# Who was the last Secretary of State to accomplish something noteworthy?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-last-secretary-of-state-to-accomplish-something-noteworthy/802000>\
**Category:** Politics & Elections\
**Created:** [November 18, 2017, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-last-secretary-of-state-to-accomplish-something-noteworthy/802000 "2017-11-18T16:19:31Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Lantern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d26b3c/32.png) [@Lantern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lantern)\
**Post date:** [November 22, 2017, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-last-secretary-of-state-to-accomplish-something-noteworthy/802000/21 "2017-11-22T05:13:46Z")

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> [@Ravenman](#):
>
> I’m not sure how anyone with even a passing interest can overlook multiple major nuclear arms control agreements, the banning of landmines and chemical weapons, the expansion of NATO, the Iran nuclear deal, a series of free trade agreements (not the least of which was NAFTA) and the various climate change agreements in talking about noteworthy foreign policy achievements. Whether or not you agree with them, they are certainly historic pacts.

I would add the Montreal Protocol on ozone depeletion, the building of the coalition in the first Gulf War and more generally the peaceful end of the Cold War. Credit where credit due, the Reagan-Bush era had a lot of diplomatic achievements and in fact I would say the diplomacy of those years has been the biggest achievement of the Republican party over the last 100 years, which makes their subsequent deprecation of diplomacy all the more baffling.

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**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\
**Post date:** [November 22, 2017, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-last-secretary-of-state-to-accomplish-something-noteworthy/802000/22 "2017-11-22T05:54:12Z")

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George Shultz pushed for Ronald Reagan to establish relations with Mikhail Gorbachev. The end of the Cold War ame soon after.

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**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\
**Post date:** [November 22, 2017, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-was-the-last-secretary-of-state-to-accomplish-something-noteworthy/802000/23 "2017-11-22T08:15:03Z")

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> [@Chronos](#):
>
> I think that Secretary of State is one of those jobs that goes pretty much unnoticed unless something goes wrong. So saying that a given SoS “didn’t accomplish anything” is actually praise.

I agree. In fact, I’d say that at least 95% of the job is putting out fires - every day a war doesn’t break out somewhere in the world is a good day for the SoS.

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