Housing for FSOs was not always provided on assignments abroad. Francis Terry McNamara had to find housing for himself and his family in many different places, some under unconventional situations. McNamara tells about his house-hunting in Elizabethville (now Lubumbashi), Congo in 1962 after the city had been ravaged by an attempted insurrection and continued unrest… Read More "House for Rent in the War-torn Congo–Three Baths, no Squatters"
FSO Ends Up in an Irish Stew Over His Christmas Letter
We’ve all wanted to blow off steam about our boss, co-workers, or those troglodytes in Human Resources. Robin Berrington, who served as Public Affairs Officer in Dublin from 1978 through 1981, was no different. He talked about his frustrations with his job and with Ireland in general in what was supposed to be a private… Read More "FSO Ends Up in an Irish Stew Over His Christmas Letter"
When Visa Officers Went Bad
Consular officers are often the face of the U.S. government overseas. They are the ones interviewing visa applicants, dealing with prospective adoptive parents, helping U.S. citizens who have had their passports stolen or gotten in a scrape with the law. It can often be a demanding job, with weekend calls as duty officer or the… Read More "When Visa Officers Went Bad"
Japanese Fishermen and the Bikini Atoll H-bomb Blast
On March 1st, 1954, the U.S. conducted its largest hydrogen bomb test ever near the Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. An unexpected blast of 15 megatons — 1,000 times stronger than the Hiroshima bomb — affected Australia, India and Japan with widespread radioactive fallout. The Fortunate Dragon (Daigo Fukuryū Maru), a Japanese fishing boat,… Read More "Japanese Fishermen and the Bikini Atoll H-bomb Blast"
The Day Stalin’s Daughter Asked for Asylum in the U.S.
On March 9th, 1967, Svetlana Alliluyeva — Joseph Stalin’s only daughter — walked into the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi and requested political asylum. No one knew she was even in India. (She had traveled there in 1966 in order to place the ashes of her boyfriend, an Indian Communist she had met in Moscow,… Read More "The Day Stalin’s Daughter Asked for Asylum in the U.S."
The Red Scare Hits the Foreign Service Institute
The Foreign Service Institute plays a central role in the training of American diplomats and other professionals in the U.S. foreign affairs community. Decades of experience and its hundreds of course offerings–from language and area to studies to management and technical training–have made FSI uniquely qualified in this regard. Despite its importance, the Institute’s existence… Read More "The Red Scare Hits the Foreign Service Institute"
The Terrorist Attack on the Saudi Embassy — Khartoum, 1973
Less than a year after its members murdered 11 Israeli athletes and one German police guard during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, the infamous Palestinian terrorist group Black September Organization (BSO) on March 1, 1973 launched a brazen raid on the Saudi Arabian embassy in Khartoum, Sudan, kidnapping U.S. Ambassador Cleo Noel and Deputy Chief… Read More "The Terrorist Attack on the Saudi Embassy — Khartoum, 1973"
Nixon Goes to China
“There is no place on this small planet for a billion of its potentially most able people to live in angry isolation.” Richard Nixon, after his election in 1968, pushed for better relations with China despite historical tensions and hostilities. In 1971, National Security Advisor and future Secretary of State Henry Kissinger took two trips… Read More "Nixon Goes to China"
With his infamous Wheeling, West Virginia speech on February 9, 1950, in which he declared he had a list of communists working in the State Department, Senator Joseph McCarthy ushered in one of the darker periods in the post-war era. The speech came at a time when the fear of communism and communist infiltrators in… Read More "McCarthy’s Red Herring"
President Nixon Meant to Thank Faisal, not Faisal
Less than a month before President Richard Nixon’s resignation on August 9, 1974, he took a presidential tour of the Middle East. The trip was meant to strengthen U.S. relations with the region as well as provide the president with a respite from the onslaught of bad press at home due to the infamous Watergate… Read More "President Nixon Meant to Thank Faisal, not Faisal"