"AMBASSADOR, WHERE’S YOUR COUNTRY?”

When George P. Shultz was the secretary of state in the US administration, there was a big globe in his office. When the ambassadors, who were newly going to their posts or in their posts and coming back to visit him got ready to leave, he would say to them, "Ambassador, you have one more test before you can go to your post. You have to go over to the globe and prove to me that you can identify your country."  So unerringly, they would go over and they'd spin the globe around and they'd put their finger on the country they were going to, pass the test.

Mike Mansfield, great elder statesman in America, former Senate majority leader and who had been ambassador to Japan was a close friend of George P. Shultz.  During a visit to US while being the ambassador to Japan, he visited George P. Shultz.   As he got ready to leave George P. Shultz said, "Mike, I got to give you the same test I give everybody else. Before you can go back to Japan, you got to show me that you can go over to the globe and put your finger on your country."

So he went over and he spun this globe around and he put his hand on the United States and said, "That's my country." From that day on George P. Shultz told the above story to all the ambassadors going out, "Never forget, you're over there in that country, but your country is the United States. You're there to represent us. Take care of our interests and never forget it, and you're representing the best country in the world."

What does it tell us?