Why the Foreign Service Officers should be angry at the new Iraq policy that the State Department proposed

The Foreign Service Officers in Iraq has the right to be upset at the new State Department Policy that was proposed concerning Iraq. This Policy says that they could either stay in Iraq or put their jobs at risk. They gave them no choice. That is not only the negative side of the story, they weren’t even told about the change in matter. It was said that the Foreign Service Officers weren’t told about the change in policy directly, but heard it from a news organization last week. Upon hearing this news, they called it a “potential death sentence”. In showing how upset the officers were; One veteran of the Foreign Service left some comments and said that “it is one thing if someone believes in what is going on over there and volunteers, but it is another thing to send someone over there on a forced assignment, I am sorry, but basically that is a potential death sentence and you know it, who will raise our children if we are dead or wounded?”. Another office said that “the rule should consider the dangers of a war zone, lack of security and regular rocket attacks on U.S. personnel”.

With all of these outbursts from the officers, Harry Thomas (Foreign Service Director General) said that the announcement made last week would inform 200 people as prime candidates and the selection would be done by Thanksgiving. Harry Thomas also said that the “Personnel chosen would be given 10 days to reply and unless they had a valid medical reason to refuse, those who decline could face dismissal”. Regarding that comment said by the Foreign Service Director General, it shows that they don’t care about how the Foreign Service Officers feel about the matter, they just want to get the supposedly job done regardless of any opposition. Like Thomas said, “We cannot shrink from our duty, we agreed to worldwide availability”.

To conclude this, because the Personnels agreed to “worldwide availability”, that doesn’t give the Director General or whoever is in charge of the affairs the right to put the officers where ever they want without the officers knowing about it. It was wrong what the State Department did on this issue. Next time, the person in charge should let the Foreign Service Officers know the step they were or are going to take because the officers are humans like everybody else, they have feelings, and loved ones who cares about them.
The New Iraq policy prompts angry words at the State Department article can be found on cnn.com
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/10/31/state.department.iraq/index.html#cnnSTCText