7/31/2019 Ambassadorial Visit to Bratislava

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Advice and Comment

Ambassadorial visit shines alight on the diverse roles ofU.S. diplomacy.

By Timothy B. Clark

The U.S. diplomatic corps is one ofgovernments elite institutions,representing the United Statesin many countries with diversecultures, languages and perspec-

tives on world aairs. Its hard to get intothe Foreign Service, and even harderto become an ambassador, whether asa career diplomat or as a presidentialappointee. The importance of ambassa-dorial postings is reflected in the require-ment for Senate confirmation.

U.S. Ambassador Theodore Sedgwickand his wife, Kate Watt Sedgwick, areat the tip of the diplomatic spear in theSlovak Republic, a nation of 5.6 millionpeople at the center of Europe. When

NOTES FROM BRATISLAVA

America

Abroad

they invited me to join a small groupvisiting them in Bratislava this spring, Ijumped at the chance to have an up-closelook at the ambassadorial life.

We to ok th e opport un it y to visitBudapest, Vienna and Prague, in addi-tion to Bratislava during a 10-day trip.

Tracing the tragic history of this region,we saw many monuments commemo-rating the millions of people who hadsuered repression and slaughter at thehands of the fascists and the commu-nists over five decades of the 20t h cen-tury. We were reminded too during ourtravels of the power of ethnicity in theseareas, the occasional stirrings of un-savory nationalism and the limits on thepower of the United States to influencepolitical trends.

Sedgwick is only one of many ambas-sadors in Bratislava who compete for thetime and attention of Slovak authorities.But he is probably first among equals,given the political and economic powerof the United States, its sway in NATO,and its strong connection arising fromwaves of immigration that have resultedin hundreds of thousands of Americansclaiming Slovak descent.

A fte r Hu ng aria n rul er s be ga n aperiod of repression in 1848, a quarterof the Slovak population immigratedto North America. Poverty at home

brought another wave to these shoresin the 1930s. Many settled in WesternPennsylvania, able and willing to takeon the tough mining and industrial

jobs at companies like U.S. Steel, a lead-ing employer there. Headquartered inPittsburgh, the company is now led by

Chairman and Chief Executive OfficerJohn P. Surma, who is of Slovak descent.U.S. Steel is the largest private employerin Slovakia, having taken over a bigproduction facility near the easterntown of Koice in 2000.

U.S. companies are big employers inBratislava as well. This city has becomea magnet for technology giants like

Am azon, Cisco, Del l, Google, HP andIBM, which have taken advantage of thecountrys low tax rate and labor flex-ibilities on issues like hiring and firingthat were adopted by Slovakias center-right government. Slovakias technicalschools churn out programmers andother specialists to be employed bythese companies, and demand for theirskills is beginning to outstrip the supply.Sedgwick has been speaking in favor ofgreater investment in education to meetthat demand.

On a Monday morning, we are invitedto the chancery to hear the press briefinga rundown of what local news outlets aresaying of consequence to the embassy.

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U.S. Ambassador Theodore Sedgwicks job ranges from meetings with heads of state to homegrown American hospitality.

7/31/2019 Ambassadorial Visit to Bratislava

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Advice and Comment

This is a daily meeting conducted by twoof the embassys 70 Slovak employeesfor senior American sta. Its the begin-ning of a big day for Sedgwick that willinclude visits to the president and theprime minister.

The embassy sta of about 30 Ameri-

cans includes economic o cer Robert D.King and information officer MatthewMiller. King, an interesting example ofchanges in State Department recruiting,

joined nine years ago after a two-decadecareer in finance and operations for theLiberty Mutual insurance firm.

Miller is younger, having joined soonafter college, and he boasts five post-ings ranging from Haiti to Cameroon.King served in Greece, India and Mexicobefore coming to Slovakia th ree yearsago. Hes thus had several journeysthrough the departments intensive24- to 44-week language training pro-grams, as has Miller.

Sedgwicks high-profile appoint-ments shed light on the ambassadorswork. The morning meeting withPresident Ivan Gaparovi, is all aboutthe NATO summit coming up with-in the week. Sedgwick wants to helpGaparovi in his interactions withsenior U.S. officials in Chicago and issending several U.S. experts from hisembassy staff to the NATO summit.The ambassador notes that Slovakiahas maintained its commitment tothe NATO Afghanistan mission: 350

high-value special-forces troops andexperts in explosive ordnance disposal.Other NATO players, notably France,have been cutting back on their com-mitments. Also on the NATO agenda isthe idea of cooperative defense amongthe Visegrd FourHungary, Slovakia ,Poland and the Czech Republicand other NATO nations, a difficult-to-achieve idea that would requirespecializing in certain kinds of equip-ment and training, likely at the expenseof a more rounded force. Sedgwick isamong American o cials who are press-ing European nations to boost their

defense spending from their current,rock-bottom level of slightly more than1 percent of gross domestic productatough sell when European authoritiesare attempting to cap budget deficits at3 percent of GDP.

The afternoon appointment withPrime Minister Robert Fico is aboutdeveloping nuclear power generationin Slovakia. Of three competitors vyingfor the construction work, one is from

Russia and one from France. The thirdis Westinghouse, long an Americanicon but since 2006 owned by ToshibaGroup of Japan. Sedgwick accompaniesa ranking Westinghouse executive tothe meeting with Fico with the inten-tion of saying little but demonstrat-ing by his presence the interest of theU.S. government, right up to the W hiteHouse, in the jobs the contract wouldcreate in Pennsylvania.

Later, in a conversation with a lead-ing Slovak parliamentarian, I ask if U.S.companies are disadvantaged by our1977 Foreign Corrupt Practices Act,under which the Justice Department islevying heavy fines on firms that engagein bribery abroad. Yes, he says, observ-

ing that Germany and other nationsfirms are adept at hiding payments toofficialdom in hard-to-detect account-ing artifices. Corruption is rife in manycountries, and U.S. ambassadors dowhat they can to discourage it. Slovakauthorities pay attention, Sedgwicksays, to entreaties to crack down on sextra cking by criminal networks dealingalso in narcotics.

Theres a multinational effort toimprove honesty and transparency inthe countrys judicial system. Amongthe ambassadors priorities is to helpSlovak authorities guard against nuclear

trafficking. U.S. government expertshave been working with 10 Slovak agen-cies to prevent cross-border smugglingof nuclear materials, and in mid-JuneU.S. officials will conduct training forprosecutors and judges who deal withwhat the ambassador calls a signifi-cant problem.

The United States is encouragingSlovakia to become a benign actor onthe world stage. With its unr uly democ-

racy, free press and free elections, thecountry can offer practical lessons toneighbors like Montenegro, Sedgwicksays. Hes excited by Slovakias partici-pation in the Communities of Democ-racy program, in which developed,less-developed and developing coun-

tries team up to promote democraticgovernance. Slovakia, in the secondcategory, has joined the Netherlands tohelp Tunisia as it emerges from decadesof dictatorship. Sedgwick notes thatan A merican ambassadors job reachesbeyond issues peculiar to any singlecountry to encompass the more generalideals of democracy, transparency andhuman rights. His monthly column in

Hospodrske noviny, the local equivalentofThe Wall Street Journal, and weeklyposts on his Facebook page reflect theseideas. Interestingly, about 2 millionSlovaks, more than a third of the popu-lation, are Facebook users. So far theyrenot much into Twitter, so the ambassa-dor isnt Tweeting yet.

Sedgwick wants to project the openand welcoming traits of the A mericanpersonality. He has persuaded the StateDepartment to fund construction of anice, wrought-iron fence to replace thegrim metallic cage that protects theembassy from passersby on HviezdoslavSquare, a grand boulevard of mightytrees and elegant buildings leading upto the Slovak National Theater.

And t he amba ssador was found flip-

ping burgers recently at a cookout onthe square for Slovak youths slated toparticipate in a work-study programstateside this summer.

In an amusing scene at the residence,Sedgwick hosts a practice session for thesoft rock band for which he plays piano.The band includes the portly Greekambassador, Nicolaos D. Kanellos;the multi-instrumental Romanianambassador, Florin Vodita; an Americanexpat who has been a translator here for15 years; two local think tank leaders,one of them heavily tattooed; and, onthis day, yours truly on blues harp.

The group performs at high-visibilityfunctions across the country. Sedgwickalso makes a point of participating incharitable events, such as a recent ten-nis tournament, and making appear-ances in many other settingson the

Woody Al len theor y, he says, th at 80percent of success is showing up. Thatseems a good approach to projecting

American values in t his small corner ofthe world.

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With its unrulydemocracy, free pressand free elections,Slovakia can offer

practical lessonsto neighborslike Montenegro, U.S.Ambassador TheodoreSedgwick says.