DANGEROUS ASSIGNMENT: Dangers Of Diplomacy

No one knows the danger of serving the US abroad than former Ambassador Kenneth Quinn, who now heads the World Food Prize in Des Moines. 

Quinn knows first hand, being a foreign diplomat is dangerous work. He spent much of his career working with the American Foreign Service, eventually being named US Ambassador to Cambodia.

He says as an ambassador, there is always a target on your back.  “You know, in my career I have either been blown up, wounded, shot at, under death threat in every assignment” Quinn says, “(You) never know how much you love your children as when you’re lying on top of them, covering them with your body, and praying to god that if the bullet comes in that it hits you and not them.”

If this was a terrorist attack, Quinn says he doubts there will be any more anytime soon. He says, generally terrorists will wait for their enemies to drop their guard before striking again.