Diplomatic service
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Search complete. 113 mentions across 33 episodes found for "Diplomatic service".
Oct 26, 2026
Ron GerstenfeldGUEST
be happy to.
Ron GerstenfeldGUEST
So first of all, I'm in the Foreign Service for the last almost 19 years now, since the end of 2008.
Ron GerstenfeldGUEST
It was always a dream of mine to represent my country.
Ron GerstenfeldGUEST
mainly overseas, so I'm very happy that I was able to do so.
Tracey HolmesHOST
My guest on The Diplomats today is former US Ambassador Donald Heflin.
Tracey HolmesHOST
He spent 35 years in the Foreign Service, including a posting as ambassador to Cabo Verde.
Tracey HolmesHOST
He now teaches diplomatic practice at the Fletcher School.
Tracey HolmesHOST
He argues that even when a Zoom call is only a click away, there's no substitute for professionals on the ground who understand how a country really works, from Rwanda in the 1990s to the war with Iran today.
Donald HeflinGUEST
And as a result, the people who are becoming deputy chiefs of mission are often not as senior and not as qualified as people used to be.
Donald HeflinGUEST
That's not the case in Canberra, incidentally.
Donald HeflinGUEST
Canberra actually has a really longtime foreign service officer as a deputy ambassador.
Tracey HolmesHOST
You mentioned also that the nature of the American appointees has changed somewhat, not only in the fact that there's not as many, but also there's a lot more political appointees.
Dan RosenblumHOST
We're very honored to have Lynn with us today.
Dan RosenblumHOST
Lynn, after three decades of being a foreign service officer in the State Department, led the embassy in Moscow from 2023 to 2025, and leaving Moscow in June of 2025, sort of capping off her career as, at the moment, our last ambassador to Russia.
Dan RosenblumHOST
We don't have one there now.
Dan RosenblumHOST
And so we hope today to talk to her about mostly about her time in Russia, but some other things from her career as well.
6 MINS LATER
Lynne TracyGUEST
And that, to me, was a real measure of the change that had taken place under President Gorbachev, this freedom to begin expressing opinions publicly, openly, without consequences, without repressive consequences.
Dan RosenblumHOST
Right.
Dan RosenblumHOST
And presumably you, members of the embassy, whether contractors or foreign service officers at the time, were increasingly getting access to Soviet society during that time, too, because of glasnost.
Lynne TracyGUEST
That was absolutely true.
Marnie Von WilpertGUEST
But it also reminded me what America can be.
Marnie Von WilpertGUEST
You know, I was able to dispense lifesaving medication to people alongside our Foreign Service.
Marnie Von WilpertGUEST
And the diplomacy was wonderful and the partnerships we had in Africa were wonderful.
Marnie Von WilpertGUEST
So when I get to Congress, I'm going to fight hard to restart USAID.
Ben RowswellGUEST
Yeah, very much.
Ben RowswellGUEST
In fact, that Somalia period that you mentioned was before I joined the Foreign Service.
Ben RowswellGUEST
So I studied international relations.
Ben RowswellGUEST
I was really interested in or seized with the problem of war, like how they start, how to stop them, how to prevent them from happening again.
Ben RowswellGUEST
And so the minute I graduated, I managed to find my way to Mogadishu to be a contractor on the ground at Mogadishu Airport working for a UN contractor, basically that leased planes.
Ben RowswellGUEST
And it was there that I got the call that I had passed the Foreign Service exam.
Ben RowswellGUEST
So I was already kind of doing that even before I became a diplomat.
Paul WellsHOST
Now, you graduated from Georgetown.
Tim OwenHOST
So Ollie Robbins is the former permanent undersecretary of the Foreign Office.
Tim OwenHOST
And at the same time, he held the office of head of the Diplomatic Service and the unknown job of statutory office of accounting officer, which, as we'll explain in a minute, has important constitutional implications.
Ken MacdonaldHOST
I used to be one of them, so I can tell you a bit about that if you like.
Ken MacdonaldHOST
Oh, right.
Tim OwenHOST
Sounds familiar.
Tim OwenHOST
Well, exactly.
Tim OwenHOST
And a key aspect of Ollie Robbins' claim was that while the Prime Minister had the power to manage most civil servants under the terms of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, the management of the diplomatic service expressly fell outside his powers.
Tim OwenHOST
That was solely a matter for Yvette Cooper, the Foreign Secretary.
Pankaj SaranGUEST
I'd never been to Russia.
Pankaj SaranGUEST
But when I joined the Foreign Service and I was lucky enough to get selected, it's a tough exam.
Pankaj SaranGUEST
It's a tough competition.
Pankaj SaranGUEST
I was just very lucky to have managed to get into it.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
My guest today is Danny Grossman, whose career has taken him from Cold War diplomacy to entrepreneurship, philanthropy, and nonprofit leadership.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
Danny served in the US Foreign Service in India, the Soviet Union, Austria, and at the State Department, where he focused on Soviet human rights.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
He later founded Wild Planet Entertainment, a toy company he led for 18 years with social responsibility built into the business from the beginning.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
He went on to become CEO of the San Francisco Bay Area Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund, and currently serves as the board of HIAS, the global Jewish refugee organization.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
You've repeatedly found yourself in situations where you had to influence people, navigate systems, and ultimately make things happen without necessarily having all the authority or all the answers.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
So I'd like to start at the beginning.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
You studied Russian at Berkeley and then transferred to Yale to finish your degree, and then your brother introduced you to the Foreign Service.
Michele Kawamoto PerryHOST
What was it about Russia and the Russian language that you were drawn to?
Ines BellinaHOST
The picture of them at my mom's prom has followed them to every country they've lived in and has haunted my commitment-phobe heart since time immemorial.
Ines BellinaHOST
They married when my dad was 23, fresh out of the diplomatic academy and ready to embark on his first entry-level job in the Foreign Service.
Ines BellinaHOST
And my mom was 20 years old.
Ines BellinaHOST
At the time, that was still considered underage, so my grandpa actually had to sign an official permission slip for her to even do so.
39 MINS LATER
Ines BellinaHOST
When he graduated, he spent a year in the Naval Academy, but decided it wasn't for him.
Ines BellinaHOST
He got into la Universidad Católica del Perú, started off in history, then switched to law.
Ines BellinaHOST
My grandma was the one who suggested the Foreign Service.
Ines BellinaHOST
It stuck.
Katie CharlwoodHOST
Then you have the Holy See Diplomatic Passport.
Katie CharlwoodHOST
It is issued by the Secretariat of State and to members of the Holy See's Diplomatic Service.
Katie CharlwoodHOST
Basically, for people who are representing the post diplomatically.
Katie CharlwoodHOST
Then, magic door number three, there is the Holy See Service Passport.
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