Khalid Mohammed/AP, FILE
"I feel like we've been back-stabbed," said a U.S. official based in the embassy compound."We call this a special-incentive post for a reason. And that incentive is being taken from us." It is department policy for diplomats to lose their extra"hazard" pay any time they leave a perilous post, including for rest and recuperation, or"R&R." But because of the risks in Iraq, diplomats there get another financial incentive known as"hardship" pay -- funds that the department is now dropping during time off because the embassy is on ordered departure.U.S. Army Soldiers maintain overwatch at the U.S. Embassy Compound in Baghdad, Iraq, Jan. 1, 2020.
"They shouldn't punish people who took leave expecting that they'll receive those allowances -- to say not only you don't get them, but you actually have to give that money back," said a senior official from diplomats' union, the American Foreign Service Association, or AFSA."This wasn't some effort on the part of the employees to bilk the system. The department had not clearly messaged that they felt the rules changed.
"If you need a break ... they're now attaching a financial penalty to taking that trip and thereby making it a disincentive to take that time off, and that's not good for our people," said the senior AFSA official.Assailants and attackers storm the entry control point at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, Jan. 1, 2020.
So another Pompeo policy stabbing our State Dept in the back and Biden has to unwind and fix it.