Service to America’s Security
Every day our diplomats are working to reduce threats to our country and build a more secure world. Embassy staff are on the front lines of American security, monitoring situations to detect potential conflict, engaging in dialogues to deter it, and should this fail, building alliances to bring other nations to our side in conflict. Diplomats are also the ones who negotiate the agreements to end conflicts and ensure lasting peace.
Photo on right: NATO’s Parliamentary Assembly gathers in Washington, DC, in July 2024. Wikimedia | CC 2.0
Ensuring a Safer World
Niles Bond: Saving American Code Books from the Japanese Special Police: In late 1941, Vice Consul and Massachusetts native Niles W. Bond spent most days reporting to the Navy Department on Japanese ship movements in Tokyo Bay, which he observed through a telescope on the roof of the U.S. Consulate in Yokohama.
Janet Bogue: Eliminating Kazakhstan’s Nuclear Secret: Foreign Service Officer Janet L. Bogue joined our embassy in Kazakhstan at a crucial time in history. When the Tacoma, Washington native took over the Political and Economic Section in 1994, the State Department was focused on securing the nuclear assets of the Soviet Union’s successor states.
Robert Lochner: Giving Kennedy the line “Ich Bin Ein Berliner: Sometimes securing relationships with our allies comes down to giving our leaders the language they need to win over hearts and minds. Growing up as the son of the Associated Press Bureau Chief in West Berlin, U.S. Information Agency officer Robert Lochner’s language skills were invaluable in 1963 when President Kennedy came to the divided city, where Lochner was directing “Radio in the American Sector” broadcasts.
– Department of the Navy
Photo courtesy of Michael Varga.
Yvonne Thayer: Selling the Ecuadorian AG on Drug Interdiction: Yvonne Thayer grew up in Richfield, Minnesota, began her career as a journalist, and joined the Foreign Service in 1975. After assignments ranging from economics to human rights, she arrived in Ecuador in 1989 to serve as director of the U.S. Embassy’s Narcotics Affairs Section (NAS).
Max Bishop: Warning of the Pearl Harbor attack: Ambassador Max Waldo Bishop was born in Gravette, Arkansas, grew up in Kansas City, Kansas, and joined the Foreign Service in 1935. The first of Bishop’s many overseas postings was to Japan, serving in Osaka as vice consul and then in Tokyo as a political officer from 1937-1941.
Michael Varga: Avoiding Bloodshed with Iran in the Persian Gulf: During the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, merchant ships became regular targets as each nation tried to interrupt the oil revenues and arms supplies of the other. A robust U.S. Naval presence in the Persian Gulf was tasked with ensuring the safety of American shipping.
Theodore Achilles: Bringing Portugal into the NATO Treaty (coming soon)