AP reports...The United States on Thursday named a career diplomat with wide-ranging experience in East Asia to be the new head of its de facto embassy in Taiwan.Previous Taipei Times articles on Stanton here and blog post here. Take all gossip about Stanton's political stances with a massive grain of NaCl. The previous AIT head, Steve Young, has done a bang up job, and there's no reason Stanton won't as well.
The American Institute in Taiwan said William Stanton, currently the No. 2 U.S. diplomat in South Korea, will replace outgoing institute head Stephen Young in August.
UPDATE: Taipei Times has longer piece on it today. Didn't realize it but AIT head is appointed out of State Department w/o Congressional oversight.
_______________________
[Taiwan] Don't miss the comments below! And check out my blog and its sidebars for events, links to previous posts and picture posts, and scores of links to other Taiwan blogs and forums!
Been a while since I checked in. Glad you're back.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. Gossip is gossip. He should be judged on how he performs - good luck to him!
ReplyDeleteAll the State Department people in regards to Taiwan are in place now (Kurt C was confirmed recently), so hopefully we'll see arms sales developments in the next six months or so.
Looked up Young's predecessor Douglas Paal. So Douglas Paal, does a shitty job as AIT Director, leading to horrible communications between Taiwan and the US, but then ends up as the vice chairman of JP Morgan Chase! Even if you blame part of the communication problems on the DPP, he obviously didn't do a good job. Who the hell recommended him for such a cushy job? What the heck?
ReplyDeleteYoung deserves something decent for his next assignment.