Dignity, Dialogue, and Decision-Making: A Conversation with Harry Thomas

From a childhood in Harlem and Queens to the highest levels of American diplomacy, retired U.S. Ambassador Harry K. Thomas Jr. reflects on a career defined by leadership, resilience, and service. In this conversation, Ambassador Thomas shares how early family influences, lessons from mentors, and firsthand experiences in global crises shaped his approach to decision-making.

Ambassador Thomas is a former U.S. Ambassador to Bangladesh, the Philippines, and Zimbabwe, and has held senior leadership roles at the U.S. Department of State, including Director General of the Foreign Service and Executive Secretary. He currently serves as a Senior Kissinger Fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute.

Ambassador Thomas offers candid insights into the realities of diplomacy: balancing American values with strategic interests, engaging difficult counterparts, and leading teams through uncertainty. He also speaks to the personal sacrifices of Foreign Service life, the importance of empathy in leadership, and the enduring belief that most people around the world seek dignity, opportunity, and a voice in their future.

This episode is a lesson in leadership grounded in decades of lived experience at the intersection of policy, people, and global events. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

From neighborhoods like Harlem and Queens to the far corners of the earth, the path to international leadership often begins with formative experiences rooted close to home. For those who have navigated mixed communities, adapted across cultures, and learned to operate in complex environments, that foundation can become a powerful asset on the world stage. How does one translate those early influences into effective decision making in uncertain settings where success depends upon the capacity to bridge diverse or even opposing perspectives? Welcome to Brungart Laws Lang Up, where we provide a little extra perspective through conversations with individuals from across the spectrum of society. I'm Maurice Brungart, your host. I enjoy engaging with experienced, knowledgeable, and passionate people for the opportunity to force to enrich our understanding of the world through their eyes. The more we learn, the more likely we can become better versions of ourselves and guide others towards the same. Today's guest is retired U.S. Ambassador Harry K. Thomas Jr. He served as ambassador to Bangladesh, the Philippines, and Zimbabwe, along with senior leadership roles at the Department of State, such as Director General of the Foreign Service and Executive Secretary, as well as special assistant to former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. He currently is the Senior Kissinger Fellow at Yale University's Jackson Institute. Welcome to the program, Ambassador.

SPEAKER_01 1:20

Well, thank you for having me, Reese, and uh hello to all your listeners.

SPEAKER_00 1:25

Thank you very much. It's a privilege to have you here, and again, I'm grateful for your acceptance of this invitation. Take us back to uh your childhood days, you know, to Harlem, you know, your influences there, the neighborhood, the family.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

Well, I was born in Harlem, uh, where my parents had moved from South Carolina during the Great Migration. Uh, my father was one of 10, my mother one of eight. Uh, my father was a World War II and Korea veteran. Uh, my mother, they both had attended HBCUs, one in Georgia and one in South Carolina, and they moved with my elder sister uh to Harlem for better opportunities along with many aunts, uncles, and cousins. But when I was three, we moved to Queens, to St. Albans, where we lived with my uncle and his wife, and we lived with them for one year before moving not even a mile away in St. Albans to another neighborhood where I grew up. And uh it was a great place to grow up. Most of the families were from uh the south. They were all African American on our street except for one family that did not move. Uh there was uh it was a lot of white flight, uh, but not among that family. And um it was a two-parent household. It was Queen, so you had to have a car. Most people had two cars. Uh, most mothers and fathers worked. As I said, my mother was a social worker. She got her master's from NYU and later became a director. My father became a postal worker and then opened his own restaurant and had an apartment above it. Uh so um, and we were lucky. The girls were all two or three years older than us, and the boys were all the same age. So we played a lot of sports together on the same street, rooted for the Mets. Uh, I rooted for the Giants, and we went to public schools. I went to PS 118 Junior High School 109, and then I took a test and went to Brooklyn Technical High School, which was and still is the largest public high school in the United States. It was an engineering high school, it's one of the greatest high schools in America. At that time, there were uh almost 6,000 boys and two girls, because they just considered girls didn't do engineering. Uh now it's about 35% uh girls uh at tech. And so that was my childhood.

SPEAKER_00 4:08

Uh, sir, so you prompted some questions in in my mind. And it's it's the following. So you mentioned your father was both a World War II and a Korean veteran, um, and your mom being a social worker. You obviously, your early childhood days were still during the times of segregation in the United States. Um, and that kind of resonated with me because I'm just on the verge of finishing by Booker T. Washington, his uh autobiography, Up from Slavery. And I found it very interesting how he described uh his relationships at that time in the 1800s when he was founding the Tuskegee Institute, and he actually presented uh, you know, former uh slave owners and whites in the South uh in a positive light. So not something you would necessarily expect. And uh the the message in there was a lot about uh looking forward as opposed to backward. So, how did your father and your mother's experiences influence you? Did you, for example, ever like ask your dad, you know, why did you serve you know in the military uh knowing how they were treating uh you at the time as a society?

SPEAKER_01 5:25

Everybody's dad served in the military when I grew up. Everybody's dad was in World War II. It wasn't a question. They were they were drafted. Um, and I don't think that they had any uh uh qualms uh uh about it. Obviously, they served in segregated units. Um uh my father told me that uh uh you know they were dig ditchers, then he was a typist, but he was when he went in the Pacific Theater, um the pilots would take volunteers on flights if they liked you. And they would take you, uh they'd put you as a gunner. And um so a bunch of the black kids who were Negroes or colored at that time went on flights as gunners uh with the pilot's permission, but never got credit for it. Uh and he said that was a lot better than digging dishes. Um and uh Korea, he did have problems because that the military was integrated, and he told me about fights they had among enlisted men, in particular, uh a white man who did not want to take orders from him. And in those days, he said you had to take your shirt off, your chevrons off, and then you could fight. Um, but there was no question about not serving him. He and all the men in my neighborhood were very patriotic. Um my mom participated in the march on Washington with Dr. King. She participated in many, many marches. And my dad, when he got back from World War II and went back to King Street, South Carolina, he and others uh tried to register the vote. South Carolina was a very democratic state at that time. They made them walk through manure at the courthouse, and finally he was allowed to register the vote, led by a school teacher, but only as a Republican, which in South Carolina in 1946 meant your vote didn't count much. Uh, but none of this dimmed their patriotism. That was never questioned. There was always optimism. Uh uh, and remember, my parents and my elder sister, they'd all grown up in an all-black community. So growing in the South, so being in an all-black community in New York wasn't anything else that they is what they expected.

SPEAKER_00 8:05

And do you think this is uh what placed you on the path towards serving in the federal government? Uh and let me uh add to that, in an alternate universe, what other direction do you think you would have gone in, professionally speaking?

SPEAKER_01 8:23

Well, I wanted to go into the military because my uncles were in the my uncles were career members of the U.S. military.

SPEAKER_00 8:29

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 8:31

Uh and uh Brooklyn Tech at that time sent more people to the military academies than any school in the United States. Uh, but I decided I wanted to go in the Navy and I did not have the eyesight. Um, I wore glasses. Uh uh, but uh Earl Mosley, another guy from my high school in my neighborhood, went to the Naval Academy and served honorably in the in the Marine Corps. Um, he got the appointment, and I salute him. Um and then I decided I wanted to be an attorney. Um, so when I went to the College of the Holy Cross, I went in there with the intention of going to law school. Uh, but when I got out, I decided that senior year I didn't want to go to law school. I had no love or for the law. And I wanted to save the world. And I went to Columbia University to do urban planning, and um that changed my life because I met a man named Edward J. Logue, who was my boss. And uh Ed Logue was a famous urban planner. Um, he had run the Boston Redevelopment Authority, the New Haven Redevelopment Authority. Uh, he had rebuilt Roebood Island in New York. He was a graduate of Yale and its law school, and to show you the times difference, he was a navigator in World War II. And he used to tell us about being escorted by the Tuskegee Airmen. But when he got married to the dean of Yale College's daughter, he had to convert from Catholicism to Episcopalian because you know they weren't having any Irishmen in the Yale, in the in the among the Yaleys in those days. Um, so that uh we made so much progress in the United States. Uh, but Ed Log had been in the Foreign Service, and he was the one that told me about the Foreign Service. Uh so I worked for him for three years, then I went into the Foreign Service, and I only took the Foreign Service exam because of Ed uh telling me about it. I knew nothing about the Foreign Service. I had never traveled overseas, did not speak a foreign language, and um he was my boss, so you do what your bosses say. And uh it turned out to be fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 11:00

And what was the world like at that time when you entered the Foreign Service?

SPEAKER_01 11:06

Well, President Reagan was uh still in his first term, it was the Cold War dominated. Uh so everything was Soviet, the the Soviets versus the United States through that lens. Uh, but as a first tour officer, you are doing counselor work, visa work, which they still do as first tour. So uh far from being a cold warrior, you're a person that's telling people yes or no to uh tourist or business visas, student visas. Uh there are a lot of adoptions at that time in Peru. Uh, but you're also helping American citizens. There are a lot of Americans who travel to see Machu Picchu and the NASCAR lines and other things. Uh some of them have uh injuries, uh, some get in trouble, uh, things like that, where we assist. We had to visit Americans in prison, and they still do, uh, but uh who are mostly drug dealers. Uh improve your language capability uh tremendously. Uh when I came home, I was thinking in Spanish. I had to grope for words in English. And uh so you start to understand the society in ways that you cannot if you don't speak the language or or learn something of the culture. So it was a tremendous benefit.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

And after Peru, um can you think of uh what comes to mind as individuals in the Foreign Service who you felt actually influenced you, whether it was in your first assignment, a second one?

SPEAKER_01 12:49

Well, uh Harlan Lee, because I was sent to Kaduna, Nigeria, up in the north of Nigeria, um, and my uh counsel general was a man named Harlan Lee. He was born in Hawaii, a Stanford graduate, and he was very organized, very deliberate. He taught me how to draft, as we call it in the Foreign Service and writing. Um, and he was very patient. And our ambassador who was in Lagos was Princeton Lyman, a great man, uh, very kind. Uh he was one of several children of Russian immigrants, and they all named their children after Ivy Lee schools, Princeton, Harvard, and others. Yes, true. And they all went undergraduate to Berkeley and Princeton, went to Harvard, and Harvard went to Princeton and things like that. Um but those were two great people. Um the embass uh because uh Mr. Lee had four or five children, Ambassador Lyman would stay with us when he came up uh to visit Kaduna. And uh, you know, it's a place where nothing worked. So you had to you had to do everything. And um I remember looking down the house when he got up one morning, and the painting that we had just put up the night before fell on his head.

SPEAKER_00 14:29

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 14:31

Uh, but he just picked it up and said nothing. Uh uh when my wife, uh this is my first wife, when she was pregnant um and had to be evacuated to stay with my parents in Queens. He uh passing through New York uh went and visited her. Uh JFK wasn't more than 20 minutes from our house with an extraordinary gesture.

SPEAKER_00 15:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 15:01

Uh because she had a difficult pregnancy. Um, so learning and and that did not mean uh because they were both kind and organized, that they didn't hold people accountable. They held us accountable, both uh Harlan Lee and Ambassador Lyman. Uh, but at the same time, they really uh were extraordinary in how they took care of the people who worked for them. So that was lifelong lessons for me.

SPEAKER_00 15:34

So correct me if I'm wrong, but what I'm picking up on, the things that are that struck you about these two individuals uh was I take it, their empathy.

SPEAKER_01 15:44

Yes. And you can be empathetic and still hold people accountable and be a good leader. You don't have to be a yeller, a screamer, a curse, or you don't have to de uh human dehumanize people. Uh and I that never left me.

SPEAKER_00 16:03

As we move forward through your career, and you're operating now at the center uh within the State Department as Executive Secretary, Director of the Operations Center. Uh pull back the curtain uh for our listeners what that entailed uh from the interactions you had with senior executive leadership, subordinate, your peers, uh, because you know it's it's a dynamic, fast-moving environment, and you got to make a lot of decisions.

SPEAKER_01 16:38

Yes, I worked in the Operations Center, which is our 24-hour alerting briefing and crisis uh office uh three different occasions as a senior watch office, as a deputy director and director for over five years. And then when I was executive secretary, they were under me. Uh, it's a dynamic office. We work shift work, we respond initially to crises. Uh I can remember that's when uh President Clinton sent missiles into uh Africa and Afghanistan after there were terrorist attacks. Uh United States. It was where I was working on August 7, 1998, when our embassies in Nairobi and Tanzania were bombed and we lost um colleagues, local colleagues from Kenya and Tanzania, as well as Americans and their families, um, and having to make those initial calls and organize task forces. Uh when I was executive secretary, we led the largest evacuation up until Afghanistan, since World War II, when we evacuated Americans and our allies and partners out of Lebanon in the summer of 2006. Uh, and it was a successful operation uh where we worked closely with the United States military, particularly the Navy and the Marines, to evacuate our citizens and allies and partners uh over several weeks. Uh, very proud of the colleagues I worked with at that time, uh, many of whom went on to leadership positions. Um we worked initially for uh Ambassador Christy Kenny, and then Ambassador Carl Hoffman, and then I was director and as executive secretary. Um you had the confidence of Secretary Rice, a tremendous human being. Uh I remember when we had Lebanon and there was a lot of pressure because it had American students and in Beirut and other places, a lot of people from Dearborn, Michigan, who are of Lebanese descent, and there was a lot of pressure on Congress. And uh she stood behind me the whole time uh because it takes time to organize, uh, getting people out by ship, uh, by helicopter, by sea. Uh, but uh having her stand behind us and uh shield me from outside criticism uh was uh was um something I'll never forget.

SPEAKER_00 19:16

Reflecting back on that time, uh what do you think helped prepare you for that type of work in the Operations Center, interacting with uh Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice? And what do you think? Where did the institution falter in not preparing you?

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Yeah, because you always have successes and failures, and you also have lack of training. Um the Foreign Service initially was not the best in training other than languages. So it didn't prepare people for uh leadership and management in much the way the military uh does. It was like, well, you will you will figure it out. Um so yes, the successes I had came from watching how other people acted in crisis situations. Um so I learned from that. And the the failures I had was forgetting how I, for me, forgetting how I watched them act and uh getting out of a good zone. And uh, but I'm I was heartened that in the 90s we put in a lot of training programs to try to put people in in learning how better to be leaders. Uh, but that for me, I had to read a lot of books uh on on leadership. Uh the favorite one for me was Rules and Tools for Leaders. Uh I read that um uh it's uh in a checklist form also that helped me. And I used that whenever I took over uh an office or an organization uh to help steer me clear. But then certain things you pocket. I saw Ambassador Jeff David out during crises when his staff was working 18 to 24 hours a day go out and buy everybody pizza out of his own money. You're not getting reimbursed for this. I said, okay, this is the things you need to do because people will run through a wall for you. I saw uh other people buy all the ladies in the embassy flowers on Valentine's Day. So when I became ambassador, I always did that. Um I always wrote um Christmas, Hanukkah, or Passover letters to the parents of the Marines guarding us as well as our first tour officers. None of these were my original ideas. I saw other people employ employ. Employ this. But that didn't mean I didn't make mistakes. I held a press conference when we were charged with sending people to Afghanistan and Iraq, and a person asked me a question. He was being a jerk and provocative. And I should have taken 10 seconds to breathe and answer calmly, and I did not. And I would ended up being on TV over the weekend as you know the CNN worst person of the year. So that humbles, that humbles you.

SPEAKER_00 22:59

Did you find during these times when you're actually occupying, you know, now these positions of uh influencing authority that you would every now and then revert to some lesson or experience back from your days uh in New York, you know, with your family? Anything that, you know, all of a sudden, some comment your father or your mom made or a neighbor, and all of a sudden, hey, that makes sense for this situation.

SPEAKER_01 23:29

Well, uh, my childhood neighbor Marcus McCann and I always talk about our our fathers and how, you know, if we did something stupid, they would just look at us and shake our head. And, you know, you don't want to do anything stupid that your dads would uh disapprove of. Um and and I read the Bible a lot. Uh my parents, we went to church every Sunday. Um, so I continued to do that, uh, particularly when I was in leadership positions. It it calmed the New Testament calmed me. Uh, but at the same time, uh my parents made sure, although they worked all the time, as did our other parents, that they went to every kid's event. So I tried to do my best to go to all my daughters' events, no matter what. And I found out when I was overseas, particularly, uh, if the ambassador goes to the events of his or her children and takes leaves work, other people feel comfortable doing that also. If if he doesn't, then they don't because they're afraid. And after all, you're only in the Foreign Service for a portion of your life, but you have your children for your entire life. Um, so you need to go to their their music events, there's their, you know, I coached the baseball team. We never won any games. Uh so I wasn't the best coach. Uh, but you know, I went there. Um, so those things, because everybody's ambitious, everybody wants to do well. Um, you want to make your parents proud. Uh my sister and I were blessed to have great parents. My neighbors were blessed to have uh great parents on our street. Uh these were, you know, civil servants, policemen, sanitation workers. Uh we had several policemen, we had a couple of sanitation workers. Um we had people who worked uh motormen on the on the trains, civil servants. And being a civil servant in New York uh gave you decent health care, uh access to good schools for your for your kids, and dignity if you had a you know you had a good job.

SPEAKER_00 25:50

Speaking of this important uh family, briefly, um one is overseas, and unfortunately the Foreign Service tends to be overlooked. I mean, from my perspective in our society, you know, our military and they deserve the credit, but they tend to be in the spotlight. But I think a lot of people overlook the sacrifices people in the Foreign Service are making. Uh, it takes you away from the family that raised you, made you who you are, the neighborhoods that made you, the schools and so forth. Uh, in addition to the sacrifices spouses make, because in one sense they're following the Foreign Service employee. Um, at times, looking back, did you ever reflect on this? How it took you away from your family back home?

SPEAKER_01 26:42

Oh, yes, especially in the early years when there was, you know, Peru, you could just write letters. But my mom visited me and my aunt's in Peru. They came to Kaduna, Nigeria. Oh, wow. Um they came to Zimbabwe and India, and they would cook over us. Uh you could make an occasional phone call from a phone booth in Nigeria where you paid in advance. But that was everybody's world.

SPEAKER_00 27:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 27:13

Um, and we were known, we I remember, uh, you know, my father said, look, you know, when he was in World War II in uh Asia, it was tough. It was hard. And so he didn't want to hear any whining from me. He was very clear about that. So I I understood that. But that was our world. But so, and you miss funerals, you miss weddings, you miss births, and you can't make that up. And that is a tremendous sacrifice. Uh, but at the same time, you become so close, especially in those days, to your fellow colleagues because there was no internet, there was no cable TV. Uh, the Navy used to send around black and white World War II movies. So if you really didn't want to go crazy, you better make sure that you're doing something socially with that kid from Mississippi or North Dakota, that Mormon, uh, whomever, because otherwise you're just gonna sit in your room. So we did a lot of things together, whether it was plays, uh, running the hash, playing tennis, playing softball, all of those things, which I hope the young folks are doing today, uh, to make us closer with our colleagues who, in 20, 30 years of working with these people, when you got into crises and they were also in leadership positions and your counterparts, they could trust you and you could trust them, and you didn't have to always have to go through the bureaucracy to get things done. Uh, but now in my last tours, uh, as people got older, um more secure financially, a lot of friends visited me uh in the Philippines and Zimbabwe. Uh, but yeah, you miss you miss family events, and that uh that always hurts. But you know, remember during Iraq and Afghanistan, uh one out of every four Foreign Service officers serve there with our military colleagues, without our families. Still to this day, if you want to get promoted uh into the senior ranks, you have to spend one year at a danger or hardship post without your family. Um and let's I'm not in any way saying that we uh share the same danger as the military, but we do sacrifice, we do work with them. Obviously, I was working in the old executive office building on 9-11, and um that was uh when my brief was Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, and violent dash. Uh so again, another date that I will never forget, but tremendous leadership from President Bush and Secretary Rice after that, uh, and Secretary Powell and others.

SPEAKER_00 30:10

When you think of your uh last overseas assignment, and you had mentioned uh this engagement uh back in the early days of the Foreign Service, do you think nowadays the way the world has developed and technology uh it actually uh creates barriers for that type of interpersonal engagement? Now that someone can be overseas, but they can stream their movies, even if they're in Timbuktu, so to say. And then there's actual less interpersonal relationships that would then foster a strong sense of community at a diplomatic mission?

SPEAKER_01 30:49

Well, yeah, but then it comes up to the ambassador to make sure uh even in Zimbabwe, uh, where we had very good internet, my last post, we made uh I I was having cigar parties for the guys, and these women said, Hey, you're not having anything for us. And they were professionals, and uh so they wanted to do a um Kentucky Derby party, and um women are always better than men at doing it, and I'm I assume much favored having their their parties with games and drinks than just the all the men. Um uh so you have these things that are inclusive. And uh to make sure uh that you'll just have a barbecue uh for for the families, because you know, sometimes it's detrimental having somebody just watching Netflix or streaming all day or being on the internet in all weekend and not going out socially. Um so we did a lot of those things with groups. Uh we had uh the most a lot of funny things, but the most important thing is that everybody was together and you get to know people because when you're leading and supervising people, it's very important to know know what makes them tick, because that can help in in the crises and things like that or give them confidence. Um so we did a lot of that. Uh we were having uh when we had when there was the military took took over in Zimbabwe, uh my deputy uh reminded me how important it was to have a town hall meeting so that we could employ, employ, and give information to the families about what was going on. And we did uh in the morning, on Saturday morning at her house, uh where we had breakfast and just gave people uh an update unclassified on what was going on. And while we were doing that, there was a march downtown in front of where our embassy was in those days. And it was across the street from the Russian embassy. And uh Washington was very concerned that uh might need the violence. Uh after all, you have 50,000 Americans that travel to Zimbabwe each year for tourism because of Victoria Falls, another 15,000 Japanese, uh, even though that was a well a few hours away, would people be safe? And uh we had the Marines still at the embassy. And this was the advantage of technology. As those people marched past our embassy, they shouted USA, USA. And that was in a country whose leadership cursed us often, called us bio names often, uh, because we supported democracy and human rights. Um so when we support democracy and human rights, people will chant USA, USA. When we don't, they will curse us. But we were able to, thanks to the Marines uh on the rooftop, taking videos of that. And we were able to um shoot the videos to Washington and that let them know wow, we don't have to contemplate sending troops in from Djibouti, my joint special task force uh in the Horn of Africa, and that people are going to be safe. So that was a major benefit. Uh, in the old days, I would have had to call them on the phone and try to convince them. But just that video uh was remarkable.

SPEAKER_00 34:53

What do you think resonated with local Zimbabweans uh that would be important for uh anyone uh to understand that created this atmosphere of support for the United States, appreciation for the United States?

SPEAKER_01 35:12

We s we supported them in several ways. Uh they were subjugated, not stupid, and that's always the case. People know what's going on in their country. One, we had PEP bar, President Bush's president's emergency program for AIDS relief. Um every family in Zimbabwe had been devastated by HIV AIDS, and the United States was a leader in um support, and Zimbabwe, because of its high literacy rates, uh, was a success. And they knew that the U.S., in particular, President Bush, was behind that. They also knew that every time there was a rigged election, um we call the government, the ruling party out on rigging elections, we call them out on beating human beings, we call them out on uh discrimination against the gay community. And uh while we try to get others to join us, rarely, other than on occasion, a British ambassador or Canadian ambassador, most times it had to be the United States, um, who would speak out about this, but we would fund uh civil society organizations. We'd work with Thompson Reuters who were training journalists. We work with Google who would try to educate people about elections. And we did not want to take sides in all of this, but we wanted to show that giving people a chance, an opportunity was important. And I will go to my grave believing that most people, not all, but most people in the world want democracy. That doesn't mean they want a Westminster tile democracy or Republican-type democracy. They want some type of democracy that allows them freedom of speech. Um and uh because in Zimbabwe, when the government fell, before the government fell, people were never afraid to say a word. On occasion, they might say a joke, but it would be, you know, satire or irony, nothing direct. As soon as that government fell, everybody was making jokes about them. The way we make jokes about President Trump or President Obama or President Biden without fear or retribution. And uh they probably can't do that again in Zimbabwe because of the dictatorship, but they they wanted that. And they wanted to talk about schools. Uh they wanted uh so and they wanted to choose their representatives in terms of you know, members of parliament for them or congresspersons for us.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

Um so at the end of the day, people just want to be valued, people want to be heard. Yes, and they want dignity. Okay. When you mentioned uh speaking out, uh, you know, I came across a previous interview of yours uh about your time when you were leading our diplomatic mission in the Philippines and talking about uh, you know, having to interact with government officials who were known or heavily suspected of having participated in extrajudicial uh killings of innocent individuals, journalists, so on and so forth. Uh but you made this comment that really resonated with me that yes, this is unfortunate, and you know, uh at that time and now, you know, we are still pro-human rights, but we don't live and operate in a vacuum. Uh, and that is something that is sometimes overlooked. What misconceptions would you uh like to address for the public to understand, you know, this this delicate balance of trying to represent? I mean, we are still an imperfect society, an imperfect government, uh, but it's it's been around for 250 years. Uh how do you balance that when you're dealing with people who, yeah, they have questionable past, so to say?

SPEAKER_01 39:40

Well, we're not looking for virgins. We understand how the world works. Uh, you need to have a decent relationship with the government of the day. Uh, one, because our most important job as a diplomat is to protect American citizens. So if there is a crisis, that these people will help you protect the American citizens. No, number one. And so in most cases, you any criticism uh and candor, you want to be in private. You don't want to embarrass somebody or uh force them to respond in a uh negative way. Uh the fact that we did previously um give foreign aid was one to give humanitarian aid, which we should do, but to gain influence and leverage. And clearly, when you're giving people military aid as well as humanitarian aid, you have not a hundred percent leverage, let me be clear, but you do have some leverage and uh especially in private meetings to get them to do things that you need, whether that is allowing more military U.S. military bases, troops, uh training to take place in the country, well, which is important, whether that leads to more cooperation on narcotics, on human trafficking, all of those things you can do. And it helps if you are uh assisting them. So if you want their military to do something, if you're training their military with our military, if that allow that training allows our military to train in places that they normally would not be able to train, if that means that you're sending their officers and non-commissioned officers to the United States for training, which includes human rights training, um, those officers typically sent to the United States of the best from their countries. When they rise and become flag and general officers in 20 years, you will have kept in touch with them, and those people uh will appreciate and we hope like and respect the United States. But similarly with people who are working in narcotics, uh similarly in veterans' affairs. Uh, in the Philippines, we gave uh every year the Veterans Hospital of the Philippines financial aid. Um, and that was not money, but through CAT scan machines, MRI machines, all of these things. And why? Because they had been part of the United States Army up through World War II. They had fought with us in World War II. Three of them had won the Medal of Honor. Thousands of them had died uh fighting for the United States, and it took us until Obama was president to compensate them for their service over 60 years. Um and we built our own veterans facility in the Philippines for our veterans, which were 300,000 when I left. And uh mostly Filipino Americans who had fought uh in the Navy and the Marine Corps, with some in the Air Force and the Army, uh, who had decided to retire back to the Philippines for family or cost reasons. So these things people need to understand. It's a good use of your tax money.

SPEAKER_00 43:35

With that in mind, what what suggestions based on your experiences? What decisions should people be making or how should they be making them when you're interacting with others, whether it's, you know, in a diplomatic environment, you know, overseas or at the local level? And how do you reach across the divide? I mean, there's a tendency to just completely cut people off because they don't uh they're not uh in agreement, they don't share the same ideologies, or in this case, dealing with people of, yes, uh, they've engaged in violations of law or ethics, morals. How should one approach those types of relationships to influence them towards a better path?

SPEAKER_01 44:27

Well, uh, Reese, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Yes. You can't influence everybody. So you can't change everybody on a local or foreign level. Uh, but you can get them to understand you. You can get most people to listen to your point of view. Um, and that is overseas in the states, this works the same way. Sitting down with people, knowing them. So in the Foreign Service, we have to learn languages. So you learn Spanish, you learn Hindi, you learn Tagalog, you learn Bengali, andor even a smattering of it. People understand, oh, this person's trying to learn my culture. So let me listen to what they have to say. And maybe I can teach them about my culture, or maybe um they can learn more, and people will respect you more when you try to do that. Um, I live in Florida now. I lived in Arizona. Arizona was very different from New York, let me tell you. Uh as uh as is Florida, but um when I go out to have cigars tonight, I sit with a broad demographic group. Let me tell you, extremely broad. Uh some are unwilling to listen to people, but most will. And they may not know much about foreign policy, they may not know much about defense, they may get their news from the radio or TV station on the left or right that is a little wacky. Um, but they'll listen to you if you listen to them. If you listen to their point of view, whether they're telling you how to be uh a plumber or electrician, or they're telling you why they dislike people on food stamps or people on public assistance, listen. Don't retort first and then get to know them, get to know about their families, where they went to school. All of these things will get people to listen to you. May not change their minds. Always, let's not kid ourselves. Uh, but they'll they're it'll they'll become more thoughtful unless they're an idiot. Most people don't want to be seen as an idiot, even in public or groups. Most people don't want to be seen like that.

SPEAKER_00 46:59

And with in that vein, uh listening to people. Uh I don't know if you've ever had the experience of working in a under toxic leadership, but what suggestions would you have for individuals who find themselves in those situations? Uh, again, whether it's in government, business, local politics, uh, how they should best navigate that type of situation.

SPEAKER_01 47:27

Unfortunately, we all, if you work long enough, you're going to be in a toxic embodiment.

SPEAKER_00 47:31

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 47:33

That's not going to go away. And sometimes you have a toxic leader. And I really disliked working under a couple of toxic leaders. Uh, but I learned from them what not to do when I got in a leadership position. And that was not immediate, but it's tough and it hurts you. The second thing I would say um, you also have toxic colleagues, some colleagues who won't support you or steal your work or talk back about you. And that can be that can be hurtful. But that's why you have to step back uh during these times, and then it's not easy to take care of your own mental health, whether that's through exercise, cooking, prayer to the good Lord. Today is Passover, we're in Holy Week. Um spend time with your loved ones and don't bring your job home. But you know, that is very difficult. I don't want to make light of it because uh when you're in a toxic, when you have a toxic boss or colleagues, it affects your home life and and other things. You can bring these things home. So you really have to find an outlet. I have a colleague now who has that, and his outlet is through through golf with us, you know, where you can talk about that uh after at the 19th hole, the fame 19th hole. Uh so you've got to find something, uh, but it's not easy. And the thing I I know now, years later, when you see some of these people and you still go, I hate that SOD. You realize that person doesn't even remember or care. They don't. You were never important to them, you know. Uh so try to have some balance and and separation because 20 years hence, they're not gonna remember or care.

SPEAKER_00 49:42

You're now in the role of academia. Uh that strikes me as someone who wants to give back. Uh take all the experience, uh, the knowledge that you've absorbed over the years. Um what do you find that you're focusing on uh at this level?

SPEAKER_01 50:08

Lisa, I first taught at Arizona State University, which is one of the largest public institutions in the nation. And now I'm completing my eighth and final year at Yale. And um these are kids. These are somebody's kids. And the most important thing that you can teach or reinforce is leadership skills. Uh, I teach courses on crisis response, on economics and trade. And it still comes back to how leaders act, whether in crisis or not. Are these ethical people? Are they do they deny themselves? Do they do like uh the Kiwi uh rugby world championship team when they the man of the match still has to mop the floor and wash clothes? The leaders eat less. And we may be talking about uh finance, trade, music, uh terrorism. But how you react, how you combat, how you overcome to me comes from leadership. And I try to imbue that in all of that, and there are many different ways to lead. You don't have to be a rah-rah leader, um, you don't have to be loud, you can be quiet, you can be loud, you can be, but there are many ways. Uh, but you have to treat people decently, and you have to give them opportunities uh to uh get ahead of you. So for the students that have had the privilege of teaching at Arizona State and uh Yale, um that is the most important, and they're not much different. Very different institutions, very different resources, but at the end of the day, some kid forgets their, you know, my homework, the dog, the dog ate my homework.

SPEAKER_00 52:19

Some things don't change.

SPEAKER_01 52:20

Yeah, they're kids. They're kids.

SPEAKER_00 52:22

Do you do you tell them to read the book that uh you always had uh next to you, Rules and Tools? I tell them to read two books. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 52:31

I tell them to read Rules and Tools, but I make them read uh biography of Robert Grassoni by uh Robert Kaplan. And that is about Bob Grassoni, who Robert Kaplan calls America's greatest humanitarian. And the reason I want the students to read that is Bob was a child of Jewish immigrants from New York. He grew up in the city uh with parents who were disaffected. Um he never did well in school. He was a high school dropout. He went to Vietnam. He served in Vietnam. He wasn't in combat, but he served. Never graduated from high school, uh college, and by circumstances, he is uh great with languages, listening, and uh he listens to people and he understands that everybody knows their own neighborhood. So when you go into an area after earthquake or a civil war or terrorism, those people know more about what they need to bring their neighborhood or their community or their country back than an outsider. And you got to listen to them. And in listening to them, they'll say, hey, we don't need this timber. We have timber, we need nails, or maybe we need uh screws, but we know how to do this. We can build our own buildings. Um, and so he did that all around the world, and he was able in ways that us in the Foreign Service cannot influence President Reagan, President Clinton, President Obama, President Bush. A great book by a high about a high school dropout.

SPEAKER_00 54:20

When you look at your students and engage with them as we come to a close, what do you see as our greatest ch challenge and our greatest strength?

SPEAKER_01 54:34

Well, 250 years of trying to do the right thing, not always succeeding in doing the right thing. And what we need to tell children is the things we did well and the things we didn't. They're smart enough. They can handle the truth. And what we must avoid is selfishness, uh putting ourselves first over others, believing we can go alone. We learn bitter lessons in Iraq and Afghanistan. Um not listening to people trying to go alone, thinking it was our way was the only way. Cannot do that. Just like you need your neighbors and your teachers and your clerics in your neighborhood, you need that overseas. And at the end of the day, nobody wants to be dissed. As you just said, people want dignity. You can't ask somebody to help you after you publicly diss them. Uh, so that is what uh uh I impart. I have a grandson now, and I want uh his parents and him to learn that from me and from each other. That's more important that my grandson and your children and grandchildren have a world where America is still a force for good.

SPEAKER_00 56:06

Sir, thank you for sharing your thoughts and observations. Uh, this has been a true education to our listeners. Thank you for joining us on Brungart Laws Lanyat, where we provide a little extra perspective because the devil's always in the details. Uh, please continue following us. Let us know what you think, share with others. Ambassador, again, gratitude.

SPEAKER_01 56:27

Thank you, Reese. Have a great, great week, and God bless.

SPEAKER_00 56:31

Same.