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The Dartmouth
July 17, 2025 | Latest Issue
The Dartmouth

Ricciardone '73 named ambassador to Turkey

Francis J. Ricciardone, Jr. '73 became the U.S. ambassador to Turkey following his confirmation by President Barack Obama during the Congressional recess.
Francis J. Ricciardone, Jr. '73 became the U.S. ambassador to Turkey following his confirmation by President Barack Obama during the Congressional recess.

Obama's decision to appoint Ricciardone during the recess rather than wait for Senate confirmation was motivated by Republican threats to block his appointment, according to Henri Barkey, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

"It is all part of a very contentious atmosphere in Washington where Republicans are interested in blocking everything the president is doing," Barkey said in an interview with The Dartmouth.

Former Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., was responsible for the delay in Ricciardone's confirmation, as he had placed a hold on the nomination, according to the press release.

Ricciardone's presence will ensure that American interests are effectively represented in Turkey, according to Hugh Pope, who conducts research on Turkey and Cyprus for the International Crisis Group.

"A Turkish-speaker like Ricciardone, who is well known from previous tours in Ankara, and who also knows the Middle East well, will enjoy a distinct advantage in putting the U.S. point of view across," Pope said in an e-mail to The Dartmouth.

Turkey's ambassador to the United States, Namik Tan, said he was pleased with Obama's decision.

"We are satisfied with his appointment and confirmation and see it as a positive development as it reflects the importance the U.S. attaches to Turkey," Tan wrote in an e-mail to The Dartmouth. "His past experience with Turkey will help Turkey in conveying her views on different issues effectively to the U.S. Administration."

For the past five months, the U.S. Embassy in Ankara has been run by a charge d'affaires, whose leverage is limited because such an official is considered temporary and can do little more than relay messages from Washington, according to Pope.

"Governments like Turkey prefer to deal with someone who has the authority and status of an ambassador, and are much more likely to listen to [Ricciardone's] arguments," Pope said in the e-mail.

Pope and Barkey both said that Ricciardone will be crucial in resolving the divergence in American and Turkish views on how to confront Iran's nuclear policy.

Ricciardone's presence in Turkey for the P5+1 summit a meeting between Iran and the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany in Istanbul later this month will help the U.S. communicate that Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons poses an imminent threat, Pope said.

Differences over Iran's policy arose at the U.N. Security Council last year, due to Turkey's opposition to the U.S. attempt to impose stricter sanctions on Iran, Barkey said. The sanctions were ultimately approved by the Security Council in June.

A protracted battle in the Senate over Ricciardone's confirmation would have left the United States without an ambassador to Turkey for many more months, potentially feeding Turkish skepticism about American attention to Turkey, Barkey said.

Some Republicans opposed the selection of Ricciardone, citing what they viewed as his failure to take a tough stance on democracy promotion in his days as ambassador to Egypt, Barkey said. Critics failed to recognize, however, that Ricciardone was not acting on his own but following the directions of then-President George W. Bush, according to Barkey.

"If the White House told him to be more insistent on democracy, he would have done it," Barkey said.

None of the criticism was directed at Ricciardone's work in Turkey, where he was the second highest-ranking State Department official in the 1990s, Barkey said.

The selection of a career diplomat such as Ricciardone for the Ankara post rather than a political appointee reflects the high priority of Turkey on the American foreign policy agenda, according to Kenneth Yalowitz, the director of the Dickey Center for International Understanding and a former U.S. ambassador to Belarus and Georgia.

"It is really important to U.S. interests that Turkey remains democratic," Yalowitz said in an interview. "That's why you need a career ambassador there to guide U.S. policies."

As a career diplomat, Ricciardone spent decades training in diplomacy and moved up through the ranks of the State Department to become an ambassador, Yalowitz said. When the White House opts for a career diplomat to fill an ambassador position, the presidential administration usually appoints the diplomat recommended by the State Department, he said.

By contrast, political appointees selected as ambassadors tend to have close ties to the president, Yalowitz said. In most administrations, roughly 75 percent of all ambassadors are career diplomats and 25 percent are political appointees, according to Yalowitz.