Category Archives: May You Live In Interesting Times

What Is An American?

 

What makes someone an American citizen? As a consular officer with the U.S. State Department serving overseas, I interviewed many parent couples seeking to claim American citizenship for their children.

In general, anyone born in the United States obtains American citizenship at birth. This is called jus-soli, “right of soil.” Many Americans are not aware that citizenship in some countries is determined by parentage, not by birth in that country.

American citizenship is granted through naturalization to legal permanent residents who have resided in the United States for a period of time and meet other requirements.

A child born abroad also gains U.S. citizenship if both of the child’s parents are U.S. citizens.

U.S. law is more complicated and has changed over time when only one parent is an American citizen and the child is not born in the U.S. If the parent has lived in the United States for a certain number of years, the child obtains citizenship from that parent. The number of required years has changed over the time.  (Ten years, then five.) I had difficulty explaining to some parents why one child in the family was not an American citizen and another one was. Between the two births, legislation had changed the law specifying the length of U.S. residency for the parent.

Some children I saw were not born in the U.S. and had no U.S. citizen parents but had spent most of their childhood here. Thus, they were not entitled to U.S. citizenship, though they had absorbed more American culture than many born abroad to two American citizen parents.

A child born in the U.S. to foreign parents but who grows up in the country of the parents’ nationality can become a difficult subset, one who is legally a U.S. citizen but may know little of the culture gained by living here.

What makes an American? The issues are complex. They deserve our unbiased consideration in this era of a world grown smaller by social networking and complex immigration movements.

The Twain Meet: East and West

 

“Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,

Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat . . .”

–Rudyard Kipling, “The Ballad of East and West”

 

Despite Kipling’s oft-quoted phrase, the east and west meet regularly these days. Our boosters in the Seattle area back the much-touted “pivot” to Asia. Many of the goods to and from Asia pass through our western Washington ports.

Walter Russell Mead, writing back in 2000, suggested a common core that begins to bind east and west perhaps more than trade—the Abrahamic faiths. Mead believed the communism of China to be a descendant of the Abrahamic faiths, a back door to a belief in beginnings and endings, as opposed to the more circular views of some Eastern cultures. When communism became dominant in China, a whole society was wrenched from traditional teachings.

Still unresolved is how to encourage the most humane way toward an end point.

Kipling’s poem, one in which two young men from different cultures scorn warfare for friendship, ends:

“Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,

Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat;

But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,

When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth!”

“We have our thumbs on their jugular”

Someone once wrote an “interpretation” of diplomatic language: Example: “We had frank discussions” means “we have our thumbs on their jugular.”

Why is diplomacy so full of bland speech? Even hypocrisy? Answer: A frank assessment may shut down fruitful negotiations over delicate issues. Open agreements openly arrived at is an ideal that if literally carried out may result in zero agreements. Talks away from public scrutiny  may be necessary. Sometimes public announcements in which news is limited to those bland statements allow meaningful give and take to reach a compromise.

In negotiations when both sides want ninety percent, each will have to settle for less if they want to conclude an agreement. Naming your opponent an irresponsible egomaniac is unlikely to wring concessions from him. Bland speech may keep the negotiations going until a meaningful compromise is reached.

De-Americanization?

 

In the wake of budget troubles in the United States and the near collapse of the nation’s promise to pay its debts, China has suggested the “de-Americanization of the world.”

De-Americanization goes beyond economics. China, Russia, and other nations are questioning, not only the primacy of the U.S. dollar, but the rules set up by Western-oriented nations, including the United States. China bristles at any questioning of its internal affairs.

Should any nation have a right to interfere in the sovereign affairs of another nation over alleged human rights violations such as torture? In 1948, the United States, one of forty eight nations, voted in favor of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Among other issues, the declaration prohibits signatories from practicing torture, slavery, or prohibition of religious preferences.

Most Americans take for granted that certain practices are good: freedom of religion, the presumption of innocence until proven guilty of a crime, the right to peaceful assembly, and so on. At times we have fallen far short of what we profess. Nevertheless, we adhere in principle to basic human rights and have allied ourselves with European and other nations who believe similarly.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Middle East took center stage. China rose meteorically in economic realms. The Rwandan massacres of 1994 brought frustration. Foreign policy was challenged by drugs coming from southwest Asia and South America. India and Pakistan, two old enemies, one influenced by Hinduism and the other by Islam, faced off with nuclear weapons. A bit player, North Korea, boasts of nuclear weapons.

These new players on the world stage appear with less history of adherence to our professed beliefs. How do we live peacefully with them in the new global community? Where did our assumptions originate? If we deem them “good,” how is the best way to encourage them in cultures far different from our own?

Shutdown, Day 9, View Not From Washington

 

State Department officials attempting to carry out U.S. policy overseas, despite the shutdown, must answer embarrassing questions from the foreign press. John Kerry, U.S. Secretary of State, answered one such question, as reported by ABC news.

“I am absolutely confident that when we get this moment of political silliness behind us, we will be back on track,” Kerry said in Indonesia, where he was attending meetings at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit. We have recently recognized the importance of Asian nations to our economy as well as to our security arrangements.

President Obama was scheduled to attend but canceled his trip to stay in Washington while Republicans and Democrats wrestle with funding the federal government and bringing roughly 800,000 furloughed employees back to work.

The news report indicates how the diversion of our energy to the shutdown, and possible debt default, affects our influence overseas. China, of course, scored brownie points off our humiliation. Chinese officials cautioned that a default might change their thinking about the creditworthiness of the US government.

Diplomacy The Old-Fashioned Way

 

Noting U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s peripatetic globe trotting, I remember a criticism someone leveled at U.S. diplomacy at the beginning of the digital age. Now that we have instant electronic communications, he said, we don’t need diplomats. Now the leaders can communicate electronically.

Thankfully, national leaders can and do utilize modern communications, but face to face meetings remain essential. These meetings do not magically appear. Venues, lists of invitees, translators, hotels, protocols (who will sit next to whom in an order established over centuries) must be organized, at times on short notice. Executive summaries, background papers, and talking points provide up-to-the-minute information for the principals, flying in for a day or two.

Diplomats who live in these countries and speak the language perform these functions. They hold conversations, not only with leaders, but with ordinary citizens of the country. They talk to the opposition who may one day lead and to the younger populace who will become the next movers and shakers. Person to person remains paramount. Electronic communication enhances. It can never replace.

Kerry is especially knowledgeable about the work of a diplomatic outpost. He is the son of a U.S. diplomat and spent at least a few years of his childhood living in U.S. overseas missions. Kerry likes to tell of the time when his father and family were posted to Berlin during the days of the Cold War. The twelve-year-old Kerry, using his diplomatic passport allowed him as part of a diplomatic family, biked through checkpoints one day over to East Berlin.

His father, Kerry says, was not pleased when he found out, confiscating his young son’s passport to prevent future such escapades. “You could have caused a diplomatic incident,” he lectured the future Secretary of State.

Iraqi Shadow Haunts Syria

 

I watched Colin Powell’s presentation before the UN Security Council in 2003 as he tried to persuade members to follow the U.S. lead into Iraq. Many members of the Security Council were unconvinced, as well they might be. The charge that Iraq harbored chemical or other weapons of mass destructions proved unfounded. We learned the truth only after the deaths of Americans, Iraqis, and those allies who, believing us, followed us into war.

Critics later charged that American officials molded U.S. intelligence to fit a desire to attack Iraq, though Iraq at the time posed no direct threat to us. The intelligence was flawed, deliberately “cherry picked” to suit our purposes. We are now paying for that choice.

As America lays out intelligence about the use of chemical weapons in Syria, where the evidence is much stronger, our past deception haunts us. No nation is unswervingly honest, but the United States before Iraq was trusted more than most. After the misuse of intelligence in the runup to Iraq, we lost our valuable credibility. Indeed, our right to lead in foreign policy anywhere in the world is now questioned.

Trust, once lost, is not easily regained.

 

Syria: Questions To Help Us Think

 

To attack Syria or not to attack Syria with missile strikes has divided everyone, it seems, Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives. Rather than give my own opinion (which is still evolving), I’m enclosing links to two thoughtful pieces. One is a general question-and-answer piece about Syria. The other is a colunn by Nicholas Kristof, a journalist for The New York Times whom I have always admired:

Question and Answer

Kristof article

 

Syria: No Good Options

 

We are weary of our Viet Nams, our Iraqs, our Afghanistans, and our Libyas. We have fought, shed blood, and expended treasure for what we are not sure.

We are cured of our hubris that followed the end of World War II and later the cold war. We know that sending in our military when wrongs are done does not necessarily end the wrongs. As we contemplate the brutal evidence of innocent men, women, and children dying horrible deaths in Syria after a probable gas attack, we know a military response may not stop the brutality.

We should know, if we contemplate action, not to expect a democracy friendly to us or even a democracy at all as a result. It could even encourage another Iranian style theological state, quite hostile to us.

The bloody regime of Bashar al-Assad has not attacked us nor supported al-Qaeda nor Iranian nuclear ambitions. If we should decide to act in Syria, we should do so with the motive of, possibly, shortening this inhumane war. Pure altruism and nothing more. Most likely we shall gain, if anything, only that. No scenes of welcome as liberators. It may be enough—if we take the chance and lives are saved. But it is not a definite nor easy decision to make. We can at least refrain from name-calling the decision makers. Prayer for them, and sympathy, are more in order.

What Do the Youth of Afghanistan Want?

 

An article in The New York Times examines the youth of Afghanistan. They have adopted bits of American culture, some of the clothes and music. However, they also appear wedded to the mores and customs of their parents.

One young Afghan woman protested against Western values. She expressed fear that her society would be “corrupted like that of the West.”

These ideas are discouraging to many Americans. Women have been brutalized in that traditional society. We surely want an end to the inferior status of women.

We may learn other lessons, however. The first is that American culture is not always as desired in the rest of the world as we sometimes think, or, indeed, as it used to be in the past. We treasure equality and the freedom to pursue one’s own path. Others in places like Afghanistan see us as condoning drugs, promiscuity, permissiveness, and dysfunctional government.

Although we wish to see changes in Afghanistan, we can be sympathetic also to the views they have of America. We are, perhaps, not the beacon we once were.

What Happens When U.S. Embassies Close?

 

Twenty-two U.S. embassies, as of this writing, are affected by new intelligence which indicates terrorists are planning attacks on American interests. The embassies will close August 4, a few days before the end of the Ramadan fasting period for Muslims, and perhaps other dates as well.

U.S. embassies close not only to protect their staffs but also to prevent injuries to the public. An embassy is a busy place. Those seeking visas, usually to visit or study in the U.S, may be so numerous that they must wait hours in long lines at some embassies. American citizens also visit to renew passports, receive notarial services, or to register new-born children.

To announce a closure does not mean everybody stays home. The majority of the staff in an embassy is usually non-American. Most embassy work is not classified. This includes maintenance of the embassy and housing for Americans assigned to work there. Foreign service nationals, or locally hired staff, as they are now called, also perform skilled work because of their language abilities, knowledge of the country, and continuing contact with local government. They often work their entire adult lives for the embassy and develop valuable contacts for their American employers. Many local staff are asked to stay at home when the routine work at the embassy is shut down.

During the times I served in embassies in the Middle East, I don’t remember a closure in which I stayed home. As one who served American citizens, I needed to be there for emergencies and often to notify our citizen warden networks if new information came in.

I hated when an embassy closed because it meant a double work load the day we opened again.

Christians and Culture: A Fourth Way

 

Is Christianity on the way out, not to be taken seriously, as some have alleged? Whatever your opinion, few deny that Christian faith does not easily coexist with Western culture at the present time.

James Davison Hunter, a professor at the University of Virginia, wrote To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World. Recently, he spoke to a symposium at Seattle Pacific University and suggested three ways Christians wrongly engage our present culture.

The first, the “purity from culture” way, pits Christians mostly in opposition, expressing themselves in anxiety, anger, or fear. Its adherents withdraw from the culture.

The second Hunter called the position of  “relevant to culture.”  This position, he says, risks the church and the world becoming indistinguishable.

The third is similar to the first. Hunter calls it “defensive against” the world. Instead of withdrawing, however, Christians become hostile to the world. They aim to win at all cost, often politically.

Hunter suggested a fourth way: “faithful presence in the world,” which emphasizes the practice of faith. In this mode, Christians become a presence in the world as they live out faith, hope, and love toward all, including their enemies. This presence is lived out in families, communities, classrooms, marketplaces, and workplaces.

In a talk with his disciples, Jesus said that neither he nor his disciples belonged to the world. However, he did not ask that his disciples be removed from the world. Hence the phrase “in the world but not of it,” another way of indicating “a faithful presence.”

Cyberwar: Gentlemen (and Women) Who Read Each Other’s Mail

 

“Gentlemen do not read each other’s mail.” So Henry Stimson, Secretary of State under U.S. President Herbert Hoover is reported to have said. He closed the code-breaking office in the Department of State in 1929. However, by World War II, code-breaking was an acknowledged part of defeating the enemy, even if it meant reading private mail. Unprecedented changes to the way information is passed today mean that the boundary between public and private information blurs even more.

The American and French Revolutions took years to unfold. The revolutions known as the Arab Spring took days, spurred by Twitter and other social media.

Spies in past wars, like the Napoleonic military campaigns or the more recent Cold War, stole secrets and slipped them to the other side. Information about troop movements or knowledge of the atomic bomb passed to a well-defined enemy. Today’s hackers extract information through cyberspace. Malware is planted on another nation’s computers.

We hesitate, bewildered by what should be allowed and what shouldn’t. For good reasons, we don’t want our privacy invaded or spied upon, yet, we wish we had known more about the Boston Marathon bombers before they left their deadly pressure cookers.

Both the enemy and the new war zone in cyberspace remain shadowy and ill-defined. How do we define them? What are the new rules?

Coups in Tennessee and Egypt

All the ingredients of a political thriller simmered: a corrupt state governor accepts money for political favors. A new governor of another party is elected, but the inauguration is days away. The current governor appears set on transacting as many illegal acts as he can for bribes before the end of his term. Those acts include the pardoning of convicted felons, even murderers.

Then: a coup, of sorts. Members of both parties, those of the corrupt governor and those of the governor-elect, appalled that public safety is threatened, agree that the acts must be halted. They swear in the new governor in a suddenly-called, early ceremony.

The story is true. It happened in 1979 in my native state of Tennessee. Keel Hunt recounts the story in his book, appropriately titled Coup. The governor was Ray Blanton. The governor-elect was Lamar Alexander.

During a day of decision, the leaders of both political parties secretly discussed, parried, and analyzed. Was it allowed by the state constitution to administer the oath to the governor-elect days before the set inauguration? Alexander believed strongly in operating within the law and wanted nothing that hinted of illegal seizure by his party. He refused to be sworn in early unless leaders of both parties agreed to it. Finally, all agreed, and Alexander was sworn in early. Whatever felons Blanton might have released remained in prison.

Coup is heavy on local history, an endless parade of local characters, but fascinating for those of us who grew up with their stories. The memories of a bygone era are bittersweet: courthouse political speeches and face-to-face campaigning before the days of social media, as well as the effective but sometimes questionable old boy network.

Contrast this extraordinary desire to stay within the law, even when public safety is in peril, with Egypt, where power recently was seized by the military. Egypt and Tennessee operate in vastly different spheres. More differences than similarities are involved. Yet, we can be proud of a group of politicians, including one who had just won an election, for their concern for lawful process.

We are a nation of laws and not of men, said John Adams, second president of the United States, who left office after losing election to a second term. No matter that we sometimes fall short. May the Egyptians soon know such a striving for a nation of laws and not of men.

Warriors and Cost

 

I’m reading What It Is Like To Go To War, by Karl Marlantes. It is an in-your-face, blunt, disturbing picture of the suffering we require of our warriors when the nation’s leaders decide to send them to war. Facing war through the eyes of a soldier who’s been there and doesn’t pull any punches teaches the rest of us things we need to know. As we wrestle with the debris of our past wars and the possibility of future wars, we need an accurate assessment of war’s costs.

For Marlantes is not a pacifist. He recognizes that a government must secure its people against enemies.  He asks that we understand the suffering of war, even a war we choose in order to protect our country.

To train young people to kill is against every moral precept that we otherwise attempt to instill in a civil society. It doesn’t matter if we believe the cause is valid. To order a person to kill, violates the moral code of civilized people.

To tell a warrior that killing to protect your country is different from other killing, so he need not feel guilty about it, forbids the soldier to weep when he needs to weep. Any time one takes life, one needs to sorrow and grieve. An enemy’s life is just as valuable to him and his loved ones as any other life.

Benghazi, Libya, June 1967: U.S. Mission Attacked and Burned

 

The following is from a recounting  by John Kormann, officer-in-charge at Embassy Benghazi during the 1967 attack.

“The most harrowing experience of my Foreign Service career occurred in Benghazi at the outbreak of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Convinced by propaganda broadcasts that U.S. Navy planes were attacking Cairo, Libyan mobs . . . attacked the Embassy. . . . A detachment of soldiers provided by the Libyan Government to protect us was overwhelmed. The embassy file room was full of highly classified material, which we desperately tried to burn. . . . The mob finally battered its way in. They pushed themselves in through broken windows and came at us cut and bleeding.

“We were well armed, but I gave orders that there be no shooting, so we met them with axe handles and rifle butts. Dropping [t]ear gas grenades, we fought our way up the stairs and locked ourselves in the second floor communications vault. We were able to continue burning files in 50-gallon drums on an inner courtyard balcony . . . The mobs set fire to the building. The heat, smoke and tear gas were intense, which while terrible for us, blessedly forced the mob from the building. We only had five gas masks for 10 people and shared them while we worked. . . .”

[The embassy staff was able to extinguish some of the fires after the attackers were forced out by the flames.]

“At one point the mob used a ladder to drop from an adjoining building on to our roof, catching us trying to burn files. . . They cut the ropes on the tall roof flag pole, leaving the flag itself hanging down the front of the building.”

[An Army Military Assistance captain braved rocks from below and managed to raise the flag.]

“The reaction among my people was profound. I could see it in their eyes, as they worked on with grim determination under those conditions to burn files . . .

“I took a photograph of President and Mrs. Johnson off the wall, broke it out of the frame and wrote a message on the back to the President saying . . . that we have tried our best to do our duty. Everyone signed it.”

This attack ended more happily than the attack of September, 2012 in Benghazi. After several unsuccessful attempts, British troops were finally able to reach the site and take the Americans to a British base on the outskirts of town.

Tempted by Euphoria

 

We’re familiar with election night euphoria that afflicts the winners. Prosperity, peace, and happiness are ours, all because our party was elected.

Inevitably, the rosy glow gives way to the hard task of governing. Blessed is the elected official who governs for the long haul, who is prepared to understand the temporary nature of popularity. In a democracy, one is wise who governs from the middle. Such a leader realizes that the out group cannot be ignored. Their views must be respected, even by a victorious candidate.

Mohamed Morsi, who a year ago was feted as the first democratically elected president of Egypt, ever, now has been removed by the army. It’s hard to rejoice when the military of any country seizes power. Yet, in a fragile democracy, Morsi, from all accounts, chose to act as though all Egypt was at his feet. He governed in an autocratic style, decreeing that his decisions in “sovereign matters” weren’t subject to judicial review. In November, he took total executive power for himself and pushed through an Islamist constitution.

Let us pray that this takeover is of short duration.  Egypt needs another George Washington, who turned down a chance to become a king. Egypt has known enough pharaohs in its millennia of history.

Nationhood In The Facebook Age

 

A couple of years before he died, the diplomat Richard Holbrooke wrote: “The United States is still great. It deserves leadership worthy of its people, leadership that will restore the nation’s pride and sense of purpose. That task must begin at home, but the world will be waiting and watching.” (Foreign Affairs, September/October, 2008.)

Holbrooke began his diplomatic career with a tour in Vietnam. Later, after he left the U.S. Foreign Service, various presidents called on him to perform hard tasks. The most famous were the 1995 Dayton peace talks that ended the Balkan wars.

He understood what it meant when the United States no longer won decisive victories. He was serving, even as he died, as the government’s point man on Afghanistan. He knew the limits of our power in a world where other countries were becoming strong and prosperous, too.

The complexity of today’s world means a few individuals can cause havoc. Terrorist attacks or the ending of a dictator’s power by crowds inspired through social networking—the rules have changed since the battles of the twentieth century.

The mighty British empire over two centuries ago was unable to force a ragtag bag of American colonials to do what it wanted. It wisely left the fray and allowed its former colony to go its own way.

We still have power, but we need wisdom in the use of that power. We first need to strengthen our institutions at home, to see that ordinary people can build decent lives. We win more permanent battles by the moral influence we possess than by our weapons.

New Ambassador To Libya

 

Deborah Jones is the new United States ambassador to Libya. She steps into the spot vacant since the former ambassador, J. Christopher Stevens, was killed in that country by terrorists.

Ms. Jones, sworn in by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, closed her swearing in ceremony with these words:

“Our tragedies reveal our strengths. If I were to ask those in this audience who have lost a Foreign Service friend or colleague, officer, TDY, Civil Service employee, or FSN-LES staff to an act of violence to raise your hands, I suspect many hands would go up. And I am also certain the same people would raise those same hands to volunteer for duty again, just as Chris, Sean, Anne, my mentor, Arnie Raphel, and so many others have done.

“So I hope you will join me in a virtual toast to these individuals. To Chris, to Sean, Ty, Glen, Anne, Arnie and to all those dear friends, colleagues, mentors, and family members who serve, because that’s who we are and that’s what we do. ”

 

Classified Leaks and Trust

 

In the past, social critics wrote tracts calling for change or published underground newspapers. The more violent assassinated national leaders. Today they leak classified information to the Internet.

Debate rages as to heroes and villains, constitutional rights and the necessity to know all we can about shadowy enemies. Certainly, secrecy is harder to come by.

The line is always fine between the openness needed for democratic governance and the secrecy required for certain operations. Legitimate reasons for secrecy range from stopping terrorist actions to negotiations that are best begun in secret when officials can be open and frank. They can speak uninhibited by the hype and hyperbole of the twenty-four hour news cycle—when every syllable must be carefully nuanced.

When I worked overseas for the U.S. State Department, I wrote classified reports, but they didn’t deal with state secrets or clandestine sources. Most reported on the welfare of Americans in foreign prisons or the children of American parents, children now living with foreign ex-spouses.

These narratives concerned the anguish of individual Americans caught in painful situations. They detailed private moments, not the plots you see in spy films. The subjects deserved their privacy. As all our secrets are indiscriminately vomited into cyberspace, perhaps private moments will no longer be possible.

What happens when individualism destroys all trust in our institutions? All ability to work privately? When we no longer allow institutions to function because we no longer understand their legitimate purposes? David Brooks poses and answers such questions in a recent column. A must read.