S4E3: A Ball State Graduate Reflects On His Global Impact as a U.S. Diplomat (Jeff Feltman, Retired U.S. Ambassador and UN Undersecretary General for Political Affairs)

Jeff Feltman is a distinguished Ball State graduate who has had an impressive career in foreign affairs and international diplomacy. Currently, Jeff is the John C. Whitehead Visiting Fellow in international diplomacy in the Foreign Policy Program at the Brookings Institution, and he's a senior fellow at the UN Foundation, both of which are based in Washington, D.C.

Over the course of his impressive career, Jeff served as the UN's undersecretary general for political affairs and as U.S. Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa. During our conversation, I ask Jeff about his undergraduate experience at Ball State and how it prepared him for the Foreign Service. We also talk about his diplomatic posts in the Department of State, including his experience as ambassador to Lebanon from 2004 to 2008.

And we discuss the Ball State professors who encouraged Jeff to pursue his challenging and rewarding career in the Foreign Service. Among his mentors was Warren Vander Hill, a long-time professor and distinguished administrator who died in July. This month, Jeff joined the University community in attending an on-campus memorial for Dr. Vander Hill. Jeff and several of his classmates also created an endowed fund in honor of Dr. Vander Hill. The fund will support internships, research, and other experiential opportunities for Ball State students. 

If you enjoy this episode, please leave a review to support the show. 

Transcript

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Hello, I'm Geoff Mearns, and I have the good fortune to serve as the president here at Ball State University. Today's guest on my podcast is a distinguished graduate who has had an impressive career in foreign affairs and international diplomacy. Jeff Feltman is the John C. Whitehead Visiting Fellow in international diplomacy in the Foreign Policy Program at the Brookings Institution, and he's a senior fellow at the UN Foundation, both of which are based in Washington, D.C.

In more than 30 years in diplomatic service, Jeff also served as the UN's undersecretary general for political affairs and as U.S. Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa. In this episode, I'll ask Jeff about his undergraduate experience here at Ball State and how it prepared him for the Foreign Service. We'll also talk about his various diplomatic posts in the Department of State, including his experience as ambassador to Lebanon from 2004 to 2008.

And we'll discuss the role that diplomacy plays in promoting stability and peace around the world. So welcome, Jeff. Thank you for joining me as a guest on my podcast.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

President Mearns, thank you very much. It's an honor to be part of this program, this podcast, which I regularly listen to. And it's really, really great to be back on campus and just see how wonderful the, the, the campus looks.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Well, thank you for your kind words and thank you for joining us. So, one of the reasons that you're here and that we're having this conversation is because later today, we're going to attend a memorial service for Warren Vander Hill, a longtime professor and outstanding distinguished administrator here at Ball State who passed away this summer. So thank you for making the trip. And you're joining me and so many others who will participate in that celebration of life later today.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Oh, there's no way I would want to miss that celebration of Warren given the role that Warren Vander Hill played during the time that I was at Ball State. And of course, he went on to bigger and better things even later.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yeah, he was a remarkable man. So in a moment, I'm going to ask you a bit more about your experience as a student in the Honors College, which Warren founded. But first, can you tell us a little bit about your family, where you grew up and what your family life was like before you came to Ball State?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

President Mearns, I think I'm about as middle class and Middle America as they come. I grew up just an hour east of here in a little town called Greenville, Ohio, just across the state line. My mother's family were longtime farmers. My father's family were townees, so I got the best of both the town and the country. And, you know, just happy middle, you know, small town family. I did track, sang in the children's choir at the Presbyterian church, all that kind of stuff. And got to spend lots of time at the family farm. In fact, I just came from Greenville, Ohio, this morning, visiting my mother, visiting my uncle. My cousin still farms the farm that we had. I did fail at the piano. The rest of my family was musical and I failed at the piano. And my mother always said, but you will thank me for making you take piano lessons. And she's still waiting.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

[laughs] She's still waiting to see if you can recover. So you grew up in a small town, the classic small town, middle America experience, and then you enrolled at Ball State, where you were among the first recipients—one of the first recipients of a Whiting Scholarship. It's our most prestigious award for incoming first year students. Why did you choose to leave Ohio and come to Muncie, Indiana, to come to Ball State?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Well, there were there were two reasons. One was I was familiar with Ball State because I'd been active in student journalism, when I was in Greenville High School. And at the time, maybe Ball State still does, they had summer journalism workshops for high school students. And so I came over probably between my junior and senior year, and had a great time at the journalism workshop. Learned a lot, met friends and just thought, wow, this is a fun place to be. This is a great campus. So that was that was one reason that got me looking at that. That prompted me to look at Ball State. The second reason, the primary reason really was the Whitinger Scholarship. At the time, the scholarship was administered by Warren Vander Hill in a little house that's now where the parking garage sits. He interviewed me in person. It was rather intimidating, you know, to be challenged by Warren Vander Hill on some of the things I said in answers to his questions, but in the end, I got the scholarship, and that sort of prompted me toward Ball State. The third thing was that my father's side of the family for generations had gone to Miami University in Ohio. And being a, you know, 18 year old boy, I did not want to go to Miami University. I wanted something else. So I came to Ball State.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

And as we would say something better than our rivals down there in Oxford, Ohio. So as we said, Warren actually helped establish the Whitinger Scholarship. Tell us a little bit more about the influence that Warren had on you as a student after you arrived here.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Well, there were three roles that Warren played that were important to my time at Ball State. One was, of course, he was head of the Whiting Scholars program. And it wasn't simply that we had a scholarship. It was that Warren organized activities for us, that he organized activities to expand our horizons. He organized activities so that we could meet the business community. See something more than just the campus. So that was one role that Warren played. Second role was that he was head of what was then the honors program before the Honors College was set up, which had, you know, its own programs, classes that, you know, again, to try to expand our horizons beyond the small town Midwestern upbringing I had. And then the third was he was simply just an inspiration for all of us. He was enthusiastic about everything. And basically pushed us to do things that we might have been grumpy about or thought we couldn't do. And so I feel that Warren's presence pushed all of us who had the opportunity to work with him beyond where we might have otherwise gone.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Right. We talked a moment ago before we started the recording, that he was one of those people that demonstrated to you that you had more ability, more potential than maybe you thought you had yourself.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Yes, exactly. Exactly.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Were there other mentors or, or faculty members here at Ball State that had a lasting impact on your life and your career?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

There were two others that, really helped me define what I ultimately did, which was work in diplomacy, both long gone from the campus. One was, Phyllis Yuhas, who I believe has passed away, and she had this little warren of an office over in North Quad that was just full of literature about foreign studies, programs about travel opportunities, scholarships abroad. All this stuff. And you could go into Phyllis's office and say, say, Professor Yuhas, I'm thinking I'd like to do something to improve my French. And she would ruffle through things and pull out some kind of scholarship application for a program. And she was really great at answering questions in the days before internet about what was possible.

And the other one was was Richard Wires, who was a history professor, here at the time. And he hired me as a research assistant. We had a funny little office in Lucina Hall where I worked on editing publications for him and worked on grading papers, all the things that one would do. But he had extensive time overseas, particularly in Europe during the Cold War. And listening to Doctor Wires talk about his experiences also got me thinking beyond the horizons of Muncie, Indiana, and Greenville, Ohio.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yeah. So during, it was either your sophomore or junior year, as I understand it, that you actually went on a study abroad experience and that had an influence on you in terms of changing your career aspirations. If that's correct, tell us a little bit about that.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

That's correct. I was one of those people that sort of floated around, had different majors at different times of my Ball State career. One of those students—

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yes, most of us are that way.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

But at the time, in fact, I ended up graduating with a double major in history and arts. And I did the Ball State London Center experience the spring of my sophomore year. I'd never lived in the city before. I mean, I guess Muncie's a city, but I'd never lived in any place like that, like London.

And as I said, I was an art major. And so I started thinking, I really like the travel I've done. I'm thinking about what Doctor Wires and Doctor Yuhas were saying about their experiences overseas, I thought that I'd like to kind of continue this, but I also have this affinity or this desire to do something in art, not acknowledging to myself I really had no talent in art at the time. But you know, when you're 19 years old, you have these great aspirations. And I thought, well, I'll become a cultural attaché. I had no idea what a cultural attache was. So I came back to Ball State in the fall, talked to Dr. Yuhas and Dr. Wires about and probably Warren, but I don't remember. I remember more clearly the Dr. Yuhas and Dr. Wires conversations that I want to become a cultural attache that that would be able I would combine my Ball State education, my like for art, my newly discovered interest in traveling in this career as a cultural attache, whatever that cultural attache was. So they explained to me very patiently, that's a Foreign Service officer, that's a U.S. diplomat. You have to join the State Department. To join the State Department, you have to pass a series of tests and assessments—

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Difficult tests.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

But it was Ball State that got me thinking in a different way. And it was Ball State professors who were able to define what it was that I was trying to explain that I wanted to do.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yeah. So after you graduate from Ball State, you went to Boston, to Tufts University. And it was from there that you went to the Foreign Service. And you described a little bit about that process. When did you join the Foreign Service? And tell us about some of your experiences during your early years in the Foreign Service?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Well, I should admit that I failed the Foreign Service assessments twice. I failed them after Ball State, and I failed them after graduating from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. It was only a few years later when I passed. I don't think I was any smarter the third time, but I think at that time I was more confident. Because part of the Foreign Service exam is an oral exercise with others in the room where you're being watched. Do you have the personality, the demeanor, the posture to be able to represent U.S. interests overseas? And I think that that third time, because I've been working in New York City for a few years for a Foundation, I had more self-confidence. So I don't think it was, again, I don't think I was any smarter,  but it was that third time. My wife, who I met in the Foreign Service, when we both joined on the same day in January 1986, she came from San Francisco. I, I at the time came from New York and we met. We met there married to her. But her last job before retirement was head of recruitment for foreign service. And she laughs that I'm the only Foreign service officer she knows who admits to having failed twice before getting in, even though she knows others have done the same thing.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

I'm sure there are several others who have done the same thing. So where—what countries were you serving in during those early years, and was that experience what you expected?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

If one passes the series of assessments to get into the Foreign Service and one is ultimately hired by the Foreign Service, the first job that one typically has as a U.S. Foreign Service officer is a visa officer. That you are evaluating whether someone, a foreigner qualifies for a visa for an immigrant or a nonimmigrant visa, depending on what the applications for what that means in practice.

You're telling a lot of people, no, you're not going to get your visitor's visa because we think you might be staying illegally. And so my first assignment as a visa officer was in Port au Prince, Haiti. And, so I learned Haitian Creole to be able to interview Haitians about what their ties were in Haiti because the visa application, the eligibility for visas does not depend on what they're going to do in the United States. It's will they go home? And if you're from Haiti, even in 1986, that was a hard case to make.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Right. Where was your next post after Haiti?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

After Haiti, I went to—and Haiti was considered a hardship post. I think it's even harder now than it was than it was when I was there. And so I was bumped up in priorities of where I wanted to go next. What happens is you sort of give the State Department a list of where you would like to go. First, the State Department gives you a list and says these are the jobs that are coming open at your level in your specialty. I was an economic officer. And so I got the list. I looked at the list and I said, I want to go to Budapest, Hungary. I want to go to Europe.

Budapest sounds interesting. I would have been bidding, which is called, you know, applying for the job, in 1987, I guess. And it just sounded like an interesting place to be. I had not spent time in Eastern Europe. But I got the job and I just happened to be in Budapest, which is a small embassy backwater embassy in the Warsaw Pact country during the time of the Cold War. The Soviet Union, with its satellites, of which Hungary is one, against the United States and there I am and suddenly communism falls. Hungary and Poland started the process, but then the Berlin Wall fell and the entire world changed. So I started off in Hungary during a time when Hungary was in the enemy pact. I left Hungary in 1991, when Hungary was on the threshold of NATO membership and EU membership. It was an incredible tour. I get goose pimples just thinking about what I the first hand, the front row seat I had to the fall of communism.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Certainly a remarkable start to a remarkable career. Tell us a little bit about what are the duties, what were your duties when you were in Budapest and whatever your next post was? What are the duties at that level in the Foreign Service?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Well, you know the United States and other countries have embassies abroad for a couple of reasons. One is to try to protect citizens. So part of the job is to, you know, to work on protecting American citizens. If you lose your passport, you go into an embassy to try to get the travel documents to go home.

If you get thrown in jail, the embassy tries to make sure that you're being treated according to whatever the local laws are. They can't necessarily spring you, but they can make sure that you're not being, you know, abused. So part of the embassy's role, and part of every foreign service officer’s role, is to make sure that you're attuned to what the needs are of the American citizens in that particular country, be they residents, be they, you know, visitors.

And that’s a fundamental, fundamental purpose of having embassies overseas. But more broadly, we're promoting U.S. interests. We are—and it could be helping businesses navigate the local environment in terms of trade and investment. It could be making sure that the host governments really understand U.S. positions. It could be trying to get the host governments to side with us in, in disputes or in adopting certain resolutions.

It's basically promoting U.S. interests overseas and then doing the reverse. It’s making sure that Washington understands the host country points of view, that Washington understands the perspectives of the host country, that Washington has a sense of who are the leaders, who are the people in this country who are making the decisions, who do we need to know to be able to influence their policies?

[GEOFF MEARNS]

So your experience in Budapest was remarkably positive. It was a transformational, positive change in the world. Different experience—2004 to 2008, you were our country's ambassador to Lebanon. And during that time you played an important role in helping to evacuate approximately 15,000 Americans who were living in Lebanon during the war between Hezbollah and Israel at that time. What was that experience like?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Well, as you can imagine, President Mearns, I'm sort of reliving that experience every day, given the current news. And in a way, Mary and I sort of—Mary, my wife—and I sort of tease each other that we have PTSD all over again from that 2006 war. But as I said earlier, a fundamental role of an embassy is to help U.S. citizens overseas. And usually that means replacing passports, something like that, or maybe recording a birth or a death abroad, something like that. Where this is, we suddenly have war and we have 15,000 Americans who want to go home, who want to get out—

[GEOFF MEARNS]

And whose lives are at risk.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

And whose lives are at risk. And the Israelis bombed the airport on day one of that war in 2006. I should say Hezbollah provoked the war. Hezbollah did a cross-border raid into Israel, kidnaping and killing Israeli soldiers inside Israel. Israel obviously responded. And on the first day they bombed the airport, cratered the runways and blockaded the ports. So here we are suddenly in war, with 15,000 Americans, and there's no airport and their ports are blockaded.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

And your job is to try to help them get out. 

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Yes. Yes. And there had not been signs that this was going to happen. Lebanon is a beautiful country. But of course, it has a very tragic history. But that summer was a quiet summer. That summer, American Lebanese from Dearborn and from Pennsylvania brought their grandchildren over. Dropped them off to spend the summer with grandma and grandpa. Learn Arabic. Learn a bit about their about their heritage. While the parents went back to continue on with their jobs because it was considered to be a quiet summer for Lebanon. Well, obviously it wasn't a quiet summer. So what do you do when you have toddlers who are American citizens? Their parents are in Dearborn. They can't get there to Lebanon because everything's the airport's been bombed. The grandparents don't have visas. They aren't American citizens—

[GEOFF MEARNS]

And they're not permitted to travel—

[JEFF FELTMAN]

They’re permitted to travel and accompany their grandchildren. And we had to figure all this out. How do you get this done. And the other thing was, how do you hire ships? How do you arrange for the port for the Israelis not to bomb the port when your ships come in? When we sent convoys to southern Lebanon to retrieve Americans who were trapped in besieged villages, I had to coordinate with my counterpart, the U.S. ambassador to Israel, to make sure that the Israelis knew these were our convoys, not Hezbollah convoys, so that our convoys wouldn't be hit. It was an incredibly complicated operation, and it took us it took us 4 or 5 days to get started after the war started. And those 4 or 5 days were the worst days of my career, because I was being hammered by the American citizens who wanted out. I was being hammered by the American citizens’ families who wanted their people home. And we had no ships. We had no helicopters. We had to get money from the State Department. We had to get the Department of Defense involved. And so it was the worst period of my professional career. But then once we got started, once we got everything in place, including the coordination through the US embassy to the Israelis, with the Israelis, we got everybody out in five days.

And so that was the most rewarding part of my career, was when the last ship sailed with the American citizens in 2008. The first ship that went out after this excruciating 4 to 5 day wait, the State Department wanted me to go down to the dock to wave at the ship on the television cameras, so that people could see it's finally happening, the evacuation is finally starting. So I went down and dutifully waved. My mother saw this on CNN and sent me an email and said, dummy, you were waving at the ship. Why didn't you get on the ship? 

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yeah. And were you, did you evacuate at some point shortly thereafter, or were you still stationed in Lebanon for an additional period of time?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

No, no, I was still there. We evacuated what we would consider to be non-emergency staff, because we were also trying to get to a cease fire. We were trying to get the Lebanese to adopt certain positions that would permit the Israelis to withdraw from southern Lebanon and stop the aerial bombardment. So we were we were working on political security, military issues at the same time as we were trying to get the Americans out. So it was a 34 day war, and then another 6 or 8 weeks of sort of a siege that we had to work out to get lifted the Israelis imposed. And it was the most intense period of my professional life. But it's nothing compared to what's going on now. 

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Right. Were you safe or what were the ways that the United States government, the military or the State Department is keeping folks like you safe in a war situation like that one?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

I was probably at my safest in Lebanon during the war because Hezbollah, that would have loved to have kidnaped or killed me, was otherwise occupied. You know, they were occupied in pushing back against the Israelis. So the threat against me probably receded. The Israelis weren't going to bomb the US embassy. And if we had convoys that were going in areas that the Israelis were bombing, we let our embassy in Israel know so that they could notify the Israelis. And we didn't have any mistakes. So that was probably the safest period for me in Lebanon because as you know, the Marine Corps barracks in Lebanon were blown up in the 80s. The US embassy was blown up twice. Every day when I would walk from my residence to the chancellery, which is the embassy office building, I would pass the memorial to all the Americans— and Lebanese, Lebanese who worked for us, who'd been killed in these bombings.

It was sobering. And as a result, every time I moved, every time I would move to go to a meeting in Lebanon, go out to dinner with Lebanese officials, 40 bodyguards went with me. 40. You didn't see them. You saw the one who was like, right with me. That’s called close protection.

But the others were in buildings around or roads around to sort of keep an eye on things. They weren't obvious. It wasn't like if, if, if I were still ambassador, that we would suddenly have 40 people hovering over the two of us as we're talking. But it took 40 people for me to move. And there were two, always two motorcades. So Hezbollah would never be sure which one I was in. And we would go down into a basement of a building, into a parking garage, and flip the motorcade so that even if they'd figured it out, it would be different. So it was a little bit like being in a movie, but you get, but eventually you get sort of accustomed to it. And to the point where when I finished my tour and went back to Washington, we were, Mary and I took a taxi to meet some friends at the restaurant. We got to the restaurant and Mary looked at me, and she said, Jeff, you have to open your own door.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

(laughs) You were back to reality, you know, in a more safe and secure reality. So what other countries during your career, what other countries were you assigned to as a Foreign Service officer? And tell me a little bit about how you had to adapt to the languages. How many different languages have you learned during the course of your career?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

The language is a good question, because that sort of defined where I ended up. I learned Hungarian from Budapest. Hungarian is a devilishly difficult language. It's lots of fun because the Hungarian, it's sort of like the talking dog, if you can say anything in Hungarian, the Hungarians just love you because no one learns Hungarian unless you're unless you happen to be Hungarian.

But I went from Hungary to Washington, where I worked on a job dealing with Central and Eastern Europe. So the logic would have been for me to go to Poland or me to go to Prague or Bucharest, because I'd served in Budapest. I'd now served in Washington, in Central and Eastern Europe. I was there for the, as I said, the fall of communism. I was sort of a cadre of people who'd worked on these issues at a very critical time. It would have been logical to go back to Eastern Europe, central Eastern Europe. But I didn't want to learn another one country language. Unless I'm gonna have repeated tours in Budapest, which I love Budapest, but that wasn't why I joined the Foreign Service to be in one country all the time. So that's when I asked to learn Arabic. And so I spent the rest of my career after that job doing Central Eastern Europe in Washington, in the Arab world, plus Israel. So North Africa, the Levant, the Middle East. And then my last job in the State Department was as assistant secretary of state over that region.

The State Department is divided into bureaus, regional bureaus like Africa. I was the Africa or Europe. I was the head of the Middle East and North Africa Bureau, and then also functional bureaus. And so I basically spent the bulk of my career, and the most senior parts of my career at the State Department, working on Middle East and North Africa issues.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

So after your career in the State Department, you worked at the United Nations in New York, and I think from about 2012 to 2018. What were your responsibilities at the United Nations?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

I was the Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs. And what is that you may say? What is that? I said, when I was sworn in by then Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon, he tried to help me understand what my job was and said, you are like the secretary of state. Only, you're the secretary of State for the United Nations.

What it meant was, that I was the one who was sort of doing the— I was not doing development, I was not doing Unicef children's vaccinations. I was doing the political relationships globally. So I was like, his foreign minister, his foreign advisor. The U.N. is not a government. But that would be the closest equivalent. But of course, when he said that, I looked at my talented but modest staff. I wondered where my limousine and security detail were. I looked at my tools. You know, I was used to U.S. tools which were hard tools, like the power of the currency, the power of the White House, the voting way that the IMF, the world power, the power of the military, all these real tools.

I looked at my UN toolbox. I saw the charter, I saw conventions, I saw principles, I saw ideals. It was a whole different tradecraft I had to learn at the UN.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

It required even greater diplomacy without those hard tools.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Exactly, exactly, President Mearns. Because as a U.S. diplomat or as a U.S. official, you know that while we would like to have as many partners as possible, if we need to, we can go it alone. I don't think that's always the wisest course, but we can. Whereas at the UN, you're only as powerful as the consensus you can build. So it's a whole different tradecraft. 

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yeah. The power of your persuasion. The appeal that you could make. While you were serving at the United Nations, back in 2013, you came back to Ball State and you were received in an honorary degree. And in that commencement ceremony, you had an opportunity to address the students who were graduating and embarking upon the world. Was that—kind of a two part question: Was that a meaningful experience for you? And do you recall what was the message that you were trying to communicate to the graduates on that special day?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

I can't overstate what an honor it is when you think that, when you think there are thousands of people from Ball State who graduate every year, but there's only one spring commencement. And these thousands of students who graduate every year go on to wonderful careers. Wuite varied, some more prominent than others, but they go on with their careers.

And that I was selected to come back and give one of those addresses. It was an incredible honor and to get an honorary degree, but it was also intimidating because you look out from that—I mean, as you have done—you look out from the from the arts terrace and you see all these, you know, hundreds, thousands of students that are on the threshold of a new stage in life and some of them have a very clear idea of where they're going to go. Some of them are a little bit uncertain, but it's a threshold. They're really starting a new stage of life. 

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Hence the name commencement. A beginning. 

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Exactly. And you've got their parents there. Their parents who are proud but probably a bit wistful. This is a, you know, the new stage of life is starting. What in the world can you say to these people that has general relevance, that has general resonance among the crowd? And I think I talked a bit about my career because I think, I do think my career has turned out not because I planned it, but because I think it's turned out to be somewhat unique. But I talked about the fact that I was one of those people that never planned. Beyond the fact that I really wanted to join the Foreign Service once I knew what it was, my whole career was that sounds interesting. Arabic sounds interesting, Budapest sounds interesting, and ,u life worked out fine. That if you're one of those people, if you're a planner, that's great. But if you're not a planner, that's great too.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

One of the things that, when I'm asked by students, you know, for advice, one of my usual responses is just say yes. If somebody gives you an opportunity, say yes. Don't equivocate. If it's a good opportunity, embrace it. And the path will develop from saying yes. A couple of questions before we wrap up. The first question is, I want to ask you about your final diplomatic appointment in 2021. Secretary of State Antony Blinken asked you to serve as the special envoy, our country's special envoy, to the Horn of Africa. What made you say yes to that request or that opportunity?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Well, it's a good question, because when I retired from the State Department in 2012... I retired and then joined the UN, I had no intention of going back to work for the US government again. That chapter of my life was over. I was moving on. I did things at the UN like go to North Korea, go to Iran. You know, I did things that I couldn't have done as a State Department person and I had moved on. But when the Secretary of State asks you to do something, it goes back to what you just said. You say yes. When they ask you to serve, you say yes. And so I, I felt an obligation.

I asked, why me? Because I've never lived in the Horn of Africa. There are a lot of U.S., former U.S. diplomats or current U.S. diplomats who have lived in the Horn of Africa. And so I said, of course, but why are you turning to me for the Horn of Africa? My expertise with the State Department was the Middle East and North Africa, and that the UN, I had global responsibilities that included the horn, but I didn't focus exclusively on the horn.

And the response was look at the Horn of Africa, who's mucking around in a way that affects the stability of the Horn of Africa. It's the Saudis, the Egyptians, the Emiratis, the cutters, the Turks. Those are the people you know, Jeff. Those are the people you worked with. If someone just worked in Africa, they wouldn't have the contacts that you have to try to help stabilize a strategically important region

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yeah, and as you said earlier the benefit of a diplomat like you is understanding the other people who are engaging, whether it's the residents of the country or, in this instance, other countries who are interested in engaging there. So, wanting to turn back now to, from the Middle East and from Africa to Europe. We're anticipating another change in administration, and there's been a lot of debate and discussion about the impact of the transition of administrations to NATO.

Tell us your perspective on the impact that President Trump had during his first term that began in 2017. Then the transition to President Biden, and then now we anticipate the transition to a second term for President Trump. What do you anticipate will be the future of our engagement here in the United States with NATO and the future of that alliance?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Well, let me start out, if I may, President Mearns, by noting I was hired when Ronald Reagan was president into the Foreign Service. I retired when Barack Obama was president of the United States, I worked under Republican, Democratic administrations from Reagan through Obama. And every president, every secretary of state, understood that one of our most important assets as a country is the alliance system that we did so much to create and lead. That these alliances are force multipliers for U.S. interests and U.S. policies.

And I include NATO in that, in that list of things that every president from Reagan through Obama appreciated and understood. Now, I am concerned about the incoming Trump administration's view toward NATO. We'll see what it is. But I agree with questions from advisors to the incoming Trump administration that Europe does need to do more to protect its own security. So what I would like to see is not to have NATO blow up, not to suddenly have a bomb thrown at NATO. I would like to see a serious effort made to have some kind of transition to greater security leadership by the Europeans for their security. That we're still there. We're still a partner, because I believe NATO has been, as I said, a force multiplier for us, but that we are less dominant in NATO than we are now. But this would be an evolutionary process, not a bomb throwing. So when President Trump says Germany must pay more for its own defense, I agree with that. But I don't agree with saying if Germany doesn't do it tomorrow, we're just going to withdraw from NATO and blow it up.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Right. And it will be an important and delicate discussion, and true diplomacy in this instance among allies.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

I hope so, because in the first Trump administration, there was a discrepancy between the rhetoric which was bomb throwing and the reality which wasn't bomb throwing. It was, you know, pressure in the marshes, you know, start increasing your defense spending. But it wasn't bomb throwing. So I would hope that the bomb throwing rhetoric doesn't turn into bomb throwing against NATO itself.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Right. And that process that was started under President Trump's first administration with the other countries in NATO investing more in their own defense has continued. And we've seen some of that collaboration in the response to the Russian invasion in Ukraine.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Yes. And I go back to the Budapest experience we've talked about. When the Soviet troops finally withdrew from Hungary, in in 89, the Hungarians immediately wanted to join NATO. You know, I mean Hungary today we can talk about it's so different than the Hungary that emerged in in 89. But that it's quite different from the alliances that Russia has with countries like Belarus that are more a forced marriage type of alliance. You know, NATO is a voluntary, alliance that people want their countries to be part of.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Yeah. So I want to preface my last question. And folks who have listened to this podcast kind of know where I'm heading. But, in preparing for the conversation, I found an interview where you said your career in diplomacy was based on the idea of service, an idea that really was fostered and nurtured while you were a student here at Ball State.

And so my question really is about, beneficence. We're recording this conversation this afternoon in my office. If I look over your shoulder out the window, I can see that beautiful statue. And Beneficence is an enduring reminder of our enduring values. The values that you have embraced and embodied through your life of service as a diplomat.

So as you think about beneficence, as you come back to the campus today at Ball State, how does the quality of beneficence doing good for other people through service and philanthropy? What does beneficence mean to you?

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Let me answer a couple different ways. I mean, I spent my career in public service, you know, as a U.S. diplomat and as an international civil servant. So I spent my career in service. But of course, that was my job. And I was very happy to be able to have an advocation for service and my profession overlap entirely.

But now that I'm out, I have to look at this differently. I can no longer say, Oh, because I'm a public servant, I'm doing service. I'm doing beneficence. Now I have to think What do I, as Jeff Feltman, you know, a retired diplomat, what can I do to help? 

And a couple things. First, going back to how we started, I'm really glad that several of us, even though we don't have the deep pockets that say the Ball brothers had when they endowed university. I'm really glad that several of us came together to come up with an incentive fund in the name of Warren Vander Hill.

In my career, I saw so many opportunities—internships, conferences, research opportunities— that weren't paid. That only people who already had means could participate in. And we have set up, it's not a huge amount of money yet, but we've started the momentum behind. And it's a fund that would allow Ball State students to take advantage of research opportunities, of travel opportunities of, of internships that that they might not otherwise do because they can apply for a stipend.

So that's one financial beneficence that I'm really proud that I was part of, part of the founding group of four students that brought this together for students. But the other thing I'm doing that I feel like I need to do is take the experience I have and see where I can try to reduce conflict, prevent war. That sounds very big. That sounds huge. I mean, I know that that sounds probably pretentious. But there are nonprofits and foundations of which I'm serving as an advisor on the boards, etc., that are working in places like Africa, Latin America and elsewhere to try to broker understandings on small political or security conflicts that could go out of control, that could turn into war.

So if we're successful, you'll never hear of any of these wars. But I feel that preventing war now is something I have to continue to try to do, even though I'm no longer being paid for it. And then the final thing is prepare the next generation. Who are the upcoming diplomats, the upcoming peacemakers, the upcoming international civil servants who are going to be working on conflict prevention, conflict mediation?

I'm working with the UN on helping train the next generation of these sorts of people. Again, this is all pro bono, but this is the contribution I feel I have to I have to make, to take my experience and apply it to real world situations today and to help the next generation.

[GEOFF MEARNS]

Well, that's a remarkable statement. So thank you for your generous support of that scholarship fund. Thank you for joining me for this conversation today. And thank you very much, on behalf of every citizen of the United States and every citizen of the world, thank you for your service to our country and your service to peace in our world.

Thank you, Jeff.

[JEFF FELTMAN]

Thank you, President Mearns for having me.