RUTHFULLY YOURS

The most successful recent Secretaries— Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, James Baker —used the department’s assets to serve their agendas. They put allies in key jobs to manage the biggest issues, while letting the career staff run lesser portfolios. But more than a year into the Trump era, most senior State posts remain vacant, as do key ambassadorships to the likes of South Korea, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Mr. Tillerson relied on too many diplomats who served the bureaucracy’s agenda.

Mr. Tillerson’s larger problem was that he disagreed with his boss on key issues. From the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris climate pact to the Saudi Arabia-Qatar dispute, Mr. Tillerson took positions publicly at odds with the White House. This offended Mr. Trump’s easily offended ego, and the President struck back with tweets that undercut Mr. Tillerson at key moments. As if to prove the point, on Tuesday the White House fired another senior State official for contradicting the White House line on Mr. Tillerson’s ouster.

Mr. Pompeo has the advantage of sharing Mr. Trump’s more hawkish instincts on Iran and North Korea in particular. The 54-year-old finished first in his class at West Point and has served in the Army, run businesses, represented Kansas in Congress and for a year has led, as he’s put it, an “aggressive” CIA. His daily intelligence briefings for Mr. Trump have allowed the two to form a rapport.

Mr. Pompeo may thus have more influence with a President who has conflicting foreign-policy instincts and often eschews counsel. On Iran, Mr. Trump has talked tough but stood by while Tehran has propped up Syria’s Bashar Assad and built military positions on Israel’s border. Mr. Pompeo’s challenge will be to help the Administration think beyond the Obama-era Iran nuclear deal and formulate a more comprehensive pressure strategy on Tehran.

Then there’s North Korea, where Mr. Pompeo will have to move quickly to formulate a strategy for the impending Kim Jong Un-Trump summit. Mr. Trump has promised to maintain “maximum pressure” on Pyongyang, but he’s a deal-maker who could be tempted into damaging concessions in his personal diplomacy. Mr. Pompeo’s experience may bolster Mr. Trump’s skepticism of Kim’s sincerity.

Then there’s the challenge of Vladimir Putin’s Russia. Mr. Trump has done little to push back on the Kremlin’s foreign adventurism, aside from arming the Ukrainians with lethal weapons. Mr. Tillerson warned Tuesday of the “troubling behavior and actions” of Moscow, a reference to the recent poisoning of a former spy on British soil and Mr. Putin’s nuclear saber-rattling.

Mr. Pompeo will inherit a demoralized State Department, but fixing that isn’t as formidable a challenge as setting a more coherent foreign-policy direction. Mr. Pompeo will have the advantage of like-minded allies in Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, with whom Mr. Tillerson often disagreed.

Mr. President named Mr. Pompeo’s deputy, Gina Haspel, to replace him. She’s a veteran of the operations side of the CIA, which can use a champion. But she’ll also have to prove she has the chops to run the agency and play a role in Administration debates.

Mr. Trump has run through a spate of advisers in recent weeks, and a personnel reset isn’t surprising for someone so new to governing. But Mr. Trump should be careful to treat his colleagues better than he so often does, lest he drive away first-class talent. He needs to get the team he wants and show them the same loyalty and respect he demands from them.