are to flag and country, will be adequately prepared to deal with and observe Iraqi society (if and when they are able to escape from the supposedly secure "Green Zone," also known as "Emerald City" -- what else but a 21st century Roman camp? -- where the embassy is located.) How many FSOs will have had the time to learn the language to be fluent in it? With rapid turnovers at the embassy, how many will be able to establish relationships with Iraqis that can lead to meaningful discussions (and possible solutions) of bilateral and other problems?

Fourth, given the perilous security situation in Iraq, the embassy will have great difficulty carrying out a most important task of American missions overseas -- implementing public diplomacy programs such as media and academic outreach and cultural presentations. These activities require constant, open contact with host country audiences, but given the rampant hostility toward the U.S. in Iraq -- and an insurgency throughout the country -- such programs will prove to be a challenging, if not impossible task.

Fifth -- and this brings me back to dead time waiting for congressional delegations to arrive at the airport -- the Baghdad embassy will be constantly visited by VIPs and "agency heads" from Washington. FSOs will be on the receiving end, arranging the logistics for these visits. Cables, e-mails, and telephone conversations on what the Chief of Bureau X should do in Emerald City will devour long hours during the "work day" (and beyond). It will be Americans talking to Americans to prepare visits by Americans, with Iraqi employees probably assigned the task of organizing more "local" arrangements (if there are any, given security concerns).

Sixth, FSOs formally assigned to deal and negotiate with the Iraqi government on various matters will play a negligible or secondary role, even regarding minor bilateral issues. Given how sensitive Iraq is in American domestic politics during a presidential election year, the shots will be called by the White House and its staff. True, Ambassador Negroponte may have a say in implementing decisions after (maybe even before) they are made, but the bottom line is that strict guidance will come from Karl Rove's White House, with little leeway for FSOs to set the agenda or define the key questions.

Finally, and this is a very important point, an essential part of the American presence in Iraq -- the military, who are already entrenched in parts of the country -- will not be under the embassy's supervision. "The incoming chief U.S. commander, Gen. George W. Casey Jr., will report up through the chain of command in the Pentagon, not to the State Department" (Washington Post, June 19). In practical terms, what this means is that an appalling amount of dead time will be spent by FSOs trying to find out what their military colleagues are up to.

All of these obstacles to carrying out diplomacy in a country of crucial importance to the U.S. raise a fundamental question: Why should the new embassy in Iraq be so large in the first place? Are hundreds of Americans holed up in Emerald City really a way to assist the "new Iraq?" Couldn't a smaller, leaner, and better prepared mission -- with a well defined mission -- do a more efficient job? And wouldn't a more modestly sized embassy communicate an important message that the Bush administration is supposedly trying to bring home to the new Iraqi government and the local population: that the fate of their country is in their hands, not in those of occupying forces.

There used to be a joke in Cold War days: that the Soviets were proud to have the biggest microchip in the world. I hope the same joke, in a different version, won't be said about our embassy in Baghdad.