Synopsis
Since September 11, 2001, some U.S. missions have faced increasingly difficult operating circumstances. In these high-threat environments, there are daily challenges to implementing assistance programs: limited ability
to visit project sites, publicize activities, work closely with local beneficiaries, and allocate resources relative to the size of the assistance program. As a result, the U.S. government and the donor community have developed innovative approaches in monitoring and evaluation, public diplomacy, civil-military cooperation, and program implementation.
This session is designed to encourage participants to explore new approaches and share experiences. It will focus on four themes: (1) the central role of locally-hired staff and local implementing partners; (2) the importance of teamwork within a mission; (3) the importance of balancing security with the need to take some risks to implement assistance programs; and (4) the need for flexibility in program design, implementation, and evaluation.
Notes
Shannon Green, Siobhan Green, and the Bureau for Asia and the Near East (ANE) organized this year’s seventh USAID Summer Seminar, Operating in High Threat Environments. Presenters included Iqbal Noor Ali, CEO, Aga Khan Foundation U.S.A.; Gary Gibson, Assistant Director, Bureau for Diplomatic Security, Department of State; and former Ambassador Nancy Powell, Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Department of State. The session provided an opportunity to share strategies from the public and private sectors on operating assistance programs under dangerous circumstances.
Deputy Assistant Administrator Mark Ward introduced the session topic by explaining that since 9/11 and the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, USAID and other agencies have been asking “how do you start and manage large assistance programs when security conditions limit your ability to see what is going on?” Ward then stated that the goal of this seminar was to broaden discussion of managing foreign assistance programs in high threat environments to an interagency level by sharing lessons learned from a joint Department of State-USAID program launched in December 2004.
Iqbal Noor Ali presented an overview of the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN), a group of agencies working in tandem to attain positive development outcomes through programs and institutions that address health, education, rural development, culture, and economic opportunity. He then outlined the challenges the Aga Khan Foundation has faced in Afghanistan as a nongovernmental organization delivering humanitarian aid and development assistance. Since 2002, it has leveraged $50 million in contributions from USAID and other sources.
The development objectives of the Foundation in Afghanistan are to:
1. Address the basic needs of society.
2. Assist in building a vibrant civil society to help develop economic, social and cultural institutions as well as the necessary enabling environment of proper legal and fiscal frameworks for the birth and growth of sustainable national institutions that characterize a modern state.
3. Foster and legitimize a pluralistic society tolerant of religious and ethnic differences and one that draws on every citizen’s strengths.
4. Assist the return of refugees back to their places of origin.
5. Improve the prospects and livelihood of the Afghan people.
6. Support the government in developing the secondary and tertiary sectors through intermediary instruments that link people’s needs to national systems and institutions.
The AKDN seeks to achieve these goals by supporting civil society organizations, education and health initiatives, culture, economic opportunity, and rural development projects. Specifically, the Aga Khan Foundation is working through the Afghan government’s National Solidarity Program to create democratically-elected village development committees.
Noor Ali then described the threats and challenges the Aga Khan Foundation has encountered in Afghanistan. Popular discontent with the perceived slow pace of change and the return of refugees influenced by radical ideology have increased risk factors for foreign NGOs and development agencies in Afghanistan. This past spring, a mob looted and burned the Aga Khan Foundation regional office in Baharak, Afghanistan. Moreover, the emerging narcotics economy is changing power relationships and providing significant financial incentives for illicit activities. Noor Ali stated, “Unless there is proper enforcement and interdiction, the culture of impunity will continue.” Unfortunately, the limited reach of the government in Kabul makes enforcement difficult.
Drawing on the years of experience that the AKDN has had in Afghanistan, and similar environments in neighboring Pakistan and Tajikistan, Noor Ali proposed two ways to mitigate the risk factors of operating in high threat environments. They are to:
1. Have a long-term commitment to the development of the country and to communicate this commitment to the beneficiaries, a lesson drawn from the experience of the AKDN in Northern Pakistan, where it has been working for over 25 years. Donors also need to make this long-term commitment.
2. Foster NGO and government cooperation on development, even when the results may not be immediately visible.
Following Noor Ali’s presentation of an NGO’s strategies for operating assistance programs in high threat environments, Gary Gibson addressed the topic from a diplomatic security perspective. The Bureau of Diplomatic Security (DS) is “responsible for all of the security officers overseas and all of the security policies that are put forth in embassies, missions, and consulates.” The chief of mission with the help of the Regional Security Officer (RSO) is responsible for the advancement and implementation of all security policies within a post. The threat of terrorism has made DS’s task both more critical and difficult. Today, the U.S. maintains diplomatic posts and conducts foreign assistance programs in countries that would have previously been evacuated because of security concerns.
The stringent security standards that DS must enforce at every diplomatic post are legislated by Congress. Congress passed the Diplomatic Security Act in 1986 that established the Accountability Review Board (ARB). The Secretary of State convenes an ARB whenever there is a loss of American life or damage to a building at a U.S. diplomatic post. ARBs seek to review all security procedures in effect where the incident occurred by focusing on the following questions regarding security procedures:
• Were security measures sufficient to have prevented the act?
• Were they adhered to by all embassy employees?
• Were they strictly enforced by the chief of mission?
Congress also passed the Secure Embassy Construction Counterterrorism Act (SECCA) protecting security enhancement funds for the 80 most vulnerable posts as designated by the Secretary of State. ARBs, SECCA, and other statutory security requirements reflect the negative consequences to U.S. diplomatic and foreign assistance programs if any serious incident were to occur.
Gibson then summarized new security concepts and challenges that affect USAID personnel and programs. A recent and troubling trend from the security perspective is embedding agency staff with the military and host governments. Embedding creates accountability problems and overlapping jurisdictions for personnel. Gibson warned that if something happened to an embedded USAID employee, then “vulnerable programs could come into question, and have restrictions placed on them that would make them almost impossible to operate.”
Gibson concluded his presentation by discussing the need to revitalize the concept of risk management. He stated that RSOs must examine various risks in the “aggregate.” This means assessing the threat in the specific area where a program requires personnel and understanding the probable local response to an emergency. Gibson used the example of his time spent on the Sudan Assessment Team, which evaluated the security situation of a USAID program in Juba, Sudan. This example highlighted the need for RSOs to be on the ground to advise the chief of mission more accurately.
Nancy Powell then provided recommendations to address the challenges identified in the first two presentations and by sharing her perspective as the former Ambassador to Pakistan. Powell’s experience with high threat environments includes managing the danger of internal disorder in Togo, a possible third African embassy bombing in Uganda, and the post-9/11 situation in Pakistan.
Powell first emphasized the importance of individuals and agencies being part of the team. During her time as Ambassador to Pakistan, Powell improved teamwork by enforcing what she called her “no diva policy.” A “diva” may be an agency or individual that creates more work for other personnel by neglecting administration arrangements and not working as part of the team. Ambassadors can deal with individual divas through their authority to dismiss personnel for “loss of confidence.” Concerning potential “agency divas,” the Emergency Action Committee (EAC) should include all agencies at a post to ensure complete understanding of EAC plans and of each agency’s role during a crisis.
Powell then underscored the value of performance plans in high threat environments. Realistic planning can help prevent people from over or underestimating what is logistically possible in a high threat environment. Planning for security needs should be specific and done on a regular basis, but posts should also be flexible and recognize what does or does not work. In Islamabad, the U.S. embassy tried quarterly performance plans but settled on biannual reports.
Foreign Service Nationals (FSNs) also play a central role in the success of U.S. programs in countries with a significant threat level, and Powell stated that USAID and other agencies need to better recognize their contributions. FSNs can be instrumental in running U.S. programs in the event that security conditions in a country necessitate the evacuation of U.S. staff. FSNs can also be trained to do surveillance at sites that are too risky for U.S. personnel to visit. Given the pivotal role they play, FSNs also need to be included in emergency planning. U.S. staff should avoid assuming that “they will just melt away in the crowd” or not be targeted because they are not Americans. Powell also called attention to the daily discrimination FSNs face every morning at embassy security, which can create mindset and morale problems.
Powell then offered some more direct criticism and advice for USAID employees overseas. She warned that a false perception still exists “that USAID is not a target, and therefore, does not have to follow the rules.” This perception is dangerous to the individual and all U.S. programs in that country since the consequences for a mission following the death of any U.S. personnel are enormous. Recalling her experience in Pakistan, Powell described how following the deaths of two Americans, all mission dependents and two thirds of the embassy staff were evacuated. To avoid preventable casualties, common sense, good judgment, perspective, and flexibility are essential.
The presentation concluded with a series of suggestions to improve the morale of staff in high threat environments. They are:
• Breaks are essential but should be managed so that the mission can still operate fully.
• Ensure that everybody has access to the International Voice Gateway line and unclassified email.
• Coordinate with RSOs to support morale activities.
All three presenters highlighted the substantial need as well as the risks for operating foreign assistance programs in today’s high threat environments. Following the presentations, an informative question and answer session followed and included the speakers, Ward, Patrick Fine of the ANE Bureau, and Susan Wallace from the Bureau of Policy and Programming Coordination (PPC).
Question and Answer Session
After the attack on your [Aga Khan Foundation] office in Afghanistan, did you have to come up with special incentives at that office or any other office in the country to encourage your staff to stick with you?
Ali: The office in Balkh, [Afghanistan] has not completely reopened. We evacuated people very quickly. They were all evacuated back to Kabul via helicopter. It took about twenty-four hours to get everyone out. They are all still employed, and some of them are posted there. The decision to reopen the office and at what level is still being made. This is not because the staff is unwilling to go back, but because the whole complex situation where we operate means that agreements have to be made, and the program has to be reviewed. One of things that has been determined is to further decentralize the operation, both for operational and security purposes and to maintain a flexible team. We do have the advantage of working out of Tajikistan, so a lot of the logistical effort was already based out of there.
Who serves on an Accountability Review Board (ARB)?
Gibson: ARBs are put together with the final approval of the Secretary of State. Initially there is a meeting of the Principles Committee, which consists of people underneath the Secretary at the State Department. They review most of the information that has come in so far, and they are the ones who determine if a certain threshold has been reached that would warrant an ARB. Usually the ARB contains at least one former ambassador. There also may be a former security officer, and the last three ARBs have used WAE [When Actually Employed Program] retired security officers who had served in many forms overseas. In addition, they always bring in somebody from the private sector for a reality check to make sure that the ARB is not totally one-sided. Now, they have had people from other agencies and the military, so the Principles Committee pretty much wants to make sure they get the right people on the ARB for this particular problem. If it were an issue that involved USAID, then they would seek out some former USAID people to give the ARB credibility.
What do you do when you find a “diva” on your staff?
Powell: Islamabad was fairly diva free [laughter]. The Ambassador retains the right to do a loss of confidence if an individual becomes a problem, and I was prepared to do that in a couple of cases. One year goes by fairly quickly, and you can wait some of these people out. There was also a lot of positive reinforcement and trying to get that message across to people from the agency. From the admin side I think it is tough, but we were fortunate in that almost everyone from our admin team stayed the entire time I was there. I was able to work with the various agencies, particularly those who had the tremendous numbers of TDYers to set up new procedures to work through the issues. We had issues with customs and some of the host government issues that simply applied to everyone––and those are tough. You need to have really well-established procedures. The first person that did the logistics for the regional affairs office, which had a tremendous number of TDYers was not very good. We worked with the agency to go back and say we have to have someone here who is among your most senior people. We then got a superb person, and the second year was much easier. You have to take those proactive steps and go back. I think USAID had a very good admin team that had fewer people and was better managed.
Patrick Fine, former USAID Mission Director in Afghanistan: Aga Khan is doing really important and fantastic work in Afghanistan, and I congratulate you for that work. I was intrigued by your conclusion that the increase in opium production is having an impact on improving living standards in Badakshan province. I am not sure if I would agree with that. There was a household survey that was done about a year ago in Afghanistan and one of the interesting conclusions you could draw from it was that it made it possible to do some poverty mapping. The poorest provinces and the poorest districts were the ones where the most opium production was going on. There was a negative correlation between opium production and poverty that seemed to suggest that opium production was not really benefiting the communities where it was taking place. With respect to improvements in infant mortality, I think that has a lot more to do with what the Ministry of Health has been doing, the national vaccination campaigns, and UNICEF. I think that is what is causing the increase in infant survival and not any correlation with opium production. I find it interesting that that is the perception that you are getting from your people on the ground, and I think it is worth looking into.
Ali: Thank you for the clarification. I think I misspoke when I said infant mortality. I was speaking from my notes and was being more general. The anecdotal evidence is there. In the surveys that we have done and based on the UNODC [United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime] survey of last year, some 50,000 households in Badakshan are gaining their income directly from poppy production, and it is having an impact at least from our perspective on the ground that is worth exploring. It is impacting gender relationships, and within families or households you hear that people are getting more of their income from poppy production than ever before. Thank you for the correction.
Fine: One of the things that I feel passionate about is the whole question of diplomatic security. I found Gary [Gibson] and Ambassador Powell’s comments very revealing in the sense that you both talked about the consequences to our programs if there is an incident, if we lose a life, if somebody is injured, or if we lose a building. These would result in an immediate draw down on personnel, and constrain our ability to carry out our mission in that particular country or force us to go in front of the ARB. You are intent on avoiding the negative consequences. This has reinforced my view that the policy we have for diplomatic security actually makes us less secure as a nation because it limits our ability to carry out our mission in critical environments. I think [this level of] diplomatic security equals insecurity for us as a nation because it limits our ability to carry out our mission in critical environments. I noticed you talked about a lack of guidance. Perhaps what we need is leadership on this issue. The policy we have now is a sort of a zero tolerance policy that [says] we cannot lose any civilians. My view is that in a situation where we the U.S. is at war, we should have a policy that manages risk but accepts that there will be civilian casualties if that is what is necessary to achieve our objectives. I think that we need Congress to review the overall policy because as long as it stays the way it is, you are going to have the kind of tensions that you described, you are going to have limits on our ability to achieve our objectives, and it will not serve our national interest.
Gibson: What we have been trying to do recently is to come up with an agreement. Population Migration and Refugees has an initiative with [Department of] Homeland Security [DHS] to bring Homeland Security officers out into remote villages to do interviews and prescreening of people who may be emigrating out to the U.S. They never do it at the embassy of course, and they cannot do it in town. They are actually going out into the remote villages. They [DHS] asked us to come up with some sort of way to review the security situation in that area and determine whether it would be safe enough for DHS to go out there and do that. DHS would not go unless they were guaranteed that they were going to be in a safe and secure environment. We came up with a way that a RSO [Regional Security Officer] could give an assessment, pass that assessment on to the chief of mission, and the chief of mission would agree whether country clearance would be granted to DHS or not. The problem with that concept is—and I agree with 95 percent of what you said—[with] the rules and procedures that are in place now, it would take an act not of Congress, but someone above [laughter] to get those changed because they were all knee-jerk reactions to try to cover a situation. The biggest problem we have as security officers is that cookie cutter approach. The same rules exist for every country in the world when not every area has the same security threat. We are limited in our ability to look at the threat in a specific country and figure out how to apply security standards.
Powell: What Patrick described is what actually happens on the ground for most of us. If you want the USAID program to continue, then you make the adjustments to get them out as much as possible. My fear is that we will somehow have a willingness to accept casualties rather than a standard where we try to have none. I think you have to be very careful about that in calibrating this. We may have to accept that these programs have risks in them, and we should not have the terrible consequences of a third of the embassy disappearing just because something happens. You do not want to build in that we are planning to take casualties. You have to avoid that mindset, and you have to avoid the mindset that this is so important that it is worth X amount of lives. I do not think we want to go there, and I am not suggesting you are saying that. But you can get there if you are not really looking at the zero-tolerance option, at least in the planning of things. You have to be aware of that. My point was to just to make sure that everybody understood why a chief of mission or a RSO might be reluctant to sign off on something.
Question to Ali––How does working with governments, especially the U.S. government effect your ability to operate in these high threat countries? How do address the concerns for your staff’s safety?
Ali: Yours is a very interesting question, and I have to be balanced and diplomatic in answering it because this is on the record and look who I am sitting next to [laughter]. I do not think it is a challenge unique to the Aga Khan Foundation or the Aga Khan Development Network, but in some ways it is special for us. At the governmental level in countries like Afghanistan or Pakistan, where they know of our track record, I do not think we have an issue there. It is when you get down to the community level in a country like Afghanistan that has so many influences coming in, you have to be particularly careful not to wave the banner of anybody, sometimes including yourself, because to be perfectly frank in parts of Afghanistan we are seen as a religious organization even though we are not. We may be seen as supporting and only promoting the Ismaili community, which we are not. This is not to say we are not working to help Ismailis, but it is to help them and their neighbors, so these are all sorts of very delicate balancing acts. We work with multiple donors, and that has always been our policy and strategy, because we do not want to be seen as representative of any government. We have a development agenda that is open, transparent, and clear, but perception issues do linger on.
One of the things that does worry me is USAID’s new thrust with branding, and what that does to a foundation like ours. If it is pushed too far, then it could put their [USAID’s] work and people in peril. On the flipside of that, I have been having this conversation with senior USAID people here, and they are very sensitive to that issue. You can work it out with the particular mission director or ambassador. It is a constant balancing act, and thank God it has not been a problem yet.
You talked about how Foreign Service Nationals (FSNs) or an NGO [nongovernmental organization] can operate in areas where others cannot. If something bad were to happen, how would you handle that on a public diplomacy level in that country?
Ward: One of the assumptions that I think we operated under in Pakistan was that our FSN staff was less at-risk being out, putting eyes and ears on something, than an ambassador or I would be. Certainly, they were less noticeable than we were. When we pulled up, the antiterrorist squad would spread out, and we were hard to miss. When the FSNs went out, we would not send all of Gary’s troops. We learned that maybe this might not be a valid assumption. We lost eleven of our Afghan staff on our Alternative Livelihood program in the last month or so. Afghanistan is not Pakistan, and we have to be careful to remind ourselves that every country is different. I think we still have confidence in Pakistan that we can use quality NGOs and FSNs to do some of the eyes and ears work. One of the things you’ll read about in the handout, [Operating in High Threat Environments] is what we adopted in Pakistan. Because we were not able to have the same number of people that we had in the old days, we hired local accounting firms in each of the provincial capitals to keep an eye out and basically be our local staff. They were not the U.S. government and did not have to have all the security stuff. They were from that community, and they were accounting firms so they could look at something and compare it to what the standard is supposed to be and tell us whether it is on track or not. We think that worked, but that would not work in Afghanistan, because they only have fledgling accounting firms now.
Good morning, I am from Joint Forces Command and in the spirit of interagency cooperation, I thank you very much for the presentation today. My question is based on the work we are doing with Joint Forces Command for DOD [Department of Defense]. We are charged with developing the actual constructs and concepts for joint interagency coordination at the operational and tactical levels. I was very interested in the comments Mr. Gibson made earlier on embedding, and I was wondering if you have had any problems with that. I would like to ask both Ambassador Powell and Mr. Gibson to comment on your views about the level we can realistically expect to have embedded USAID personnel involved in military planning and coordination, both in pre-conflict and high-risk environments and also in post-conflict stabilization.
Gibson: The embedding problem comes about because you have two specific rules going on at the same time. Military forces are in countries usually under the care and control of the commander of that geographic area, in other words it is usually strictly military, whereas the USAID person or the other executive bureau person that is embedded with you is under the control of the chief of mission. Therefore, you have two different situations ongoing. It gets a little complicated because the chief of mission usually cannot relinquish the right of protection for that individual over to the combatant commander, even though that has been worked out in some instances. What we are more or less worried about is that the facilities in the wilderness or wherever you are embedded are not up to par. However, they can be better because you have more, for lack of a better term, active shooters. Any facility that the embedees take over will only be viable while you are there. When you leave, as we are facing in Afghanistan, and will eventually face in Baghdad, all of these locations where people were embedded are no longer legitimate. They will have resort back to those “archaic standards” [laughter].
Powell: From Pakistan we had a divided command, which made things very interesting. The General was half reporting to me and half reporting to General [John] Abizaid, and that created some tensions for him. Most of the time it worked out fine, but those issues do have to be resolved with the military. At my current job, I am working with the Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Bureau in the State Department, and we are working in both Afghanistan and Baghdad. Half of our program in Afghanistan is under the chief of mission. The other half is under the military, and it is very interesting to see how the two compare on security. Our program in Baghdad is totally under the military, and … we just had a person out in Baghdad last week try and determine the drawdown that has been discussed, and how this might have implications for us. They are enormous. We are trying to train police throughout the country. With the enormous amounts of money involved and trying to reach those standards, it [drawdown] would change the way our program is distributed. Security conditions really demand that we are part of the security apparatus, but it is not going to work unless we have a joint planning on the drawdown and how the transition goes back to more civilian programs whether it is USAID or INR [Bureau for Intelligence and Research].
Wallace: I would like to remind you that we are establishing an Office of Military Affairs here at USAID, and there are intentions to have liaisons at each of the major commands. I think what that does is put USAID into the planning process which will make them a little more visible about the security plans, the security issues, and in the planning and preparations for on the ground activity.
Audience member reply: We [Joint Forces Command] also are working very closely with some of the people down at INL [State’s Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs], and we are looking across the board at some of these issues. They are extremely complex, particularly transfers of authority between civilians and military on the ground. All I can say to you is that we are actively and openly soliciting all the input we can get from you guys who have been out in the field and in high threat situations.
What threshold would you recommend to a USAID grant recipient to put an evacuation plan into action if necessary?
Gibson: One of the problems that we have with USAID overseas is that they have a lot of different levels of people that are affiliated with the Agency. Some of them are basically taken care of in terms of being involved in the plan, and some of them are more or less on the periphery where they are a telephone call away. It would be hard to say what level you would be as a grantee. That would be something you would want to clarify before even going to the country. You need to know where you fit in the bigger scheme of things in the planning, even if USAID does not have you directly involved in the Emergency Action Plan from their perspective. Once you arrive in a country, one of the responsibilities for you is to check in with the consular section, and you would become part of the greater warden network. As a U.S. citizen, you are protected overseas. You should make sure, if you are official, quasi-official, or whatever relationship that you have with the post, that you check in with the consular section, and make sure they have all of the data to contact you and put you on that greater warden network.
Powell: Maybe I can introduce you to one other concept that the DS [Diplomatic Security] people used in our own evacuation planning, and this is the concept of trip wires or establishing those things that would make you look at what you need to do ahead of time. This could be the death of one of your staff, an attack on the building, or a decrease of law and order in the country. The consular section in dealing with the warden system will go through some of those that we established for the diplomatic missions, and can be quite helpful I think. Mark asked the RSOs to sit down with our grantees and contractors and to see if this [Emergency Action Plan] made sense. Congratulations if you already have an evacuation plan, because too many people do not do that. The trip wire concept is very good even if you do not have a sure fire plan to send off. With the trip wire, you at least know you have a problem when you reach that trip wire.
Ward: That is a great question and thank you very much for asking it. I am thinking back to when we guessed the invasion of Iraq was coming. We did reach out to all of the grantees and contractors to remind them that we expected that they have a plan. We were not going to give them our plan, but they needed to be thinking about this. A suggestion to the USAID officers in the room, if you are in a country where there is good local capacity, where there is good indigenous capacity in the NGO community, such as Pakistan, one of things we tried is what Ambassador Powell referred to as a “bomb-proof” program. We encouraged and built into evaluation criteria for selecting grantees and contractors that they have a management team that was as indigenous as possible so they did not stand out like sore thumbs. Also, the capacity was already there, and you did not necessarily need the expatriates in charge in Pakistan. Where, if you had an expatriate at the top, the next guy in the chain of command would be a local who could take over, if God forbid, the expatriate at the top had to evacuate. We did this because it was so important particularly to the United States in Pakistan for the Pakistanis to see that we were not going to cut and run every time something happened and that we were there for the long haul. You become part of us, whether you have our brand on you or not. As long as we are funding you, they know that if you are running away something is wrong. So it is important for us to keep you there even on the bad days and having an indigenous management in a country helps.
No one has addressed the cost implications although Ambassador Powell I think touched on the human aspect of costs. In terms of the monetary aspect, have there been any analyses whether or not there are benefits? It goes without saying that there are enormous costs for operating in high threat environments, but what is the return on investment at the end of the day?
Powell: The cost implications are enormous for just personnel alone. There are additional expenses that go into trying to meet standards for buildings, and they are requirements so we are not allowed to go out into the economy and rent something like we use to be able to do. All of them have very serious implications in terms of both time and money. In terms of return on investment, I think you need to go back to your program planning to see where you are in accomplishing your goals. I certainly think in terms of the Pakistan program that all of us who were involved with it felt that it had assisted Pakistan in moving toward a more democratic and economically robust situation, and both of those were in the U.S. interest to counter terrorism. You do not have to look very far in the Afghan program to see the enormous benefits that are accruing today for Afghans, in addition to the contributions to regional stability and to the decrease of the threat to the U.S. For the people working in Sudan, feeding people is a reward in itself. I am not sure if we are ever going to get there on a cost-benefit ratio. We tie very closely our goals and objectives to our national objectives. I have been wrongly criticized for not just having one objective in Pakistan; that is, to capture Osama bin Laden. I would argue that the aid program is just as large a part of the effort to capture Osama bin Laden and prevent him from doing further damage to the U.S. as those efforts to capture terrorists and working with the judicial system. I do not think we will ever be able to put it all in terms of costs and benefits.
Fine: One way to put a dollar figure on it is to look at the alternative of having a U.S. military presence in a country. I just wanted to comment on Ambassador Powell’s statements about the costs of one-year tours and the difficulties that it creates. I think that you are absolutely right, and I think it is another way we constrain our ability to achieve our objectives. In countries like Afghanistan or Iraq, we should either consider having eighteen-or twenty-four-month tours, and there are certainly some officers who already do that. We should say that in order to do the job that needs to be done, we need people stay more than twelve months, and then find people willing to do that or provide the incentives to allow them to do that. We also need to accept the fact that there will be a high level of sacrifice. One of the things that disturbs me is that … I don’t feel we as a nation or as organizations have come to grips with the notion that this requires sacrifice and that we have to call on our employees and communities to sacrifice, but I appreciate your comments, Ambassador.
I also want to comment in a sort of defensive way on the perception that USAID does not follow the rules. This is something that I struggled with in Afghanistan. It frustrated me because in my view, it existed primarily because we were the field people. Our role there was to get out and be out. While we followed the rules, we were the ones who by the very nature of our work had to apply the rules much more often than somebody who did not have to leave the embassy compound. The rules came into play with our staff much more than with respect to other parts of the embassy, and that created this impression or perception that we did not respect the rules because we were seen out at a certain place. I think it’s a bum wrap [laughter]. I think it reflects the fact that we have rules that were crafted for a different era or mission. Right now, we sort of blame the individuals who are out there trying to do their job instead of having rules that support our ability to do that job …. It puzzles me that there is not a more concerted effort with congress or within the administration to align those policies more with the mission.
Powell: My point was a broader one than that, and Patrick is absolutely right. Dealing with your job is one thing. I remember calling the USAID director in Togo on the morning of the coup, and despite repeated instructions to stay put, the director went out jogging. This is stupid, and there is a perception that you need to be aware of that this has been the traditional reaction of USAID personnel. As I said before, I think this is changing, and we did not have any of that in Pakistan. Now, if we were grouping the various agencies for compliance with rules and regulations among the top would be USAID. I think we have to work with the RSOs, and certainly, Mark and I have had this discussion. Mark would come to me and say, “I have problem, this is what it is. I am not being allowed to do this.” I would have him sit down with the RSO, convey what was essential, and ask how we can make it happen. Then they would brainstorm to try to make it happen. Really listening to the RSO about what the concerns were for a particular event takes a lot of time, and we may need to find ways of doing it quicker and better. You really do need to spend a lot of time to convince the chief of mission or deputy chief of mission that this is an essential activity. There is an increasing attitude among the RSOs to try to understand that there are things that need to be done, and they cannot simply box everybody in and lock the door.
Ward: To the USAID officers in the room, when you are at your new post oversees and thanks to the help of the RSOs you are able to get out and participate in some event, thank them. We do not remember to do that enough. We tried to do that in Pakistan and included the RSOs in a lot of other activities. They are a part of our success, and I do not think we communicate that very well. The smiles that you get from the moms and the kids about the projects we are doing, they should share in that also. So do not forget to thank them when you come back. Ambassador Powell and I always made a point to gather the shooters and thank them because the event would not have been possible without them.
