degrading diplomacy

I'm concerned about what's been happening to the State Department -- marginalization on several foreign policy issues, still unstaffed at senior levels, threatened with huge budget cuts and questionable reorganization. The Trump people are damaging what should be our strong arm of diplomacy.

Sad to report, similar developments are undermining Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office [FCO], as described in the Economist:

The department has lost a succession of turf wars that have left it a hollow shell. Downing Street has annexed the most high-profile pieces of foreign policy—Mr Blair exercised almost total control over his ill-starred Iraq policy and the wider “war on terrorism”. The Treasury has ground its next-door neighbour by a twin process of starving it of funds and stealing some of its plum jobs. Britain’s previous ambassador to the EU, Sir Ivan Rogers, was a Treasury man who had never worked for the Foreign Office. The Department for International Development (DfID), which was created only in 1997, has grown into a monster that overshadows its aristocratic stepbrother. DfID is rolling in money because a legally mandated formula allocates it 0.7% of national income; meanwhile the Foreign Office must downsize or sell off its embassies.

Government institutions can atrophy from neglect. Talented people will go elsewhere to make a difference. Great powers need robust diplomatic instruments. I hope Britain and America reverse course.