Ronald Spiers (1925–2021), former ambassador to Turkey and Pakistan, remembers a conversation with a Navy admiral, who told him that after retiring he'd like to serve as ambassador to Spain. To which Spiers, a lifelong diplomat, responded that upon retiring he would like to command the Sixth Fleet. "He didn't think it was funny," Spiers says. The admiral did, in fact, become ambassador to Spain. Spiers did not become an admiral.
—"Embassy Envy" by Christopher Beam in Slate, 29 May 2009. Photo: one of the reception rooms in the U.S. ambassador's residence in Paris.
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