If Carl von Clausewitz's famous maxim that war is the continuation of politics by other means holds some truth, then the border zone between the two — the pathway into war, or the way around it — is where the mysterious art of diplomacy is practiced.
Marie Yovanovitch is a lifelong diplomat. She had spent her entire career representing American "soft power" in a variety of challenging contexts and under presidents of both parties, right up to the point when she abruptly and unexpectedly became a household name. As U.S. ambassador to Ukraine from 2016 to 2019, Yovanovitch became an important supporting player in Donald Trump's first impeachment, as the principal target of a smear campaign that even now, three years later, is too convoluted and nonsensical to be easily explained.
