Dr. Yasser Abdel Hussein – An Iraqi academic researcher and diplomat
Today, the diplomatic protocol rituals are no
longer just a traditional ceremony related to the etiquette of the rules of
diplomatic work, and the state’s foreign affairs that are represented by the
rules, patterns and customs of conducting international relations with
international personalities and representatives. Rather, it has turned into a
civilized and cultural device that sends coded messages. It carries the DNA of
the political leader, the identity and spirit of the country, and all the
fragrance of the country’s diplomatic heritage.The velvet glove is due to its
soft power through the indirect signals sent by that device. It is no longer
those movements contained in that old book whose papers yellowed in the
hallways of foreign affairs and diplomatic missions. Coded diplomacy is based
on the customs, cultures and civilized pulse of peoples, and is reflected in
the reception ceremonies, food, greetings and others. Therefore, it is
today more than an international blog to send elegant and polite messages of
respect to all parties, in times of peace and war. The French diplomat (Jules
Cambon) says that the protocol does not define the winning countries and the
losing nations, even for two warring countries, mutual respect is a must,
regardless of the balance of power. Otto von Bismarck advises (Be polite and
diplomatic, even in declaring war one should abide by the rules of etiquette).
Events in the Diplomatic Theatre
Why did the Russian President Vladimir Putin
and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron sit separately at a four-meter long
table in their last meeting in Moscow? Why did former US President Donald Trump
violate royal protocol in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II? Why did the
Elysee Palace cancel breakfast for former Iranian President Hassan
Rouhani? Why was there no seat for European Commission President Ursula von der
Leyen during the meeting she and the President of the European Council held with
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara? Why did Iranian Foreign
Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian stand in an unallocated place at the Baghdad
Conference for Partnership and Cooperation? And why did President Putin present
his Egyptian counterpart President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi an AK-47 rifle?
Dealing with the situations mentioned above
within the framework of a deliberate human act or a lapse comes in different
contexts. However, in general in our time, these situations are dealt with in a
different way, sometimes the focus of public opinion and the media with
passion, eagerness, anticipation and a lots of political analyzes to explain
these rituals in the context of being indirect political messages, while on the
other hand, there is another point of view that believes that these rituals do
not have a significant impact on the foreign political behavior of states, and
that they are merely events sent more often to internal public opinion to prove
the strength and character of leaders. The general situation is that all
international actors respect those rituals. This is why talking about the
subject of protocol is the subject of least interest in diplomatic work. The
natural case is that every foreign ministry has a guide to its ceremonies,
built according to the Westphalian system. However, when diplomacy is at stake,
mistakes, regardless of whether they are unintended, can lead to crises, but in
most cases the result of these slips and lapses is white hair on the protocol
officials. When the body of the Queen of Britain is touched by the American
president, as happened during the era of President Trump, it is a dangerous
violation of British royal protocol. However, it did not put the American and
British armies against each other, but the media put the incident at the
forefront of its priorities, so that it overshadowed the main objective of the
visit.
What is the use of a smooth tongue without
sharp teeth?
These situations and events may seem to be
formal, simple and uninteresting issues in the world of international relations
compared to the successive world events of conflicts, wars and new epidemics.
However, these behavioral traditions have become eminently influential, and are
subject to an analysis microscope that may understand from the sociological
angles the identity of the state or the vision of the decision-maker to send
certain political messages or interpretations, and it has become not devoid of
purposes in political psychology and goals that have hidden dimensions that do
not rise to be just a passing event. According to some specialists in
evolutionary psychology, they believe that there are voluntary and involuntary
motives that motivate sending special messages in cases of receiving guests and
leaders. However, This is more prominent in eastern societies.
Historically, it can be noted that the protocol
rituals planned by diplomacy in ancient Iraq carried political messages, and
were not just a customary ritual practiced in the traditional manner. The
Sumerians in the middle of the third millennium BC achieved civilized progress
in the field of foreign policy and its diplomatic tools, in addition to the
fact that the Akkadian language is the first language of diplomacy in the
world. Even the red carpet ceremonies dedicated to receiving kings and leaders
around the world are of Iraqi origin, as the beginning was in Babylon in
ancient Iraq about 550 BC with the reception ceremonies of the Greek king
Agamemnon, where the Babylonians spread a carpet made of red sea sponge that
extended from the Babylon Gate to the palace gate for the purpose of receiving
the Greek king on one of the diplomatic visits, as Margaret Rotten mentions in
his book on the history of Babylon.
It is enough to show an important protocol
incident reported by fellow Iraqi diplomat Thaer Taher Fadel in his published
paper on (the historical roots of
diplomacy of science, technology and innovation in Mesopotamia and its impact
on global civilization), which occurred between the
ambassador of the Kingdom of Mary, and the official in charge of protocol and
ceremonies at the palace of King Hammurabi of Babylon, where ancient Babylon
had a diplomatic relationship with the Kingdom of Mary and its ruler Zimri Lim.
In one of the diplomatic receptions for representatives of the Kingdom of Mary,
and the Kingdom of Yamkhed, which was set up by Hammurabi Palace, the
ambassador of the Kingdom of Mary was invited, and the diplomatic protocol
required that in the event of appearing before the king, the ambassadors wear
specific clothes that are provided to them by the diplomatic protocol official
in the palace. The narration indicates that the staff of the Yamkhad embassy
received the clothes, while the staff of the Mary embassy did not receive all
the clothes except for the ambassador and two of his assistants, but the rest
of the embassy members did not receive the clothes. Thud, their representation
was limited to three people without the presents’ carriers, so they refrained
from entering the ceremony and demanded an official clarification from the
protocol department. The official’s excuse was that the ceremony was only for
the higher positions in the embassy, but in return, the embassy staff of
Yamkhad were fully dressed. As a result, the ambassador of Mary refused what
happened, considering it an insult and bad faith towards the Kingdom of Mary,
so an argument occurs and the representatives of Mary’s embassy leave, so later
it comes to Hammurabi’s hearing, then ordering to send clothes and receive the
entire embassy staff, so after they attend the palace, Hammurabi tells them
that they have caused trouble and harassed those in the palace, and that he is
only who determines whom to see and when. From this case we see that the
administration of the protocol was aware in advance of the directions and
doctrine of Hammurabi in foreign policy, which sees that the Kingdom of Mary
became more dangerous than being an ally, so he sent them this protocol
message, and this situation ended with the Kingdom of Mary breaking its
relations with Babylon.
Protocol and rules of respect
Over centuries of diplomatic
practice, protocol apparatus had to not only demonstrate mutual respect, but
also had to be a political instrument, a form of soft state power and the image
of the state abroad against its competitors. In ancient Europe the lack of such
rules led to serious conflicts, such as the violent dispute over the place in a
meeting with the Swedish ambassador in London in 1661 which occurred between
the retinue of the Spanish ambassador Vateville and the retinue of the French
ambassador d’Estaing, where the King of France ordered Louis XIV to punish the
Spanish ambassador and made other ambassadors of Spain make way for future
French ambassadors, otherwise he threatened to declare war. At first glance, it
seems that the dispute between a retinue and two ambassadors is not comparable
to the danger of war between countries. However, France wanted to exploit this
protocol dispute in order to send its vision and symbolic leadership to other
European countries. Political activity is impossible without rules, because
politics becomes messy without it.
That is why the official of the protocol or
ceremony is no longer just a preserver of the state’s traditions and its law
stipulated by the ABCs of the protocol and ceremonies to receive leaders or
deal at summit conferences, but rather preserves the country’s spirit, history,
identity and the pattern of political messages that their country wants to
convey through it, or vice versa, preserving those values that are intended
to be rooted and others are required to preserve its spirit.
With the development of diplomacy and its
multiple paths throughout the history record, its tools and special apparatus
have developed. This development includes ceremonies and protocols that today
simulate the societal standards or the identity spirit of the state or the
decision-maker and their personality, ambition or their own political messages.
Political anthropologists believe that performing rituals is an important
matter. The importance of producing power, and sometimes these cultural
rituals reflect a silent dialogue with the other party, and therefore have
become expressions of what can be called heritage diplomacy, which is
mobilizing the common cultural and national past in those rituals and exporting
cultural and symbolic expressions of national identity to the outside through
the inside as sources of soft power with the use of historical narratives,
cultural and religious affiliations, and other relationships rooted in the real
and imagined past. Thus, we are facing a new concept of protocol closer to
coded diplomacy. It is enough that the 16 guards in Erdogan’s official palace
represent the countries founded by the Turks and their ancestors to express the
concept of neo-Ottomanism, also the Madeleine Albright’s expressive pins when
she was asked by the Russian Foreign Minister Igor IPhanov, pointing to a pin
she wore like an arrow: Is this one of your missile interceptors? Yes, and as
you can see, we can make it very small, so you better be ready to negotiate,
said Albright.
Today, creative methods of protocol are often
used for specific purposes to express solidarity or send a message of
preference, such as what happened in the funeral ceremony of Emperor Hirohito
of Japan, which is a major international event with the participation of
leaders from all over the world, when former US President George Bush announced
that he would attend. The problem of the traditional protocol was raised that
heads of state should have precedence by the date they take office, and since
Bush has just taken office, he will be the youngest in the seating
arrangements, while Japan wanted to consolidate their relations in Washington,
so the solution that was reached is to treat the funeral as a celebration of
the life of the Emperor of Japan and not as an official event. Therefore, it
was announced that heads of state will be treated primarily in the order of the
countries visited by Hirohito during his life, as a result of which the US
President was placed in the first row of the heads of state present. Thus, the
message of the protocol became a message of preference.
Or, it is an opposite message, such as the
scene of the diplomatic handshake, which is one of the very important phenomena
in the diplomatic theater. The hand presented symbolizes good faith and
willingness to cooperate, and refusing to do so is seen as the opposite, and
ignoring the hand presented is a great diplomatic insult, as happened in the
Algiers Agreement in 1975 between the Shah’s Iran and Iraq, where a story was
told by Dr. Fakhri Qaddouri in his memoirs that after the signing, when Saddam
Hussein left his seat, heading to shake hands with the Shah, thinking that the
Shah would do the same, they met in the middle of a protocol congratulatory
exchange, but the Shah remained standing in front of his chair and did not move
one step, and Saddam was forced to complete the distance alone until he reached
the Shah and the handshake took place. Saddam considered the Shah’s behavior a
kind of insult, and he did not forget this personal and official wound
throughout the years that followed, which ended in the eight-year war.
This coded diplomacy has
become more than just a symbolic function, but rather a sensor linked to the
eyes, thoughts and vision of the decision-maker, taking into account the
accuracy and success of the protocol arrangements, which make it suitable for
strengthening relations and making the guest feel of their importance and
status, and the status of their state in the host country, as well as the
appreciative character of the relationship. There are still so many tools that
make foreign policy work successfully and effectively. Diplomatic protocol is
one of the most important of them. It is simply impossible to imagine any diplomatic
activity without the work of that apparatus.
Sumer Foundation for International Affairs