Sweet Seals For You, Always
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@diplopundit
If the terror group's objective was to sow fear and disrupt U.S. operations, then its threat is already a success. It may be the price the country has to pay for increased security.
Sara Sorcher National Journal: Al-Qaida's Won This Round So Far (August 6, 2013)
The terrorists' stock in trade is creation of fear … as much the threat of violence as the act of violence itself. It's all about getting people to respond or react in a manner that the terrorists think will be beneficial to their cause.
Bruce Hoffman Director, Georgetown University's Center for Security Studies National Journal: Al-Qaida's Won This Round--So Far
Another possible reason for the paucity of gay ambassadors has to do with a different State Department tradition: treating a spouse as an unpaid employee. Nearly every career officer who obtains the title first serves as deputy chief of mission in an embassy after being handpicked by the ambassador. At an interview for one such job, I was rejected because I was divorced and had not yet remarried. The ambassador told me flat-out that he was not going to ask his wife to organize all the official entertaining (even though the post was a tropical backwater).
Dennis Jett U.S. ambassador to Mozambique and Peru during the 1990s July 26, 2013 WaPo: Why have there been so few openly gay ambassadors?
[W]hat we do matters. What we say matters. And when our words and actions don’t match, the credibility of the United States is at stake. I certainly think, in the context of Egypt, our promotion of democracy in the region has been severely damaged by our hesitation to call a coup a coup.
P.J. Crowley Former State Department Spokesman in Democracy Now: The U.S. Should Describe Morsi Ouster as a Coup
I don't know what [FEST] is... it sounds antiquated.
Tommy Vietor, National Security Council (NSC) Spokesman to CBS News in October 2012 on a phone call that included then-Deputy National Security Adviser Denis McDonough (now White House Chief of Staff).
Via CBS News, May 17, 2013
They were told they were not deploying by Patrick Kennedy's front office... In hindsight... I probably would've pushed the button.
An official involved in the Benghazi response on deploying FEST members (Foreign Emergency Support Team), USG's only interagency, on-call, short-notice team poised to respond to terrorist incidents worldwide.
Via CBS News, May 17, 2013
She'd rather chew tin foil.
Said by someone who's close to Mrs. Clinton when the White House had asked the office of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton if she would appear on the upcoming Sunday morning political talk shows on Sept. 13.
Via CBS News, May 17, 2013
We're portrayed by Republicans as either being lying or idiots ...It's actually closer to us being idiots."
Quote attributed to one Obama administration official who was part of the Benghazi response.
Via CBS News, May 17, 2013
"It was not a sacrifice. It was a choice that I made. I decided to follow a path that I thought was right. And so really, I deserve no praise for it, nor do I really deserve compassion for any of the problems I might have met along the way because it was my choice."
-- Aung San Suu Kyi Myanmar's opposition leader on why she does not deserve praise for her struggles.
“You can protect people where they work by building more fortified embassies. [...] But how do you protect them all the time, in all places?”
-- Anthony C. E. Quainton, a former assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security in Diplomats Pulled 2 Ways, Between High Walls and Open Doors
“When you have someone storming the compound, it takes more than just the facility. [...] It is meant to slow down the attack to give time for the host government to come in with a more adequate response.”
--Charles Michael Johnson Jr., the G.A.O.’s director of international counterterrorism and security assistance issues. Diplomats Pulled 2 Ways, Between High Walls and Open Doors
“When I looked at security measures, if I was satisfied, I was always relatively satisfied. [...] I used to tell my security guys, ‘O.K., we built a 16-foot wall, but there is such a thing as a 17-foot ladder.’ That is what we saw happen in Cairo.”
--Edward P. Djerejian, a former ambassador to Syria and Israel in Diplomats Pulled 2 Ways, Between High Walls and Open Doors
State is operating in locations that in reality are essentially war zones or conflict zones, which in the past they would have evacuated.[...] They are operating in much more dangerous environments.
-- Michael Courts, the acting director of international affairs and trade at the Government Accountability Office in NYT's Diplomats Pulled 2 Ways, Between High Walls and Open Doors
What a bore it is, waking up in the morning always the same person. I wish I were unflinching and emphatic and had big eyebrows and a message for the Age.
Chris Stevens, Piedmont High School Yearbook, 1978 (originally adopted from The Living Age, Volume 294)
I may be leaving my post as America’s Ambassador to Afghanistan, but when I return to my country I will be taking up a new, although unofficial position -- one of Afghanistan’s Ambassadors to America.
Ryan C. Crocker
Outgoing US Ambassador at the US Mission Afghanistan. Excerpted from remarks before leaving Kabul. Oh-uh!
In my opinion, any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should ‘have his head examined,’ as General MacArthur so delicately put it.
Robert M. Gates
As SecDef, telling West Point cadets that it would be unwise for the United States to ever fight another war like Iraq or Afghanistan, and that the chances of carrying out a change of government in that fashion again were slim.
It will be one of the greatest strategic victories of the United States because…. of the aftershocks that you see flowing through the region, whether it be in Libya, or in Egypt, or now in Syria.
Stephen Cambone Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence from 2003 until 2007 at the Aspen Security Forum, hailing the Iraq war as an alloyed triumph that paved the way for the rebellions now sweeping the Middle East.
Yes! Holy mother of goat and all her crazy nephews!
