News reports say Sen. John Kerry (D) will be tapped for State while former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel, a moderate Republican, may be headed for the Pentagon. If so, this would suggest a return to Mr. Obama’s attempts early in his first presidency to engage America’s adversaries abroad rather than isolate or harm them.

An investigation into the State Department's preparations for and management of the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, has concluded that "systemic failures and leadership and management deficiencies" within the department played a major role in the devastation that took place there last September.

A couple of public diplomacy colleagues have asked me what we should think of the Pentagon memo issued earlier this month, the one that seems to say Strategic Communication is out. Over. Finished... Does this mean the end of MIST teams at embassies? No more military websites targeting foreign audiences? Is it the end of a fat foreign media analysis landing on your desk every morning? No more social and cultural adaptation training for troops deploying? Probably not.

Attention, Hollywood political donors: The Obama administration has begun the delicate post-election process of deciding which key supporters to reward with coveted diplomatic appointments, and THR has learned that at least four fundraisers with close showbiz connections are under consideration.

In 1994, Bashar al-Assad was appointed chairman of the Syrian Computer Society. It was the only official title he would hold before landing the country’s top job, president, in 2000, but the appointment seemed to speak volumes about the direction in which his country was headed. This was six months into President Bill Clinton’s first term, in the same year that Tony Blair was elected as the leader of Britain’s Labour Party. Modernization was all the rage.

If you want to join the State Department's Foreign Service, you need a solid resume, plenty of time on your hands and the patience of Job. When I joined the Foreign Service back in 2002, Colin Powell spearheaded the Diplomatic Readiness Initiative, which aimed to increase and streamline the hiring process. Ten years later, the Foreign Service selection process for generalists is even longer and more byzantine than it was before.

The murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three colleagues in Benghazi highlights the dangers and hardships our Foreign Service personnel face every day as America’s first line of defense. Our nation’s diplomatic and development personnel are present overseas before the U.S. military is deployed, supports them if they are engaged in combat, and remains in place when the military returns to the United States.

Robert Banks, CPD Public Diplomat in Residence 2009-11, reviews CPD University Fellow Nicholas J. Cull's recently published book, The Decline and Fall of the United States Information Agency: American Public Diplomacy, 1989-2001.