Rest in Peace, Mr. Smith (October 8th, 2023)

A good man passed away the other day, I’ll call him Mr. Smith. You don't know him and in all likelihood you never will. He worked for one of those organizations that, at least among the true professionals therein, don’t share what they are doing. He spent a long career with them, more than 3 decades, and he did some remarkable things. Among them, he, saved a country.

Several decades ago Mr. Smith was the senior fellow from his organization in a certain country that was, and is, a close ally. The country was in trouble: there was a large and growing insurgency, there were several small groups of terrorists in one part of the country, and there were several ad hoc “organizations” within the government and army that wanted to throw out the elected government and run things their way.

Smith arrived in the country immediately after one failed coup, a coup that had come within a hair's breadth of succeeding in destroying the sitting government, far closer than what might be portrayed in a spy thriller.

Smith was not interested in seeing how close we might come again. He corralled a small group of people, both from his organization and from the Navy and Marine personnel who were in country, and got them all working in the same direction. He was talented, calm, extremely competent, and knew how to lead a room of type A personalities and let them have their run without letting them get out of control. And all was done in good humor. His comment in the post mortem of one operation that nearly went wrong, as they prepared for another, set the right tone. Said with a slight smile, he cautioned all to remember that “when things get exciting, it probably means someone did something wrong.”

And then off everyone went again.

The efforts were extraordinary successful. Two coups were pulled apart before they could gain any traction, another died in the planning stages. A long-standing slice of an insurgency was unraveled and within 18 months had effectively ceased to exist. The terrorists were, if not eliminated, at least contained.

It did get exciting at times, and several Americans were killed. But the focus remained on the main issue; there was no coup, the insurgency was pushed back into a small “box,” and when the country held elections they were able to elect a good man who knew what was needed to bring the county together. More than 30 years later that country is stable; not perfect, but certainly not teetering on the brink, as it had been.

Most of the people in Washington had no idea how close things had really been. In fact, most folks in the US Embassy had no idea how close things had been.

Smith had kept it all together, with no histrionics, no fireworks, no yelling. Even when there was a mistake he would calmly pull things back together, fix the problem and push on.

He even managed to save the careers of a Marine LtCol and a Navy LtCdr, both of whom were on the verge of being brought up on charges by some folks in Washington  - for their participation in Mr. Smith’s efforts. The Marine later retired as a Colonel, the LtCdr retired as a Captain.

In the end, he was the orchestra leader who brought it all together and made it work - he deserves the bulk of the credit.  But, in fact, I doubt there were 30 people who knew what he had done. But he had done it. And in doing it he saved a country and an ally. 

Mr. Smith, Rest In Peace.