This earlier post discussed the application of
security standards to existing buildings in terms of some of the limitations
that reality imposed. That is, that
along with prohibitive expense, the practicality of such endeavors rests firmly
somewhere in the range between Extremely Difficult and Bliddy Impossible.
Diplomacy, like politics, is an art of the
possible. Diplomatic security must
matrix both the imperative to provide security, to protect, with the need to
carry out the diplomatic mission itself. Sometimes that means that the security
situation is so dire that the diplomatic mission must be abandoned; other times
the diplomatic mission will be considered so imperative that security measures
take a backseat. Or are adapted to fit
the situation. Thus we have active and
ongoing diplomatic missions, and have for years, in countries where we would
otherwise have shuttered our embassies and evacuated our staff. E.g., Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Libya might be considered a reasonable addition to
that list.
States are responsible, under the Vienna
Conventions and customary international law, for providing the protection
necessary to secure those diplomatic and consular facilities which it has
accepted within its territory. Not being
an area expert on Libya specifically or the Mahgreb generally (but not being
completely ignorant of those regions either), the question of just how much
control the new, post-Qhadafi, central government of Libya has beyond the city
limits of Tripoli seems fairly relevent with respect to how much the U.S.
should have relied upon them to provide adequate security to our facilities in
Benghazi.
Just what the purpose of the U.S. mission in
Benghazi was is still very much an open question, the opening of an “American
Corner” notwithstanding. But its
purpose(s) were (was?) of sufficient importance to the accomplishing of the
larger goals of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Libya that:
- It was established in the first place (to the
accompaniment of whatever security waivers and exceptions may have been
necessary to do so); and
- It remained upon until it was destroyed; and
- Amb. Stevens believed it necessary to travel
there on as inauspicious a date as the 11th anniversary of 9/11.
Now, CAA is going to pull back the gauzy veil
that obscures some of the nuts-and-bolts of actual diplomacy with some
observations and caveats.
Caveat #1:
CAA doesn’t know what the purpose of the Benghazi mission (beyond what
little can be found at the embassy website) was because it is not now nor has
it ever been part of my professional portfolio.
If there’s some especially classified aspect to that mission, as a
professional matter CAA has had no need-to-know. So I don’t know.
Caveat #2:
As someone who’s held a top secret clearance since before he could
legally drink hard liquer, CAA realized decades ago that the possession of
certain secrets meant that forever after, with respect to some fields of
endeavor, even my guesses could be considered to be classified
information. So there are quite a fews
things about which, due to the meandering nature of what I laughingly describe
as my “career path,” CAA does not speculate aloud. And CAA certainly does not do so in public fora
such as the internet.
Observation #1:
Technically, there are a few clearcut categories of U.S. diplomatic
facilities located overseas: embassies,
consulates general, and consulates.
(But real life is never that neat and clearly
delineated.)
Observation #2:
Since the breakup of Yugoslavia (if not before) and U.S. intervention in
the Balkans, the State Department came up with things called “U.S. Liaison
Offices” (or “USLO”). These were
kinda/sorta consulates, in that they often performed the sorts of services
usually associated with U.S. consulates, but were generally not intended as
permanent facilities. USLOs sometimes
get upgraded into more-or-less permanent posts and become consulates or
consulates general; other times they are eventually closed. The U.S. has continued using this model in
places like Iraq.
Observation #3:
Once upon a time, CAA used to go TDY from the U.S. and participate in
surveys of various U.S. diplomatic facilities.
Never mind what kind of surveys:
the point is that my teams would visit every U.S. diplomatic office in a
particular country. Off the top of my
head I did that in eight or nine countries around Africa and the Middle
East. In some of the countries where we
had a largish diplomatic presence, we might have “official” Americans scattered
in penny-parcels across a vast landscape, all of them falling under the
authority of the chief of mission (i.e., the U.S. ambassador) and all of the
going about the legitimate business of foreign affairs, international
development, or military assistance (to list just three examples).
So I don’t find it especially mysterious or
troubling that the U.S. had an official office-building in Benghazi that wasn’t
formally flagged as a consulate (or consulate general) under a U.S. consul (or
consul general).
