FSO Confesses to Being a Romantic Fool

 

\Well, well, well. What he did for love? Where have we heard those lyrics before? 

Kiss your job goodbye 

Your last day is tomorrow

Wish her luck, but none to you 

Now you've got the shove

So we're rid of, what you did for love 

Oh, dammit, now I've got that song stuck in my head. 

As is more than obvious from the video above, yet another male FSO has shown extremely poor judgement in the serious matter of his obligation to report continuing contacts with persons from criteria countries. 

Not like that's never happened before, but this one keeps talking about it to women he's just met who are wearing wires. That's a double whammmy. First he compromises himself via-a-vis the Chi-Coms, and then he falls right into a trap set by one of the sillier anti-government activist groups. 

This sad news makes me wonder yet again whether the State Department wouldn't be better served if it went to exclusively female embassy staffing in those hostile countries where the local intelligence services like to run sexual entrapment games on western diplomats. 

Women FSOs have not been 100 percent immune to that approach, it must be admitted, but they nevertheless seem nowhere near as foolish as their male counterparts. 

Until the day comes that we raise an order of celibate monks to do diplomatic work in places like China, female FSOs might be our safest bet.

China Plans to Build a Fortress Embassy in London, To Which Security-Based Objections Are Raised

Allowing the Chinese to build this in the heart of London is complete and utter madness https://t.co/EaG4S3uTh2

— Camilla Tominey (@CamillaTominey) August 7, 2025

BBC has more on this, including a regular Chinese laundry list of security concerns:

The plan itself involves a cultural centre and housing for 200 staff, but in the basement, behind security doors, there are also rooms with no identified use on the plans. 

There is another fear, held by some opponents, that the Royal Mint Court site could allow China to infiltrate the UK's financial system by tapping into fibre optic cables carrying sensitive data for firms in the City of London. 

The site once housed Barclays Bank's trading floor, so it was wired directly into the UK's financial infrastructure. Nearby, a tunnel has, since 1985, carried fibre optic cables under the Thames serving hundreds of City firms. 

And in the grounds of the Court, is a five-storey brick building - the Wapping Telephone Exchange that serves the City of London. 

According to Prof Periklis Petropoulos, an optoelectronics researcher at Southampton University, direct access to a working telephone exchange could allow people to glean information.

Against all that, if there are any good arguments in favor of this Great Diplomatic Wall of China, I didn't catch them.

China's Balloons Explained (by People's Liberation Army Report of 2018)

China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) Report In March 2018: 'An Omnipotent Weapon - How Amazing Are Near-Space Vehicles?': Airships Can Provide Tremendous Strategic, Tactical Advantages, Are Stealthy, Can Strike Land And Space Targets
– https://t.co/bhWVwQ6HcQ pic.twitter.com/S4DTgXP2dD

— MEMRI (@MEMRIReports) February 17, 2023