Confessions of a Public Servant

By Gary Grappo

Gary Grappo is a former U.S. ambassador who held senior positions including Minister Counselor for Political Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad; U.S. Ambassador to the Sultanate of Oman; and Charge d’Affaires and Deputy Chief of Mission of the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. As a career member of the Senior Foreign Service of the U.S. Department of State, he served as Envoy and Head of Mission of the Office of the Quartet Representative, the Honorable Mr. Tony Blair, in Jerusalem. He’s currently a Distinguished Fellow at the Center for Middle East Studies at the Korbel School for International Studies, University of Denver.

OPINION — Events in Washington last week were gut-wrenching for many, not least for America’s Foreign Service and the two million other public servants of the United States. They were also inspiring and cause for much pride.

At present, the House of Representatives impeachment hearings are largely driven not by senior political figures or high-priced lawyers (yet) but rather by testimony proffered by none other than public servants. These are servants of the American people, from the CIA officer who first reported the possible wrongdoing of President Trump in a July phone call with his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, to the most recent public servants to offer testimony, three career Foreign Service officers.

“The Cipher Brief has become the most popular outlet for former intelligence officers; no media outlet is even a close second to The Cipher Brief in terms of the number of articles published by formers.” —Sept. 2018, Studies in Intelligence, Vol. 62

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