Confirmation Hearing: SJoyceFLA to be Secretary of External Affairs (Confirmed)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

SoEA Doctor Cynic will no longer be serving as SoEA.

I appoint SJoyceFLA as his successor.

Senators have up to 72 hours to question the nominee.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Mr. Speaker, if I can still use that title, I have two questions to start out with:

Will you be active throughout the entirety of your term as Secretary of External Affairs?

Will you cooperate in full with the National Security Committee and any other Committee based process in their investigations pertaining to your office and/or your actions or lack thereof as Secretary of such office?

[Donerail]

Will you be active throughout the entirety of your term as Secretary of External Affairs?

I'll be as active as possible and I hope I'll be able to be active; I see nothing that would cause me not to be.

Will you cooperate in full with the National Security Committee and any other Committee based process in their investigations pertaining to your office and/or your actions or lack thereof as Secretary of such office?

Absolutely. I fully believe in the rule of law and would comply fully with any committee investigation.

[Donerail]

Speaker Sjoyce, what is your understanding of the duties of the Secretary of External Affairs under current law?

That was actually an issue I ran into last time I was SoEA: there doesn't seem to be any unified documents that states all the duties in a comprehensive manner. Based on what I've seen and what I did last time, the role of the SoEA is to represent the foreign policy of Atlasia in the world, through proposing treaties, issuing official statements, making state visits, designating allies, negotiating with foreign dignitaries, working with the UN, issuing the foreign policy review, making recommendations, and special allocations of spending, as well as providing the foreign policy interests of Atlasia on legislation proposed in the Senate. It is also the duty of the SoEA to drive discourse through the creation of news stories related to international events; for instance, during my last tenure we had the Iranian nuclear story, which was followed by actions from my office to deal with it.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Under what circumstances would you consider foreign military intervention justifiable?

[Kaine for Senate '18]

I'm satisfied with this nominee.  I hope he will be confirmed quickly.

[Donerail]

Under what circumstances would you consider foreign military intervention justifiable?

I had a quote in my old SoEA office from Rep. John Dingell of Michigan, which read "War is failure of diplomacy." We should only go to war when diplomatic routes are exhausted.

If a nation has attacked Atlasia or presents an imminent threat to do so, we are justified in conducting foreign military intervention. It is also justifiable in the sense of small-scale operations to rescue Atlasian citizens, operations that we are obligated to conduct via mutual defense treaties, and to stop genocide. It is not justifiable in order to gain resources (a la Iraq), to overthrow governments that are not following our interests (Operation Ajax), or for 'nation building' or showing off our power.

[Franzl]

I have no questions and have no problem with the nominee. He has given very detailed and thoughtful answers, and I will happily vote to confirm.

[Donerail]

It's been over 72 hours. Any more questions? Syria's kind of exploding, so...

[Simfan34]

I have serious reservations about SJoyceFLA's qualifications to be SoEA, namely his libertarian-minded views on foreign intervention and policy in general.

I am also deeply perturbed by his description of Operation Ajax as an example of an an act "overthrow governments that are not following our interests" when in fact it was a highly necessary order to restore constitutional order to the country and put a stop to the aims of an aspirant dictator. Such comments, although considered uncontroversial, betray a fundamental lack of knowledge of geopolitics and political history.

I would be strongly opposed to SJoyceFLA's confirmation as Secretary of External Affairs.

[Donerail]

I have serious reservations about SJoyceFLA's qualifications to be SoEA

Qualifications? I am eminently qualified (former SoEA); you do not cast doubt upon my qualifications, merely my views.

his libertarian-minded views on foreign intervention and policy in general.

Not changing that, particularly the last unrelated part. However, I will say that I'm not going to allow my personal views to override those of the administration - for instance, during my last tenure, I declared the Syrian delegation to Atlasia persona non grata at Polnut's request despite reservations.

I am also deeply perturbed by his description of Operation Ajax as an example of an an act "overthrow governments that are not following our interests" when in fact it was a highly necessary order to restore constitutional order to the country and put a stop to the aims of an aspirant dictator. Such comments, although considered uncontroversial, betray a fundamental lack of knowledge of geopolitics and political history.

Let's put it simply: Ajax transformed what was a relatively liberal democratic constitutional monarchy into an authoritarian dictatorship. Said authoritarian dictatorship oppressed the people until, like Qaddafi in Libya, he was violently overthrown. The new government in Libya hasn't been as hostile to Atlasian interests as Islamist Iran became, explained because Atlasia wasn't propping up Qaddafi's regime. Mosaddegh was not a dictator: the difference, which you fail to note, is that Mosaddegh's National Front was elected, in democratic elections. The National Front was as much of a dictatorship as the Liberal Party is. Tudeh wasn't going to take over. The impetuous behind the coup was Mosaddegh's desire to nationalize Iranian oil production and remove it from the control of what was then the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (later BP), and Britain's desire to keep Iranian oil under British control: to that end, the UK did request the US step in to prevent the democratic government of Iran from nationalizing the oil corporations (the overthrow of democracy, coincidentally, opened up Iran for Atlasian oil corporations as well). Atlasian/UK imperialism is at the root of Operation Ajax, not anything "constitutional", and if we briefly suspend reality and accept your version of events (that it "put a stop to the aims of an aspirant dictator"), the actions taken to put a stop to such (nonexistent) aims ended up installing a dictator anyways.

Atlasia was wrong, I'm willing to say it. Atlasia should be one of the world's foremost advocates for democracy, and the way to advocate for democracy is not through hypocritically overthrowing democratically elected parliaments and installing dictators.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I am afraid time has expired and no motion has been made to extend it. A vote is now open on confirmation, please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Aye

[Oakvale]

SJoyce and I do not agree on foreign policy as a rule, but I do believe he'll be active and has performed well in the role in the past. More to the point, he and the President have similar views on foreign policy so I would not expect his nominee to differ significantly.

Aye to confirm.

[Simfan34]

Nay

[Marokai Backbeat]

Nay.

[Franzl]

AYE

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Aye

[Kaine for Senate '18]

The Senate Committee on National Security has unanimously recommended that this nominee be confirmed.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Aye

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

AYE OF COURSE!!!


Aye (7): Averroës Nix, Ben, Franzl, HagridOfTheDeep, NC Yankee, Oakvale, and Snowtalker
Nay (2): Marokai Blue and Simfan34
Abstain (0):

Didn't Vote (1): JulioMadrid

The nominee has been confirmed.