[yoe]

Fox's Dennis Ross always seems so calm, reasonable, I'll listen ever so carefully next time he speaks............

[Pawnbkryid]

Ross comes across as a stuffed shirt. One that is alittle better than everybody else.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

I watch FNC at times and have never heard of Dennis Ross until now!

[SkyPilot]

[gridlock]

A bit of projection, no doubt.

[steve8714]

Was Dennis Ross advising Paul Bremer in the early days?

[Leisler]

Arafat with his 'wife', Dennis 'Denise' Ross.

[samtheman]

Finally, how do we determine relative levels of cooperation? Can this be made into a reality tv show?

LOL!

[Suzy Quzy]

Ross is a Hillary and Bill sycophant!

[Thinkin' Gal]

Looks like Dennis Ross is way overdue for a Nobel Peace Prize.

[sinanju]

Ross’s very contrived word: “Statecraft” just makes me nauseous all over. It just reeks of effete, ineffectual, snatching-defeat-from-the-jaws-of-victory, diplo-weenie, incompetence.

[Schnucki]

Ross now brings his analytical powers and judgment to bear on Iraq.

LOL

[geezerwheezer]

Dennis Ross seems to be a really nice person, and that, in a nutshell, is his main problem in diplomacy. Nice guys do finish last, and Ross proves my point. His theories and methodology of statesmanship showed a total lack of preparation, and assumes all Arabs are honorable. Ross needs to remove his head from where he has it, and see the reality of dealing with liars and thieves (as most Arab leaders are) as they are, not as you want them to be. In short, Ross is a fool, and a dumbass to boot! I find him to be a feckless blowhard and a typical striped-pants putz working for the State Department.

[AliVeritas]

Sounds downright Jimmy Carterish.

Why is it the failures that have the cojones (see i’m assimilating), to poke their heads out and pontificate (in a bad way)? You would think they were ashamed and would watch and learn.

[Flintlock]

I$ it $incerity?
Or:
I$ it all $audi oil money?
Bribery, anyone?

[alice_in_bubbaland]

I try to listen, but I always get distracted by his crooked nose. :0)

[cricket]

Like so many Libs; Ross's analysis is filtered through his own bias. Ross' own 'stagecraft' begins with his interpretative analysis of the players and events as they move across the world's stage. This 'blind-eye' to the truth of the matter renders him, in effect, wisdom-impaired and surely not fit for 'greatest-good' diplomacy.

[montag813]

Has any American diplomat ever misjudged an important matter so thoroughly?

Yes. Colin Powell thought he could threaten Turkey with withdrawal of a $30 billion U.S. loan guarantee, in order to browbeat the Turkish Parliament into permitting the U.S. 4th Division to invade Iraq via Turkey. He was gravely mistaken. The result was disastrous.

In 1991 James Baker visited Ankara 3 times in a single month, and Bush 41 called the Turkish PM and Legislative leader to smooth things over. In 2003 Colin Powell did not visit Ankara ONCE, nor did Bush call to personally lobby. The arrogance of Powell's nasty approach makes his blunder the worse diplomatic mistake in my memory.

[Billthedrill]

The problem appears to be systemic - instead of considering the military "diplomacy by other means" to recall von Clausewitz, denizens of an activist State Department often act as if diplomacy is an exclusive alternative, a rival, to the military. Part of that is in the very structure of American government wherein the two are set up in separate Departments that compete for funds and have dramatically different compositions of personnel. Part of it is cultural - after time many diplomats come to identify themselves more closely with their diplomatic counterparts from other countries than they do with their countrymen. That phenomenon isn't restricted to the diplomatic corps; in fact it is seen also within the military. There is, of course, the corrective that military elites must consider their counterparts at all times as potential targets. The diplomatic corps has no such corrective.

But it is the interdepartmental rivalry that becomes a cultural rivalry once the ground assumption is granted that diplomatic activity is always preferable to military activity, a reasonable assumption but carried too far when it extends to the outright exclusion of military options as morally unacceptable. That, I think, it the real cultural problem at State. That assumption fails to properly examine whether such a preference is even feasible in the real world; indeed, all of human history suggests that it is not. Within the confines of the institution this often seems less convincing.

One possible remediation might be to embed State Department personnel, junior and senior, within the ranks of military operations just as journalists have come to be embedded, and not in the quasi-authority positions they have occupied in the past. There are counterparts in the military attaches within embassy organizations. FReepers with State Department experience are encouraged to comment - there seems to be no shortage of FReepers with military experience. I'm wondering if that isn't also part of the problem, a closed State Department contrasted with an open military. Comments?