Embassy Staff/Baghdad "will be much smaller than imagined"

"... Those plans have now been shelved or indefinitely postponed, and pleas from some Iraqi leaders to open diplomatic offices in the Shiite-dominated south, where Iran wields outsize influence, were summarily rejected.
Taken together, the shrinking of the United States’ military and diplomatic ambitions underscores the reality that a post-America Iraq is taking shape more rapidly and completely than many Iraqis and Americans had envisioned. That has heartened many Iraqis and Americans, weary of more than eight years of war and occupation, but left others fearful.........
But the expansion of a diplomatic presence will be much smaller than imagined, a victim not only of budgetary constraints but also of a growing awareness that the decision to withdraw American soldiers makes it much harder for diplomats to safely do their work.... Christopher R. Hill, a former United States ambassador to Iraq, worries that even a less-expansive presence might be risky.
“I and many other people have concerns of the sustainability of keeping so many diplomats in so many far-flung places,” he said. “If you don’t have freedom of movement, you do go back to the question of whether it is worth the outlay of the budget and risk and personnel for keeping these people there.”..."