Tag Archives: Kurds

What Does “Drain the Swamp” Mean?

The current administration promised to “drain the swamp” when it was elected. What has that meant?

Swamp draining has meant more political ambassadors, appointed because they donated money to a candidate. The number of career ambassadors serving at U.S. embassies is at the lowest level since records have been kept.

Draining the swamps has meant desertion of allies like the Kurds. It has meant holding back funds, for political purposes, voted on by Congress to help Ukrainian allies fight Russian incursion into their country. It has meant losing the respect of our allies.

“Please stay.” That’s the plea from the president of the American Foreign Service Association, as seasoned diplomats quit in frustration.

Fewer young people sign up to take the Foreign Service exam, no longer inspired to enter government service.

Not only in the State Department but in other agencies as well, turnover at the top has been unprecedented. Apparently, swamp draining means little cohesion even among those chosen by the administration. Cabinet secretaries and other appointed officials have quit, some fired by tweet, others leaving in disgust.

Here’s a look at the amount of turnover at the top tiers of our government.

Make your own decision about what draining the swamps means.

Graveyard of Empires

What’s the best bad way to cope with the Middle East? The next U.S. president had better be prepared.

The Middle East is called “the graveyard of empires.” The small region where Africa, Asia, and Europe connect has bedeviled conquerors for millennia.

An instructor in one of my classes when I worked for the U.S. State Department told us about a cliff or large rock in the country of Lebanon. The rock is inscribed with graffiti of various conquering groups passing that way over centuries, each presence erased by the next. The list might include Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, French, and British.

One of the last of the conquerors, Britain, wanted a friendly Middle East because of the Suez Canal and the desire for safe passage to India, one of their dominions. Untold numbers of British soldiers died in various wars in the region until Britain retreated from most of its possessions.

For one thing, different ethnic and religious communities live side by side throughout the region. Choosing allies from one group makes enemies of other groups.

Example: many of the Kurds, U.S. allies in the fight against the Islamic State, are enemies of the Turks, our NATO ally.

Another example: Iraq used to be governed by a dictator, Saddam Hussein, a Sunni Muslim, even though the majority of Iraqis are Shia Muslim. Now, after our war against Saddam, the Shia are the dominant force in the Iraqi government and have problems with the Sunni, who lost power. Some of the Sunni supported the Islamic State, which the Iraqi government is fighting.

The United States became interested in the Middle East when oil became important to our economy and massive supplies were found there. Now we are learning why this area is called a graveyard.