In early September, the Miller Center announced the hiring of John Negroponte as the new James R. Schlesinger Distinguished Professor. Coming just a few months after the controversial hiring of Trump policy architect Marc Short, it’s another embarrassing and morally unjustifiable choice from the institution.
One could be forgiven if the name John Negroponte doesn’t ring a bell. He’s painted as a diplomat and experienced foreign policy expert, but it hardly counts as being a diplomat when your definition of diplomacy is constant violence and war. For the last 40 years, Negroponte has been an active participant in American imperialism, often turning a blind eye to human rights abuses.
The story goes that after nearly 10 years of mass murder and relentless bombing of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, the U.S. was finally ready to leave. Henry Kissinger, was preparing a deal with Northern Vietnam, essentially conceding the end of the war and an American loss. Negroponte, however, felt this was unacceptable and voiced disapproval. Negroponte’s desire for continual war in southeast Asia was ignored, but he wouldn’t have to wait too long to aid other humanitarian disasters.
In 1981, Ronald Reagan handed off the job of ambassador to Honduras to Negroponte. While not the location of U.S. troop support for far-right governments, Negroponte did help ensure the continuance of military aid to Honduras. This was at a time when the military of Honduras was engaging in brutal human rights abuses. Among the more notorious of U.S. backed groups was the CIA trained Battalion 3-16, which indiscriminately targeted leftists, murdering and torturing them. As the U.S. funneled millions of dollars into brutal counterrevolutionary operations in Honduras, Negroponte’s job increasingly became about suppressing known human rights abuses.
At the same time, Negroponte became crucial to the escalating attacks by the Contras into Nicaragua. Many years after Negroponte became ambassador, it would become known that he was deeply skeptical of peace negotiations and actively pushed for more support to the Contra counterrevolutionaries.
The Baltimore Sun exposed Negroponte’s knowledge of these crimes in a series of investigative reports in 1994 and 1995. Yet, as a human rights abuse enabler, Negroponte found himself right at home in Washington. He’d continue with a long career in Washington, eventually being appointed ambassador to Iraq in 2004. Now, he’s settled into his role as a sage of diplomats. Having gone from one university to another, he lands at the Miller Center ready to impart his knowledge for financial gain.
It’d be reasonable to wonder what’s so bad about the Miller Center adding an enabler of human rights abuses to its staff. In fact, what high-level political appointee hasn’t done something questionable in their tenure? Rather than this line of reason being justification for whatever horrendous hire the Miller Center decides on, it showcases the need to actually engage in thoughtful critique of hiring former aides of crimes.
Marc Short and John Negroponte were both able to carry out vicious, horrible actions in positions of power, knowing that the consequences for them would be negligible. Institutions like the Miller Center are crucial to preventing anything resembling justice. Marc Short will get paid $48,000 for his expertise in implementing an agenda that can only be described as an assault on the majority of Americans. Negroponte gets a cushy and distinguished position for spending the last 45 years supporting American-backed violence.
It’s perhaps most ironic that in his letter defending the hiring of Marc Short, director of the Miller Center, William J. Antholis, writes that “I myself have written articles sharply critical of the administration within the realm of my own expertise.” It’s possible that Antholis truly sees himself as an active resistor to the Trump administration and its repressive reactionary politics. But the cognitive dissonance to try and absolve himself of hiring decisions is troubling. Writing harsh op-eds, and then using your power to provide financial support to people directly opposed to the values of peace, equality and justice is not resistance. Rather, by hiring Marc Short and John Negroponte, Antholis proves himself as an ally of the reactionary politics of the last 45 years and of the hatred that Trump spews every day.
The Miller Center has a choice: provide relief for the despots of reactionary politics, thus further legitimizing their harmful practices, or take a stand. For starters, the Miller Center should disassociate themselves with Negroponte and Short. It’s clear that they have no place in a serious academic institution. Second, the Miller Center should publish a formal apology and commit itself to no longer being a safe haven for the type of people who seek to strip public institutions and other nations for their own benefit. Without a clear action against their recent decisions, it becomes hard to take the Miller Center seriously, now and until they resolve these hires.
Jake Wartel is a Viewpoint Writer for The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at opinion@cavalierdaily.com.
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