As a side note to the side note, the "Arabist" tradition in the US State Department has been around since the mid 1800s. Robert Kaplan wrote a great book about it: http://www.amazon.com/Arabists-American-Robert-D-Kaplan/dp/0...

(The OP made it sound like elites studying Arabic for their ambassador posts is something new. It just faded in popularity when religious fundamentalists started to rise in influence.)