Consul General Speeches

AABC members

Remarks to the Amsterdam American Business Club, Amsterdam Hilton, September 18, 2006

Thank you very much for the kind invitation to speak to you today.  I have already met several AABC members, and my family and I had the great pleasure of spending our first Labor Day in The Netherlands at the AABC picnic in Amstelveen.
I should say that this is my first Labor Day in The Netherlands this time, since I have lived here before.  Perhaps this is a good time for me to properly introduce myself to you and give you a little bit of information about my background.  I’ve worked for the State Department for over 15 years now, and prior to that I worked on Capitol Hill on the staff of a U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio. 
For my first tour in the Foreign Service, I was assigned to Paramaribo, Suriname and I spent a memorable two years there in a period that included the end of their civil war.  Among a number of fascinating experiences there, I will certainly never forget being awakened in my hammock by howler monkeys, or going upriver through treacherous rapids in what was essentially a dugout canoe powered by an outboard motor.
 
In preparation for my tour in Suriname, I learned to speak Dutch at the State Department’s excellent language training facility.  It’s a skill that has served me well across my career.  It certainly helped me secure my second assignment, which was at our Embassy in The Hague during the mid-1990s, when I worked as an economic officer handling trade, aviation, and fisheries issues.  I also spent quite a bit of time during those years helping to stand up a new international organization focusing on strategic trade controls that is called the Wassenaar Arrangement. 
I’ve had other overseas assignments since The Hague:  in Russia and the United Kingdom.  But most recently I served in that most exotic of cities, Washington, D.C. 
Returning to Washington after many years overseas was a real eye-opener.  It was particularly interesting to experience culture shock on our homeward journey.  But it was great to be home, if only for a couple of years, to be able to see family and friends more often, and to understand in a way that I never could from overseas the tremendous changes that have taken place in the U.S. over the last several years.
I also had the great pleasure of working in the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs as a speechwriter for the head of that organization, and as a public affairs officer covering the wide range of the Bureau’s activities.  In Consular Affairs we often refer to our work as helping people with things that matter to them in deeply personal ways:  citizenship and nationality, marriage overseas, reuniting families, international adoption, and in sadder circumstances, illness or destitution overseas. 
We are also involved in issues that grabbed headlines to a surprising degree – sometimes more frequently that I would wish.  Take the immigration debate, for example, or changing criteria for participation in the Visa Waiver Program – which is the manner in which the vast majority of Dutch people travel to the United States – or new documentary requirements for travel in the Western Hemisphere, or the privacy debate about including electronic chips in the new version of the American passport. 
Another discussion that raged across my time in the States was how to maintain the balance between security and openness, and different groups had very pronounced ideas about how to maintain the primacy of, for example, the American economy, or the American research and science communities, in a new world where security concerns are paramount. 
It came home to me again and again over the last two years how little of consular work is known domestically.  Overseas, American citizens certainly have a better understanding of the work of the consular corps, as we are the folks you come to see when you need to renew your passport or register the birth of a child, or when you want to bring a foreign spouse or parent to the U.S. as an immigrant.  Foreign citizens certainly know us for our role in adjudicating visitors visa applications.  But even the titles and vocabulary of our work are at best vaguely understood.  I would think that professional titles like CEO, or surgeon, or baseball player, or even consultant would give a clear indication of the work in which the person is involved.  But what in the world is a Consul General? 
To give you a better idea of what the consular role entails, I’d like to use a business analogy.  The consular corps of the United States is an enterprise that has been around for hundreds of years – longer than the U.S. Government, in fact – but it has had virtually the same mission since its inception:  to protect the lives and interests of American citizens residing and traveling abroad, and to enhance U.S. national security through the conscientious adjudication of U.S. passport and visa applications. 
We have a staff of over 7,800 people, working in 211 branch offices all over the world, and conduct our work in some 65 different languages.  Our enterprise brings in well over one and a half billion dollars annually, and we expect we will exceed $2 billion by fiscal year 2007, easily qualifying us as a Fortune 1,000 company. 
The economic impact of consular work is undeniable.  Take travel and tourism.  Foreign travel to the U.S. generated about $104.7 billion in economic benefits for the United States last year, and that figure is projected to rise as the travel and tourism industry continues to rebound in the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks.  In addition, foreign students generate about $13 billion in income for the U.S. by their attending our colleges and universities, and contributing in the U.S. economy while they are at school. 
So these are some of the real reasons why we maintain offices worldwide.  In addition, however, we have to be available to provide some of the services people expect from us 24/7.
And perhaps this is where the business analogy begins to fall apart.  In thinking about what consular officials do, it is probably more accurate to compare us to a public utility, in the sense that, when you flick a light switch, you expect the lights to go on.  Without exception.  After normal business hours.  And sometimes whether or not the charge recovers the cost of services.  It might not make a lot of sense from the perspective of the corporate bottom line to have a consular operation in remote areas throughout the world, but I can assure you that the U.S. citizens and commercial interests in those areas appreciate having us there. 
Similarly, we do not have the ability to define normal business hours.  If someone is trekking in the Himalayas and falls ill or becomes injured, we need to get there as fast as we can to provide assistance.  Some of the 900,000 American visitors to The Netherlands fall upon hard times here – and when they fall ill, or are robbed, or are the victim of a more serious crime, we are there to help.  There’s no waiting for the next business day when the welfare of an American citizen is at stake. 
Indeed, we often find ourselves doing our work under difficult, or even perilous conditions.  Consular officers often rush into dangerous situations even as we are counseling our fellow citizens to leave.  We have seen this time and again over the last few years, from the enormous response to the tsunami in the Indian Ocean two years ago, to the spate of devastating hurricanes in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, to the recent violence in Lebanon and northern Israel.  In that most recent instance, we assisted approximately 15,000 Americans in departing Lebanon, and in transporting them to Cyprus or Turkey where we organized onward flights.  One of our Dutch employees at the Consulate General volunteered to assist in this effort and spent two weeks helping with the evacuation.  I am immensely proud of his efforts.
In fact, my short experience with the staff at the U.S. Consulate General in Amsterdam has shown me that we have a strong and dedicated team working to provide a high level of service to American citizens and the Dutch, and other nationalities we serve.  I’m able to say this now without hubris because I am a newcomer and can attribute the present to the excellent efforts of my predecessor in developing such a fantastic crew. 
So what can we in Amsterdam do to further support the American community in The Netherlands, and to enhance international business ties?  We will continue to offer secure, predictable passport services that will enable American citizens to travel to the U.S. – and elsewhere – as you need to – for both personal and business reasons.  We are dedicated to making sure that people who need visas get them in a dignified and predictable manner.  In fact, we laid on extra resources over the summer to make sure that Dutch students and academicians who needed to get to school in the United States were able to do so – on time.  And we will continue to work closely with our Dutch colleagues to make sure that they understand the U.S. laws and regulations governing such important travel facilitation programs as the Visa Program.  In addition, we will continue to expand information sharing so that those who would wish to do harm to the United States do not have the opportunity to travel there. 
 
I would like to give you an idea of some of my specific priorities for my time here.  First, on a personal note, I am working on excavating my Dutch language skills from underneath the dust of years of neglect and also from underneath Russian, which I learned and spoke far more recently.  Second, in any organization, communication is key, and I know that communication with our clients is central to our continued success.  We are undertaking a comprehensive review of the way we provide information to the public to see what we can do better, and to explore new ways of reaching out to the American and Dutch communities.  One aspect of this is participating actively in the U.S. Mission to The Netherlands Speakers Bureau, which
provides speakers from the Embassy and Consulate on a variety of topics, from the American Civil War, to explaining the philanthropic spirit of our nation, to talking about U.S. foreign policy to groups interested in learning more about the U.S. 
Third, I want to make sure that we can bring Consulate General services to the largest number of people possible, and that means getting out there instead of only being available to the people who come to us.  I hope to see a lot of you over the next three years.  In addition, we will conduct a series of Consulate General road shows to the provinces, and hope that American businesses and business representatives can help get us in touch with a great variety of people. 
We want to bring the Consulate’s services to bear – in collaboration with the resources available at the Embassy in The Hague – in support of what is already a strong and dynamic economic relationship between the United States and The Netherlands, and in support of the U.S. companies and interests who do business here.  I know the business metrics are familiar to all of you, but the sheer size of our economic relationship still impresses. 
The Netherlands is the eighth-largest U.S. export market and the third largest direct investor in the U.S.  The U.S. is the largest investor in The Netherlands with direct investment of $202 billion.  More than 1,600 U.S. companies with subsidiaries or offices are located in The Netherlands.  And as a strong proponent of transatlantic partnership, The Netherlands is one of the United States’ staunchest allies in many ways, from supporting free trade and the World Trade Organization, to being a leading partner in NATO and many other multilateral organizations. 
You might say that our business relationship is flourishing on its own without the help of the U.S. Government, but I would disagree.  As an occasional gardener, I know that the best results come from constant attention, and real care.  
And this brings me back to my role in Amsterdam.  As Consul General, not only do I want to make sure that we are providing top-flyte consular services in support of the American community, but that we support the world of ties between our two nations:  the cultural world, the educational world, the philanthropic world, the government world, and of course, the business world. 
My colleagues in The Foreign Commercial Service who are located in the Consulate General have a world of experience between them, and responsibility for some very active business sectors, including travel and tourism, and information technology and communications, to describe only a portion of their responsibilities.  They are now most ably led by Sheryl Maas, since the former Commercial Counsellor, Gus Maffrey, has departed the Netherlands.  I know you are quite familiar with the activities of FCS, and that they stand ready to assist you.
I also look forward to hearing from you today, and in the coming weeks and months, about how the Consulate General can support U.S. interests here.  It’s what we do.  It’s a charge we take on with the utmost sincerity and energy.  And it is a privilege to do so. 
Thank you again for the opportunity to speak to you today and introduce myself, as I commence what I am most certain is going to be an interesting and busy three years.