Meet the man behind hawkish Hillary Clinton's foreign policy
In late 2010, Tom Nides sat down for lunch with the throwback diplomat Richard Holbrooke on the second floor of Kinkead's, a legendary seafood restaurant near the State Department's headquarters in the Foggy Bottom section of Washington.
Nides had just been nominated to succeed Jack Lew as deputy secretary of state, and Holbrooke, who was serving as the US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, wanted to give Nides the lay of the land. Nides thought that meant a status update on the region.
But Holbrooke, who paid attention as meticulously to the ups and downs of the Washington elite as he did to the twists and turns of international deal-making, intended to detail the department's power structure. As they ate, Holbrooke explained that Nides must acquaint himself with a singular force in Secretary Hillary Clinton's inner circle.
"Let me tell you, the only person and the one person you need to get to know, who is loved by everyone in the institution and gets things done, is Jake Sullivan," Holbrooke said.
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http://www.vox.com/2015/5/11/8569345/hillary-clinton-hawkish-foreign-policy