A Uniquely Qualified Ambassador to Iraq

By Al Kamen
Friday, June 22, 2007

Just another day at the office for our man in Baghdad, Ambassador Ryan Crocker.

Wednesday's confidential Situation Report over there said that the security office in Baghdad "reports 9 to 10 rounds of IDF" -- indirect fire, meaning mortar rounds or rockets -- "have hit the Embassy Baghdad compound. One round caused damage to the Embassy's north wing. There are no reported casualties.

"Further to Watch Alert 1241, Embassy Baghdad reports Ambassador Crocker's office window was damaged by one IDF round, sending shrapnel into his office. The Ambassador was in the room at the time of the attack, but there were no injuries."

We're told the windows were blown out and glass shards were in the office. But this, for Crocker, is par for the course.

Let's recall that the near-legendary diplomat was working in the embassy in Beirut in 1983 when a suicide bomber driving a delivery van of explosives rammed into the seven-story building, split it in two and killed 64 people.

Crocker was blown against a wall and bloodied but not seriously injured. He and his wife, who also worked there, got out of the building and he went through the rubble, searching for colleagues.

Incoming mortar and rocket fire has become a daily occurrence of late in the Green Zone. The U.N. staff has moved to temporary quarters that are a bit safer.

But a little shrapnel? Please. Just get out the plywood and get back to work.

More Opportunities for Arabic Speakers

About six months ago, the Iraq Study Group noted that, of the 1,000 employees at the embassy in Baghdad, only 33 speak Arabic and six speak the language fluently, meaning at a 4 level. This puts the war effort "often at a disadvantage."

Well, we're happy to report, as we move along in the fifth year of the war, there appears maybe to have been progress since that report. The State Department, in response to a reporter's question, said Wednesday that now "10 Foreign Service Officers are at or above the 3 reading/3 speaking level in Arabic and five others test at or above the 3 level in speaking. A 3/3 indicates a general professional fluency level."

Hard to describe these levels with precision, but a 3/3 is the minimum fluency level, where you can get by quite well, give a reasonably correct speech but maybe not be able to read a contract or completely understand a rapid-fire chat among the locals.

But at this rate of improvement, if any, we'll be "at a disadvantage" for a hundred years.

Undoubtedly that's why the department, in a cable last week to "all department personnel," from Director General George Staples, is "offering unprecedented opportunities" for anyone who'd like to break off from their current assignments to take Arabic classes in September.

There's even going to be a special pay scale for Arabic speakers only, with those who are really fluent -- that would be level 4 -- picking up a 20 percent raise. And, if that's not enough, if you'd like to practice your language skills in Baghdad, you'll get a 30 percent pay raise.

So why would you want to sip Campari on the Via Veneto in Rome or knock yourself out partying in Rio when you can sign up right now for one of 25 openings waiting for you in the Green Zone?

Hey! Whatever happened to those 58 Arabic translators the military kicked out because they were gay?

Cutting Through a Forest of Acrimony

As the forest fire season is upon us, and there are hearings on the Hill about preparations, we recall a time, back when he was with Earth First, when environmental activist Jake Kreilick was going to jail in Idaho and Malaysia for his efforts to protect old-growth forests.

His current group, WildWest Institute, is engaged in three administrative appeals and two lawsuits against the Forest Service's policies in Idaho and Montana on logging and fuel reduction -- that is, clearing brush and smaller trees.

But then there's Jake Kreilick, owner of a home on about 25 acres in the woods outside of Missoula. That Jake Kreilick, chainsaw in hand, has been clearing dozens of trees and brush in the past couple of years to reduce fire dangers around his house, the Missoulian newspaper reported earlier this month. He's even a leader in an organization devoted to such activities around homes in wildland areas. Sort of just what the feds do that he's been fighting lo these many years.

"There's been a shift toward a more cooperative attitude, certainly on approaches involving" fuel reduction efforts around homes, Kreilick told us yesterday. "We went from a policy of 'no cuts' on federal lands" to acknowledging the need to cut, "especially near communities."

"We need to get past polarity, and we've reached out to landowners and forest services to find common ground," he said. So does that mean dropping the litigation with the U.S. Forest Service?

Well, no. "The change doesn't affect any of those cases," he said, but the tactics of the old days may be gone. After all, chaining yourself to a bulldozer or camping up in the branches are uncomfortable pursuits.

All the Modern Inconveniences

Today is moving day for the brass at the Department of Transportation. The bulk of the 5,600 or so headquarters staff members began moving out of the old digs at Seventh and D streets SW a couple of months ago.

Secretary Mary Peters and the top staffers are headed over to their opulent new headquarters at New Jersey and M streets SE, down by the new Washington Nationals stadium.

Good thing there was a shakedown period. Seems the mid-level staffers have reported toilets with little pressure and sinks where the water blasted out. (Unclear which is worse.) Some folks apparently got locked in their own offices.

But the biggest problem in the two buildings, one eight stories and the other nine, is that cellphones and BlackBerrys didn't work. This was because the structures were built according to post-Sept. 11 government specs, with extra-thick walls and windows.

So the buildings are being rewired -- work's almost done, we're told -- so they are almost virtual cellphone towers and the reception quality will be superb.

Department of Things You Never Knew . . .

From a transcript of an interview congressional investigators, looking into the firings of those U.S. attorneys, had with Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty.

McNulty: "I am kind of a softy. That is a problem I have in my life in terms of I put up with a lot of problems for a long time and I have a difficulty getting to the issue of, all right, let's take care of somebody . . ."

Q: "We will keep it confidential that you are a softy."

McNulty: "It will ruin me, that is for sure."