As a follow-up to the previous post, I'm curious what would or should happen when an ambassador calls for assistance.
Hypothetical situation...
Let's say that Chelsea is Ambassador to Mexico. She calls up the State Dept. and requests 10 additional security personnel, stating unequivocally that she's observed increased activity form Cartel gang-bangers.
- Who receives that request, and how high does it go prior to approval/denial?
- What are the resources? That is, how many hard-charging operators are waiting for such a request?
- They're hanging out there in the break-room at the State Dept., these security peeps, or there's some lag time for a recruiting process?
- How often, and under what circumstances, are such requests ignored or denied?
- If the response (or lack thereof) is unsatisfactory to Chelsea, what options remain for her? Can she go over Mom's head to Dad?
- Would she, in theory, accept a diplomatic assignment, if there wasn't explicit guarantees of adequate security? Or, would those "guarantees" be somehow conditional?
- How complicated would it be to deliver 10 (or 20, or 13, or 6, or even two) security personnel in a week?
- If you were State, and left that request unanswered or denied, under what rationale could you claim incompetence, as opposed to negligence or complicity?
- Is the State Department just another bureaucracy, not unlike the VA, where requests for assistance sit ignored in someone's "can't think about that today" bin?
Given the above hypothetical, what other questions might be warranted?
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