State Department ‘Weenies’ Do Have a Point

[babylonsister]

State Department ‘Weenies’ Do Have a Point
By Jeff Stein, CQ National Security Editor


The Marines like to boast that they never leave their wounded behind.

You won’t hear that line at the State Department these days.

That’s because of Foggy Bottom’s dirty little secret: Its bureaucrats can’t be counted on to take care of their own casualties of war.

And that’s why, say the foreign service’s defenders, State Department employees are wary of going to Iraq: Unlike soldiers, they can’t count on a safety net if they’re hurt.

Wrecked physically and mentally from terrorist attacks or duty in combat zones, State Department employees from senior diplomats on down to foreign aid workers say they have too often had to fend for themselves when they were hurt.

“The idea of being killed or injured is real,” says Frank Pressley, who was badly wounded during a terrorist attack on the U.S. embassy in Nairobi in 1998, “and if you are injured, you had better believe that you will be forgotten by the very employer that asked and needed your help.”

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