re: "Hitting nails on the head"

nmleon had responded to my earlier comment of Thursday, February 9th at 9:42AM EDT, responding to Jeff Emanuel's post at Redstate.

nmleon said:

"Having spent 3 of the last 5 yrs in Iraq (DoD contractor), I can say that Consul has it exactly right as far as he’s commented.

Nobody ate MREs on an extended basis, and the massively complicated logistics supply chain was until last Dec managed by DoD under the aegis of our SOFA (Status Of Forces Agreement). With the failure of the administration to negotiate a new or continuing SOFA, we had no option but to withdraw our military forces from Iraq.

Without a SOFA, the remaining USG organizations (and the contractors managing their logistics supply chain) HAD to be folded into DoS (with diplomatic status) or be essentially left as tourists, fully subject to Iraqi law even in the performance of their duties.

As to whether or not USAID etc should have missions there at all, I’m less than certain. While we had a continued (small) military presence I think it was a no-brainer. Iraq is a country with a lot of potential if sectarian strife can be ameliorated. Without our continued military presence I have doubts that will happen."

2/9

re: "Sticking It Out"

CAA (that's me!) continued his response to Jeff Emanuel's post at RedState:, responding to Marcus_Traianus' comment of Thursday, February 9th at 1:29 PM EST(link).

Marcus said:

"I was only thinking they would eat MRE’s until they could get to Liberty for some Taco Bell or BK. Either that or to hold them over until the crudites dip was replenished in a week.

Realistically DoS is always a crap shoot. But I think he was hoping for Europe, Scandinavia or even Namibia (Ja, sie sprechen Deutsch). It’s like another guy I know who speaks fluent Spanish and ended up in Rome (where he became a chain smoker waiting for the constant PLO threatened attacks on the embassy).

Look, I don’t like whiners not matter where they live. There is always someone who has it a lot worse. Plus this Walmart-Embassy in Iraq was really not well thought out. That above all else is obvious."

My response:

"I hope your friend stuck it out and got a German-speaking post eventually. While not as widely useful as, say, French or Spanish, it’s certainly not a “boutique language” where you go to a lot of effort learning it and there’s only one place that speaks it (Slovenian, Estonian, that sort of language). With German, you’ve got utility in not only the (several, but not as many as there used to be) posts in Germany, but in Austria and Switzerland as well.

Italian isn’t bad for a Spanish speaker to learn, and Rome a lot nicer than some of the places Spanish speakers get assigned.

As a working level diplomat, I’m not really privy to the big policy-level decisions like “what’s our post-invasion plan for Iraq” or “how big should our embassy be in Iraq.” But those decisions were generally made outside of State or at its very highest levels; i.e., by political appointees."

2/9

re: "FS careers"

CAA (that's me!) continued his response to Jeff Emanuel's post at RedState:, responding to Marcus_Traianus's comment of Thursday, February 9th at 8:52 AM EST(link).

Marcus_Traianus said:

"No salad bar? That’s medieval . Wait…what does that make living on some remote FOB and only eating MRE’s? Question for another day.

Personally I skipped out on a career in DoS after a friend of mine spent half his life becoming fluent in German only to get posted in Peru and spending years dodging the Sendero Luminoso. I think he said at the time if he wanted a career where he constantly git sent to remote countries where people were trying to kill him, he would have joined the military.

Note to DoS; an embassy is no substitute for a military base. No matter how appealing it sounds on paper."

My response:

"Congratulations! You are one of the few people who’s ever actually met or known a U.S. diplomat. (There aren’t that many of us,)

Having spent as much time at remote bases eating MREs in Iraq (in uniform) as I’d care to, I would note that they’re not intended for long-term diet. Eating them daily for the duration of a 12-month diplomatic assignment, while it might provide entertainment value for snarky folks far from the warzone, leads to malnutrition.

German is a tough language, I’ll admit. I had a very tough time learning it. On the other hand, I didn’t spend half my life doing it in the expectation that the State Dept. was only going to station me in Germany.

There’s this thing called “Worldwide Availability” in terms of FS assigments. So those folks who learned French aren’t guaranteed careers shuttling between Paris and Brussels. They can expect West Africa and places where they may need to learn another language entirely, like the Philippines."

2/9

re: "U.S. military goes hungry in Afghanistan"

This Digital Journal article came up yesterday in a Facebook comment thread, and I'd like to share some of my contributions to the discussion.

1. "I saw this article the other day. Essentially the current surge of troops to Afghanistan is stretching (and sometimes outstripping) the capabilities of our logistics and supply system. This happens in war sometimes. It sounds very much like conditions in Iraq during the first rotation (OIF 1, 2003-4).

I was there. Sometimes there wasn't enough food or water, and there wasn't any "housing" to speak of.

It doesn't mean that the president or the theatre commander are bad, wrong or evil. It means it's a war zone and sometimes things suck. Sometimes they suck a lot, but the troops aren't in garrison anymore and can rough it as needed.

War sucks. Write that down somewhere....

This makes the recent decision to shut down a lot of MWR and fast-food venues seem a lot more sensible."

2. "In case that's not clear, what I mean is that supplying all those MWR and fast-food venues eats up shipping space, storage capacity, and increases the number of "support" personnel burdening each base and the "system" as a whole. You have to look past the initial reaction of "if the chow hall doesn't have enough food, at least the troops could go to Burger King" since it all comes through the same trucks, air freight, and shipping lines of supply. Not quite a zero-sum game but close enough."

3. "We all want the best for our troops. I lost 30 lbs. during my year in Iraq (but I was coming out from behind a civilian desk job to deploy as a reservist), which wasn't all bad. My company had nowhere near enough tentage for both operations and billeting when we were deployed to a tactical assembly area so we spent weeks with our cots sitting in moon dust underneath non-issued tarps and ponchos we strung from the side of our humvee trailers. Food was MREs except when we ran mail and supply runs back to the logistical support areas where there were mess halls."

&

4. "By way of example."