Secretary of State's Visit

As we're sure you saw on the news, Secretary Clinton came to visit last week for Karzai's inauguration. Pictures from her visit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kabulpublicdiplomacy/sets/72157622706754049/

Secretary Clinton giving a Honor Award to one of our PRTers who helped pull people out of a burning vehicle when their convoy got attacked:




It was every bit as crazy as you would think. We can't really describe here everything that goes in to a visit at that level. Ask us next time we're together in person. Suffice it to say that everyone gets pulled in.

Joe's shop turned into a 24-hour a day watch and everyone in my shop was a Press Officer during the two days she was in town. I did get to shake her hand during the Meet & Greet that she had at the Embassy. The next day, I was the site Press Officer for her Meet & Greet with the troops.

It was Inauguration Day, and all the roads were closed and, so the other site officers and I had to go out to the site at 10am (before the Inauguration started) for a 5:30pm event. Good thing we did, because it took us ALL DAY to get ready. I'm not going to re-create all 10 hours (everything went late), but here's a sampling of moments:

Given the size and configuration of the room we were using, we need risers for the press to stand on so the cameras could see the Secretary over everyone's head. We didn't have risers, so we were trying to find something we could use instead. The military guys on site decided it would be easier to just BUILD some. I expected a makeshift-bench of sorts. I really didn't need anything that extensive. A makeshift-bench is not what showed up an hour later. They built giant, beautiful wood risers of various heights. They basically built me a stage. I could not believe what I was seeing when they walked in with it. The military also found me lights, a podium, a wireless microphone and PA system, and a SATELLITE link so we could have live news coverage of the event. That would have been impressive anywhere, anytime. We were at the airport. Those things were not at the airport. It was Inauguration Day and the roads in Kabul were closed and all the military in town had other jobs to do. We helped out with Embassy transportation to move stuff around, but they went seriously above and beyond...

At one point, the Master Sgt that was working with us all day came up to me and said (I'm not kidding) - the air control boss thinks the Secretary is leaving on a C-130. For those who don't know, a C-130 is a military cargo plane. I said "Well, she's not." He said, "I know. But they won't believe me. Will you come tell them?" I said, "Why would they believe me?" He said "They're Spanish. They don't know what NCOs are." I said, OK - I'll see what I can do. So, he led me down to the secured air control room where I had to say (again, I'm not kidding) - "COL (insert Spanish name), the Secretary of State is not leaving Afghanistan on a C-130." He said, "Oh, then what's she leaving on?" and I swear it was the ultimate test of my diplomatic skills not to say "The big f'ing white plane she came on the says United States of America of the side."
Said Plane:


It turns out it was a very simple mistake. She was originally supposed to go to another spot that day, and we were flying on a C-130 there and back. Apparently the news of the cancellation of that part of the trip didn't make it to this guy. Regardless, not a conversation I ever, in my wildest dreams, expected to have. OH - and after I explained it all to him, he proceeded to give me a very detailed explanation of the security procedures they would follow to clear the runway for her. All I could do was say "Great. Looks like you have everything covered." and make a break for it before he figured out that I was definitely not whoever he thought I was.

For security reasons, we don't like to call each other and say "OK. We're on the way now." So, someone from my team at the Embassy was going to call me and tell me when the event preceding mine started so I could start a countdown clock. I had just hung up the phone double-checking on that event (which had not started yet) when one of the Colonels came up to me and said "Six SUVs of journalists just pulled up on the tarmac." The problem with that statement is that all the journalists I was waiting for were traveling with the Secretary and were, therefore, still at the Embassy. I went running, literally, to see who ON EARTH these people were and how ON EARTH they got past the security checkpoints. False alarm. It was the Dutch Foreign Minister and his entourage heading out. The Colonel felt pretty bad... I thought it was funny.

So, that's some of the highlights. At the end of the day, the event went really well, she was happy, she took a bunch of pictures with the troops and we got live news coverage on a bunch of the major networks. Good stuff.