The U.S. Embassy in Iraq is the State Department‘s largest and most expensive overseas facility. Size, however, is not proportional to effectiveness. The embassy campus is sprawling and fortified, but it is more a prison than an effective representation. For an American diplomat to leave the embassy can require providing the regional security officer 48 hours advance notice, with the response more often than not negative.
Case in point: During a previous visit to Iraq, I had four hours of discussions with the president and prime minister, as well as a number of figures with whom the U.S. diplomats do not have regular contact. A U.S. official at the embassy wanted to hear about the meetings, but the security office rejected his request not because he would need to travel to an unsafe area (I was at a hotel less than a half mile from the embassy in a very safe area of Baghdad) but because he had only given 47 hours notice. Bureaucracy trumped mission.
The vast majority of officers serving in Baghdad may transit between the airport and the embassy, a 15-minute ride by armored car and even less by helicopter, but they never leave the suffocating security perimeter State Department regulations require. While those serving in Baghdad receive a 35% hardship bonus and another 35% danger bonus, most never brave Baghdad’s modern shopping malls, cafes, or swank restaurants, let alone explore the city’s distinct neighborhoods.
In effect, they could do the same jobs as effectively and at far less expense while never leaving Washington, D.C. Many other countries maintain embassies outside the green zone without incident.
Pointing this out often brings umbrage from American diplomats, but the State Department now quietly acknowledges that its isolation in Iraq has rendered it ineffective. Consider this advertisement that the State Department recently posted. It seeks a new specialist to promote:
“an understanding of and support for U.S. policy. Serves as chief advisor to the Mission on policy advocacy through media engagement. Identifies long-term trends and emerging policy-relevant issues and advises Mission leadership on strategies for promoting accurate, balanced Iraqi press and media coverage of U.S. foreign policy and American interests, correcting misinformation and countering disinformation.”
Should such a description not apply to every U.S. diplomat, though? Perhaps the State Department believes its diplomats do not have the Arabic language ability to function. If so, should failure excuse failure? Should the goal not then be actually to produce fluent Foreign Service officers or recruit those with actual language abilities?
Shouldn’t American diplomats also be able to advocate American policy effectively without having Iraqis do it for them?
While the State Department describes this position as a press liaison, why shouldn’t every diplomat be a press liaison? Diplomats at many American embassies regularly befriend and socialize with local journalists. Every American diplomat should be able to identify “long-term trends and emerging policy-relevant issues.”
The State Department might only shell out $86,000 per year for the position, but the true expense is far higher if one local press liaison effectively does the job of six or seven cloistered diplomats.
The simple fact is this: The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad is not a symbol of American grandeur or effectiveness but instead testimony to Foggy Bottom’s culture of waste and ineffectiveness. Secretary of State Antony Blinken may justify such positions because of security parameters, but other embassies have workarounds.
Many European missions, for example, distinguish between safe neighborhoods and those under the control of anti-American militias, such as those controlled by Muqtada al Sadr. Some trips require elaborate security planning, whereas others just mandate a bodyguard with a concealed weapon. That the State Department imposes similar security measures in Iraqi Kurdistan simply underlines how self-defeating American diplomacy has become.
Hiding in fortified castles does more harm to American diplomacy than having no embassy whatsoever. Self-deterrence also encourages enemies and allows them to depict themselves as the strong horse around which locals should rally.
