Gregor Peter Schmitz: Holbrooke ... The Not-So-Quiet American
[Dr. Gregor Peter Schmitz is Washington correspondent for Der Spiegel.]
There is little doubt that he was the embodiment of US diplomacy. Richard Holbrooke, who died on Monday evening at the age of 69, was a widely-respected negotiator, a former US ambassador in Berlin and elsewhere, a key player in bringing peace to Bosnia. Most recently, he was President Barack Obama's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. He was, in short, a "giant of US foreign policy," as Obama said on Monday.
That, though, is only part of the story.
In his most recent book, investigative journalist Bob Woodward describes how Holbrooke, prior to being introduced by Obama as his special representative, asked the president to use his full name, Richard, rather than his oft-used nickname Dick. His wife, he explained, wasn't fond of the name.
Obama, who despises all forms of vanity, agreed -- but he later confessed that he found the request an odd one. Indeed, the incident sheds some light on Obama's difficult relationship with Holbrooke, but also on Holbrooke's difficult relationship with himself.
A Throwback
He wanted to be seen as a statesman, a Richard. Often, however, his brusque nature got in the way. Indeed, it became a significant element of his reputation.
Richard Charles Albert Holbrooke often seemed to be a throwback -- a symbol of a time when the US maintained an unshaken belief in its supremacy, a time when China was still in a deep slumber. The proud members of the US Foreign Service were the tools of a Washington that wanted a say in all parts of the globe. Self-doubt was not a widespread characteristic in US embassies around the world.
Few exemplified this attitude to a greater degree than Richard Holbrooke, who began his diplomatic career in 1962 and soon found himself working on the Vietnam staff for President Lyndon Johnson. Washington is full of aging officials who can recount anecdotes of a young, self-confident Holbrooke in the bars of Saigon -- how he lectured a long-serving senator; how he once sent a memo straight to the president in which he argued that the war was going awry; how he collected mentors and letters of recommendation as other diplomats collected visa stamps. Soon he was known by a nickname: "Bulldozer."
Should Graham Greene have required an archetype for his hero Alden Pyle -- the young CIA agent in his novel "The Quiet American," a character whose good intentions often backfired -- he need have looked no further than Richard Holbrooke...
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There is little doubt that he was the embodiment of US diplomacy. Richard Holbrooke, who died on Monday evening at the age of 69, was a widely-respected negotiator, a former US ambassador in Berlin and elsewhere, a key player in bringing peace to Bosnia. Most recently, he was President Barack Obama's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. He was, in short, a "giant of US foreign policy," as Obama said on Monday.
That, though, is only part of the story.
In his most recent book, investigative journalist Bob Woodward describes how Holbrooke, prior to being introduced by Obama as his special representative, asked the president to use his full name, Richard, rather than his oft-used nickname Dick. His wife, he explained, wasn't fond of the name.
Obama, who despises all forms of vanity, agreed -- but he later confessed that he found the request an odd one. Indeed, the incident sheds some light on Obama's difficult relationship with Holbrooke, but also on Holbrooke's difficult relationship with himself.
A Throwback
He wanted to be seen as a statesman, a Richard. Often, however, his brusque nature got in the way. Indeed, it became a significant element of his reputation.
Richard Charles Albert Holbrooke often seemed to be a throwback -- a symbol of a time when the US maintained an unshaken belief in its supremacy, a time when China was still in a deep slumber. The proud members of the US Foreign Service were the tools of a Washington that wanted a say in all parts of the globe. Self-doubt was not a widespread characteristic in US embassies around the world.
Few exemplified this attitude to a greater degree than Richard Holbrooke, who began his diplomatic career in 1962 and soon found himself working on the Vietnam staff for President Lyndon Johnson. Washington is full of aging officials who can recount anecdotes of a young, self-confident Holbrooke in the bars of Saigon -- how he lectured a long-serving senator; how he once sent a memo straight to the president in which he argued that the war was going awry; how he collected mentors and letters of recommendation as other diplomats collected visa stamps. Soon he was known by a nickname: "Bulldozer."
Should Graham Greene have required an archetype for his hero Alden Pyle -- the young CIA agent in his novel "The Quiet American," a character whose good intentions often backfired -- he need have looked no further than Richard Holbrooke...