Former President Joe Biden’s foreign policy team entered office promising the adults were back in charge. What transpired was cringe-worthy incompetence symbolized by the deadly chaos at Kabul International Airport. Biden’s administration was relatively short, but it coincided with Iranian enrichment to near bomb-grade levels, normalization of Hamas as a legitimate entity with which to negotiate, and gratuitous bashing of decades-long partners such as Saudi Arabia and, to a lesser extent, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.
Amos Hochstein, a special envoy who could never receive Senate confirmation, actively sought to appease and empower Hezbollah. Israelis believe that Hochstein shared intelligence with Hezbollah to protect the group against Israeli military strikes. Hochstein, whose background as an energy lobbyist created numerous conflicts of interest, also sought to undermine Israel-Cyprus-Greece cooperation in favor of Turkey.
Former President Joe Biden’s foreign policy team entered office promising the adults were back in charge. What transpired was cringe-worthy incompetence.
Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken was particularly weak, and his pronouncements were often so naive to rival Frank Kellogg, perhaps the worst secretary of state the United States has ever had. Decades as a staffer to Biden made Blinken a follower rather than a leader. He allowed himself to be gratuitously humiliated by foreign officials such as Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who kept him waiting, downgraded his receptions, and removed American flags. Far from bringing peace, Blinken’s moral equivalence greenlighted genocide.
President Donald Trump is not afraid to break diplomatic china, nor is Secretary of State Marco Rubio beholden to bureaucratic groupthink. He is willing to recognize that too many diplomats put the feelings of host countries ahead of broader U.S. national interests.
Perhaps the top mistakes Rubio must address are embassies that allow host governments to define with whom Americans can speak. Erdogan consolidated control in Turkey as a series of U.S. ambassadors sought to ingratiate themselves to him at the expense of the opposition. In one shameful episode, former U.S. Ambassador Ross Wilson dismissed the entire opposition as just a “cacophony” of irrelevant voices.
More recently, in Albania, former U.S. Ambassadors Donald Lu and Yuri Kim’s desire to cement their relations with Prime Minister Edi Rama translated into their decision to blacklist many within the opposition, even some of America’s closest partners such as former Prime Minister Sali Berisha and former Defense Minister Fatmir Mediu. To prevent Congress from second-guessing their personal policies and whims, the U.S. Embassy revoked visas and refused new ones to anyone who might speak directly to Congress. Today, the fruits of their efforts to ingratiate themselves to Rama are clear: Rama has followed Erdogan’s path and not only transformed Albania into a kleptocracy but also put it at risk of becoming a narco-state.
Perhaps the top mistakes Rubio must address are embassies that allow host governments to define with whom Americans can speak.
The same is true in Africa. The insurgency in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo is a direct result of former U.S. Ambassador Michael Hammer’s decision to ingratiate himself to President Felix Tshisekedi by ignoring opposition and lifting military purchase reporting requirements. Today, the democracy the U.S. praised is gone, and Tshisekedi seeks to become president for life. By confusing money spent on military hardware with a capable army, he stoked conflict that now burns out of control, and he sold Congo’s resources and rare earths to China. Rubio should recognize that Tshisekedi is a liability and establish direct ties with M23, the rebel group that might form the backbone of a federal region in the eastern DRC or even contribute to a more competent government in Kinshasa.
In Somalia, too, diplomats’ tunnel vision has undercut U.S. interests. Former ambassadors such as Donald Yamamoto and Larry Andre Jr. poured billions into pro-China, pro-terrorist Mogadishu, one of the most corrupt regimes on Earth, and tried to starve democratic Somaliland into submission. Andre even retired early and registered to lobby for a Somali telecom company that emerged out of a company the U.S. pressured to dissolve due to its culpability in terrorism finance. Perhaps rather than defer to Mogadishu or a U.S. Embassy with a history of representing Somali interests first, Rubio should open a consulate in Somaliland’s capital, Hargeisa.
Making America great again need not mean turning the U.S.’s back on the world. It just means a secretary willing to ensure diplomats support U.S. allies and prioritize U.S. interests over ambassadors’ desire to have smooth tenures and good relations with their hosts.
