Yugoslavia had long been a simmering caldron of ethnic and nationalist tensions. After the death of Yugoslav strongman Josip Broz…
A Blind Eye — Fighting Terrorism in the 1980s
The U.S. focus on terrorism began to intensify in the late 1970s and 80s. However, it was often difficult to…
Iraqi Kurds, Operation Provide Comfort, and the Birth of Iraq’s Opposition
In the aftermath of Iraq’s crushing defeat during Operation Desert Storm in February 1991, protesters and rebels in the northern…
Winning the Peace – USAID and the Demobilization of the Nicaraguan Contras
In the 1980s, one of the focal points of U.S. foreign policy was the rise of leftist militants throughout the…
Iraq’s Rocky Road to Recovery Post-Saddam
In the wake of the U.S.-led Coalition Forces invasion of Iraq in March, 2003 and dissolution of the Ba’ath Party,…
Trust In Me
Living abroad often comes with an array of challenges and frightening encounters. In the 1930s before joining the Foreign Service,…
Combining Forces to Counter Terrorism — The Birth of S/CT
U.S. inter-agency coordination on countering terrorism was limited, for bureaucratic and technical reasons, prior to the mid-1980s. As hijackings and…
The King and I and The Missionary’s Wife
The Foreign Service has attracted some very talented people over the years and many of those are the spouses of…
Stop the MADness — Arms Control and Disarmament
The end of World War II ushered in an era of intense arms competition between the Soviet Union and the…
De-Baathification and Dismantling the Iraqi Army
The 2003 American invasion of Iraq, which came not long after the invasion of Afghanistan, proved to be highly controversial,…