Former Secretary of Defense General James Mattis says Badger Club guest top U.S. diplomat
The world is a challenging place these days. Beyond the blatant horror of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, autocrats around the world have felt increasingly free to test the boundaries of the world order created by the United States and her allies after World War II and defended by our firm response to acts of naked aggression in the Balkans and in the Persian Gulf War.
But since then, foreign policy experts have become concerned. Our muddled priorities and changing missions during our 20-year war in Afghanistan, our less-than-decisive record of involvement in Syria, our equally indecisive reaction to the Russian invasion of the Crimea, and the intentional fraying of our international relationships during the Trump Administration may have led autocrats around the world to question whether the United States is no longer willing or able to take a leadership role in maintaining world peace and stability.
On Thursday May 5, the Columbia Basin Badger Club will present a special online program to discuss those issues. Former Ambassador Ryan Crocker is a career Foreign Service officer who served six times as an American ambassador in some of the toughest assignments the State Department had to offer: Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Kuwait and Lebanon.
Former Secretary of Defense General James Mattis has said of Crocker, “He is the era’s top diplomat. Every time we were in trouble, he was the diplomat sent in to right the ship.”
Today, Crocker is a nonresident senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Other academic appointments have included diplomat in residence at Princeton University, inaugural Kissinger fellow at Yale University, the James Schlesinger distinguished visiting professor at the University of Virginia, and Texas A&M where he was dean of the Bush School of Government.
He serves on the board of advisors of No One Left Behind, a nongovernmental organization (NGO) dedicated to ensuring that America keeps its promises to the Afghans and Iraqis who risked their lives to support us. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, from President George W. Bush in 2009.
Are we entering a new period of world disorder and, if so, what should be done about it? Crocker has noted that the United States has shown it can lead in supporting Ukraine. “We now need to prove that we have staying power.”
American leadership is essential, he says, for maintaining world order. “If America doesn’t take the lead in maintaining world order, who will?” We failed to live up to that role in Afghanistan. “The Trump and the Biden administrations both had similar views about Afghanistan, and they were both dead wrong,” Crocker said.
He has praised the Biden Administration’s handing of the Ukraine crisis so far, but worries that America is not very good at strategic patience. And he warns that China also is challenging for world leadership, while there are other potential trouble spots, including Taiwan, North Korea, Pakistan, Kashmir, and the Middle East.
Finally, Crocker says we need to reflect on what we are doing to each other at home. “Our political divide is our greatest strategic weakness,” he said.
The forum will begin at a special time, 12:30 p.m. A 30-minute presentation by Ambassador Crocker will be followed by a question-and-answer session.
Attendees can also join an informal “Table Talk” session immediately after for further discussion. Register to attend at columbiabasinbadgers.com. Club members are not charged for the meetings, while non-members pay $5.
This story was originally published May 3, 2022 at 12:07 PM.