CarrboroWeb- Carrboro and Chapel Hill, North Carolina- Resignations

LETTERS OF RESIGNATION FROM STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICERS BROWN AND KIESLING RESULTING FROM BUSH'S FOREIGN POLICY IN IRAQ

The New York Times
February 27, 2003

The following is the text of John Brady Kiesling's letter of resignation to
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. Mr. Kiesling is a career diplomat who
has served in United States embassies from Tel Aviv to Casablanca to
Yerevan.

Dear Mr. Secretary:

I am writing you to submit my resignation from the Foreign Service of the
United States and from my position as Political Counselor in U.S. Embassy
Athens, effective March 7. I do so with a heavy heart. The baggage of my
upbringing included a felt obligation to give something back to my country.
Service as a U.S. diplomat was a dream job. I was paid to understand
foreign languages and cultures, to seek out diplomats, politicians, scholars and
journalists, and to persuade them that U.S. interest! s and theirs
fundamentally coincided. My faith in my country and its values was the most
powerful weapon in my diplomatic arsenal.

It is inevitable that during twenty years with the State Department I would
become more sophisticated and cynical about the narrow and selfish
bureaucratic motives that sometimes shaped our policies. Human nature is
what it is, and I was rewarded and promoted for understanding human nature.
But until this Administration it had been possible to believe that by
upholding the policies of my president I was also upholding the interests
of the American people and the world. I believe it no longer.

The policies we are now asked to advance are incompatible not only with
American values but also with American interests. Our fervent pursuit of
war with Iraq is driving us to squander the international legitimacy that has
been America's most potent weapon of both offense and defense since the
days of Woodrow Wilson. We have begun to dismantle the largest and most
effective web of international relationships the world has ever known. Our current
course will bring instability and danger, not security.

The sacrifice of global interests to domestic politics and to bureaucratic
self-interest is nothing new, and it is certainly not a uniquely American
problem. Still, we have not seen such systematic distortion of
intelligence, such systematic manipulation of American opinion, since the war in Vietnam.
The September 11 tragedy left us stronger than before, rallying around us a
vast international coalition to cooperate for the first time in a systematic
way against the threat of terrorism. But rather than take credit for those
successes and build on them, this Administration has chosen to make
terrorism a domestic political tool, enlisting a scattered and largely
defeated Al Qaeda as its bureaucratic ally. We spread disproportionate
terror and confusion in the public mind, arbitrarily linking the unrelated
problems of terrorism and Iraq. The result, and perhaps the motive, is to
justify a vast misallocation of shrinking public wealth to the military and
to weaken the safeguards that protect American citizens from the heavy hand
of government. September 11 did not do as much damage to the fabric of
American society as we seem determined to so to ourselves. Is the Russia of
the late Romanovs really our model, a selfish, superstitious empire
thrashing toward self-destruction in the name of a doomed status quo?

We should ask ourselves why we have failed to persuade more of the world
that a war with Iraq is necessary. We have over the past two years done too
much to assert to our world partners that narrow and mercenary U.S.
interests override the cherished values of our partners. Even where our
aims were not in question, our consistency is at issue. The model of Afghanistan
is little comfort to allies wondering on what basis we plan to rebuild the
Middle East, and in whose image and interests. Have we indeed become blind,
as Russia is blind in Chechnya, as Israel is blind in the Occupied
Territories, to our own advice, that overwhelming military power is not the
answer to terrorism? After the shambles of post-war Iraq joins the shambles
in Grozny and Ramallah, it will be a brave foreigner who forms ranks with
Micronesia to follow where we lead.

We have a coalition still, a good one. The loyalty of many of our friends
is impressive, a tribute to American moral capital built up over a century.
But our closest allies are persuaded less that war is justified than that it
would be perilous to allow the U.S. to drift into complete solipsism.
Loyalty should be reciprocal. Why does our President condone the swaggering
and contemptuous approach to our friends and allies this Administration is
fostering, including among its most senior officials. Has "oderint dum
metuant" really become our motto?

I urge you to listen to America's friends around the world. Even here in
Greece, purported hotbed of European anti-Americanism, we have more and
closer friends than the American newspaper reader can possibly imagine.
Even when they complain about American arrogance, Greeks know that the world is
a difficult and dangerous place, and they want a strong international system,
with the U.S. and EU in close partnership. When our friends are afraid of
us rather than for us, it is time to worry. And now they are afraid. Who will
tell them convincingly that the United States is as it was, a beacon of
liberty, security, and justice for the planet?

Mr. Secretary, I have enormous respect for your character and ability. You
have preserved more international credibility for us than our policy
deserves, and salvaged something positive from the excesses of an
ideological and self-serving Administration. But your loyalty to the
President goes too far. We are straining beyond its limits an international
system we built with such toil and treasure, a web of laws, treaties,
organizations, and shared values that sets limits on our foes far more
effectively than it ever constrained America's ability to defend its interests.

I am resigning because I have tried and failed to reconcile my conscience
with my ability to represent the current U.S. Administration. I have
confidence that our democratic process is ultimately self-correcting, and
hope that in a small way I can contribute from outside to shaping policies
that better serve the security and prosperity of the American people and
the world we share.

Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

Reasons for a Resignation

John Brown*

Last Friday afternoon, as I watched the horrid images of the first "shock and awe" U.S. bombing blitz against Baghdad, which doubtless brought terror to millions of innocent civilians, my feelings of outrage at the Bush administration were joined by a sense of relief that was perhaps inappropriate at such a shameful moment in our history. I was relieved that, eleven days before, I had submitted my resignation from the U.S. Foreign Service.

Numerous circumstances led to my resignation, but there were two main reasons. First, I believed that President Bush had failed to present a convincing case to Americans and the world that massive force should be used against Iraq at this time. Second, I felt an obligation as an American to speak out against this presidential failure to justify a questionable policy.

My doubts about the president's policy began in earnest in the fall of last year. A New York Times! article (September 7), "Bush Aides Set Strategy to Sell Policy on Iraq" drew my special attention. In it, White House chief of staff Andrew Card Jr. states that the administration waited until after Labor Day to kick off its plans to persuade the public of the necessity of war against Iraq because "from a marketing point of view you don't introduce new products in August." The idea of war as a product to be sold appalled me.

Subsequent readings of press and government statements did not convince me of the administration's arguments for war. Indeed, I felt they were not coherent arguments at all, but base propaganda. The crudest propagandistic techniques were in evidence: the constant repetition of words and slogans (ranging from "regime change" to "liberating the Iraqi people") without making an intellectually valid case; the demonization of opponents of the war, from Baghdad to Paris, rather than a solid refutation of their views; the appeal to atavistic emotions such as fear of outsiders and shadowy enemies instead of the use of consistent logic and clear reason. It was clear to me that this vulgar propaganda was directed not only to the world, but to us Americans as well.

The eloquent resignation letter (February 27) of my foreign service colleague John Brady Kiesling (whom I'd never met) made a strong impression. "The policies we are now asked to advance," he wrote, "are incompatible not only with American values but also with American interests. Our fervent pursuit of war with Iraq is driving us to squander the international legitimacy that has been America's most potent weapon of both offense and defense since the days of Woodrow Wilson."

The president's press conference of Thursday, March 6, was the straw that broke the camel's back. Speaking to a docile press in a faux imperial White House setting, red carpet and all, his scripted performance was a disastrous effort to explain why the U.S. should be! ready to attack Iraq at this time. Tom Shales, the intelligent TV commentator for The Washington Post, wondered if the president "may have been ever so slightly medicated."

After the press conference I could not see myself continuing with the State
Department knowing that I had done nothing against a stupid war. I sat in front of my computer for many hours to write a resignation letter. By Monday March 10 I'd had enough of staring at draft after draft on the monitor. I realized that if I didn't send the resignation letter I'd never be able to get down to serious work. So, eyes shut, I pressed the "enter" button on my computer and sent off the letter as an e-mail to the Secretary, with copy to the media.

Below is the text of the letter:
March 10, 2003

Dear Mr. Secretary:

I am joining my colleague John Brady Kiesling in submitting my resignation
from the Foreign Service (effective immediately) because I cannot in good
conscience supp! ort President Bush's war plans against Iraq.

The president has failed:
--To explain clearly why our brave men and women in uniform should be ready
to sacrifice their lives in a war on Iraq at this time;
--To lay out the full ramifications of this war, including the extent of innocent civilian casualties;
--To specify the economic costs of the war for ordinary Americans;
--To clarify how the war would help rid the world of terror;
--To take international public opinion against the war into serious consideration.
Throughout the globe the United States is becoming associated with the unjustified use of force. The president's disregard for views in other nations, borne out by his neglect of public diplomacy, is giving birth to an anti-American century.

I joined the Foreign Service because I love our country. Respectfully, Mr.
Secretary, I am now bringing this calling to a close, with a heavy heart but for the same reason that I embraced it! .

Sincerely,

John H. Brown
Foreign Service Officer