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A diplomat turns to teaching
March/April 2009
by James Kirchick '06

At press time, the campus was still speculating about which Yale faculty might be lured away to work for the Obama administration. But the Acela train runs both ways. Fresh out of a job as President Bush's deputy secretary of state, John Negroponte '60 will be coming to Yale in the fall to teach in the Grand Strategy program.

It would be hard to find a teacher with a wider range of experience in foreign affairs. Negroponte joined the Foreign Service right out of Yale and served in several posts before becoming Ronald Reagan's ambassador to Honduras in 1981. He was ambassador to Mexico and to the Philippines before moving to the private sector in 1997. Under George W. Bush, he was ambassador to the United Nations, ambassador to Iraq, and the first director of national intelligence before becoming deputy secretary of state.

Equipped with a three-year appointment and the polysyllabic title Brady-Johnson Distinguished Senior Research Fellow in Grand Strategy and Lecturer in International Affairs, Negroponte will join an all-star Grand Strategy team that includes former diplomat Charles Hill and history professors John Lewis Gaddis and Paul Kennedy. The highly selective program, launched in 2002, seeks to synthesize the study of political and military history, diplomacy, and international relations. The yearlong class, open to undergraduates and graduate students, includes a crisis simulation, frequent meetings with heavyweights like Henry Kissinger, and ritual presentations on broad topics by students who undergo merciless grilling by their professors.

Negroponte will also do some teaching on his own. "I expect to teach a course that will draw on my personal experience," he says. "The intent will certainly be to relate my past regional and national security experience to the contemporary scene.”  

Readers respond
An Open Letter to President Richard Levin and the Yale Community

This letter is not about "political correctness." We believe that a university should be a place in which ideas are freely exchanged and debated. The issues being addressed here are morality and legality. As an alumna and the family of an alumnus, we feel we need to comment on Yale’s hiring of John Negroponte.

A university should be a place that upholds the law. Yale has an extraordinary Law School at which the Constitution of the United States is taught and revered. The Constitution is also studied in the political science department (from which one of us graduated). For many years Yale was known for its exceptional courses on democracy taught by Robert Dahl among others. It is therefore quite shocking that Yale has decided to employ a man whose career which has rested to some great measure on violating the Constitution of this country.

John Negroponte was ambassador to Honduras from 1981-1985, during which time the United States engaged in the Contra Wars. Ambassador Negroponte was a key player in funding a war which had been outlawed by the U.S. Senate through the Boland Amendment. He was not tried for this, but his role was clear. The illegal prosecution and funding of this war was carried out by the illegal sale of arms to Iran through a complex network of White House operatives, CIA personnel, and rogue agents of "the Enterprise," a group of ex-military and intelligence officials. Much of this war was run through the U.S. Embassy in Honduras.

When Negraponte appeared before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations in 1989, he testified that he had "never seen any convincing substantiation" that "death squad type activities" took place in Honduras while he was there. However, the U.S. Department of State report on human rights practices in Honduras states that "184 individuals of various nationalities 'disappeared' in Honduras [between 1979 and 1989] and that the [Honduran Armed Forces] and the former Nicaraguan Resistance were apparently responsible for the majority of the crimes." U.S. Senator Christopher J. Dodd said, "given what we know about the extent and nature of Honduran human rights abuses, to say that Mr. Negroponte was less than forthcoming in his responses to my questions is being generous." The InterAmerican Court of Human Rights found that "a practice of disappearances carried out or tolerated by Honduran officials existed between 1981-84.'' And the CIA admitted that "during the 1980-84 period, the Honduran military committed most of the hundreds of human rights abuses reported in Honduras. These abuses were often politically motivated and officially sanctioned.''

The essence of this letter is to encourage the administration of Yale University, and in particular President Rick Levin, to look at the choices the university makes. What is the message that you are sending the students? Is it acceptable for a government official to take part in illegal activities? Is Yale condoning the violation of the Constitution by a group of government officials? Is Yale condoning the use of torture and death squads? By hiring Mr. Negroponte, the university is condoning and rewarding those activities.

We ask you to look at this both morally and legally, and from the point of view of what our alma mater stands for. We ask you to take your role seriously as an educator. We ask you to do the right thing. Our country needs us to do the right thing. Now.

Susan Kahn '81MA
Margaret Ratner (widow of William Kunstler '41)

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