Dear Mr. Secretary:
   

    I am writing you to submit my
    resignation from the Foreign Service of the
 United States
    and from my position as Political Counselor in
 U.S. Embassy
    Athens, effective March 7. I do so with a
 heavy heart. The
    baggage of my upbringing included a felt
 obligation to give
    something back to my country. Service as a
 U.S. diplomat
    was a dream job. I was paid to understand
 foreign languages
    and cultures, to seek out diplomats,
 politicians, scholars
    and journalists, and to persuade them that
 U.S. interests
    and theirs fundamentally coincided. My faith
 in my country
    and its values was the most powerful weapon in
 my
    diplomatic arsenal.
   

    It is inevitable that during twenty years with
 the State
    Department I would become more sophisticated
 and cynical
    about the narrow and selfish bureaucratic
 motives that
    sometimes shaped our policies. Human nature is
 what it is,
    and I was rewarded and promoted for
 understanding human
    nature. But until this Administration it had
 been possible
    to believe that by upholding the policies of
 my president I
    was also upholding the interests of the
 American people and
    the world. I believe it no longer.
   

    The policies we are now asked to advance are
 incompatible
    not only with American values but also with
 American
    interests. Our fervent pursuit of war with
 Iraq is driving
    us to squander the international legitimacy
 that has been
    America's most potent weapon of both offense
 and defense
    since the days of Woodrow Wilson. We have
 begun to
    dismantle the largest and most effective web
 of
    international relationships the world has ever
 known. Our
    current course will bring instability and
 danger, not
    security.
   

    The sacrifice of global interests to domestic
 politics and
    to bureaucratic self-interest is nothing new,
 and it is
    certainly not a uniquely American problem.
 Still, we have
    not seen such systematic distortion of
 intelligence, such
    systematic manipulation of American opinion,
 since the war
    in Vietnam. The September 11 tragedy left us
 stronger than
    before, rallying around us a vast
 international coalition
    to cooperate for the first time in a
 systematic way against
    the threat of terrorism. But rather than take
 credit for
    those successes and build on them, this
 Administration has
    chosen to make terrorism a domestic political
 tool,
    enlisting a scattered and largely defeated Al
 Qaeda as its
    bureaucratic ally. We spread disproportionate
 terror and
    confusion in the public mind, arbitrarily
 linking the
    unrelated problems of terrorism and Iraq. The
 result, and
    perhaps the motive, is to justify a vast
 misallocation of
    shrinking public wealth to the military and to
 weaken the
    safeguards that protect American citizens from
 the heavy
    hand of government. September 11 did not do as
 much damage
    to the fabric of American society as we seem
 determined to
    so to ourselves. Is the Russia of the late
 Romanovs really
    our model, a selfish, superstitious empire
 thrashing toward
    self-destruction in the name of a doomed
 status quo?
   

    We should ask ourselves why we have failed to
 persuade more
    of the world that a war with Iraq is
 necessary. We have
    over the past two years done too much to
 assert to our
    world partners that narrow and mercenary U.S.
 interests
    override the cherished values of our partners.
 Even where
    our aims were not in question, our consistency
 is at issue.
    The model of Afghanistan is little comfort to
 allies
    wondering on what basis we plan to rebuild the
 Middle East,
    and in whose image and interests. Have we
 indeed become
    blind, as Russia is blind in Chechnya, as
 Israel is blind
    in the Occupied Territories, to our own
 advice, that
    overwhelming military power is not the answer
 to terrorism?
    After the shambles of post-war Iraq joins the
 shambles in
    Grozny and Ramallah, it will be a brave
 foreigner who forms
    ranks with Micronesia to follow where we lead.
   

    We have a coalition still, a good one. The
 loyalty of many
    of our friends is impressive, a tribute to
 American moral
    capital built up over a century. But our
 closest allies are
    persuaded less that war is justified than that
 it would be
    perilous to allow the U.S. to drift into
 complete
    solipsism. Loyalty should be reciprocal. Why
 does our
    President condone the swaggering and
 contemptuous approach
    to our friends and allies this Administration
 is fostering,
    including among its most senior officials. Has
 "oderint dum
    metuant" really become our motto?
   

    I urge you to listen to America's friends
 around the world.
    Even here in Greece, purported hotbed of
 European
    anti-Americanism, we have more and closer
 friends than the
    American newspaper reader can possibly
 imagine. Even when
    they complain about American arrogance, Greeks
 know that
    the world is a difficult and dangerous place,
 and they want
    a strong international system, with the U.S.
 and EU in
    close partnership. When our friends are afraid
 of us rather
    than for us, it is time to worry. And now they
 are afraid.
    Who will tell them convincingly that the
 United States is
    as it was, a beacon of liberty, security, and
 justice for
    the planet?
   

    Mr. Secretary, I have enormous respect for
 your character
    and ability. You have preserved more
 international
    credibility for us than our policy deserves,
 and salvaged
    something positive from the excesses of an
 ideological and
    self-serving Administration. But your loyalty
 to the
    President goes too far. We are straining
 beyond its limits
    an international system we built with such
 toil and
    treasure, a web of laws, treaties,
 organizations, and
    shared values that sets limits on our foes far
 more
    effectively than it ever constrained America's
 ability to
    defend its interests.
   

    I am resigning because I have tried and failed
 to reconcile
    my conscience with my ability to represent the
 current U.S.
    Administration. I have confidence that our
 democratic
    process is ultimately self-correcting, and
 hope that in a
    small way I can contribute from outside to
 shaping policies
    that better serve the security and prosperity
 of the
    American people and the world we share.

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