FOREIGN POLICY/STATE/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “An American diplomat who resigned in frustration last week has told CNN that she believes the Trump administration is putting American citizens abroad at risk by sidelining the State Department…
The State Department not only helps shape foreign policy, she said, but gets American civilians out of harm’s way overseas.
Without the crucial ranks of experienced foreign service officers — who are increasingly growing disillusioned with President Donald Trump’s distrust in diplomacy — the American government’s ability to ‘avert disasters’ overseas, she said, ‘is definitely going to be impacted.’
Shackelford, who served in South Sudan, Kenya and Poland, was considered by many as a rising star at the State Department.
Her scathing resignation letter, in which she said Secretary Tillerson should resign if he was unable to recommit to the State Department’s mission, was obtained and published the next day by Foreign Policy Magazine…
Trump, Shackelford said, has an inability to see the bigger picture of diplomacy…
The President’s love for Twitter is no help — American diplomats the world over, she said, now know that ‘all of what we’ve said could be undone unexpectedly by 140 characters.’ “
-Mick Krever, “Ex diplomat: Trump and Tillerson hurting US ability to ‘avert disasters’,” CNN Politico, CNN.com, Dec. 15, 2017 05:07am