Shortly after Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2, 1990, Saddam Hussein and his Republican Guard forces took hundreds of Americans…
Crazy Train — A Congolese Victory Tour
What’s a party without prostitutes, undrinkable whiskey, and the best seats in the house, cleared for you at sword-point? Following…
Nixon vs. Khrushchev — The 1959 Kitchen Debate
It was undoubtedly one of the most unorthodox – and therefore memorable – settings for a major political debate. On…
Srebrenica and the Horrors of the Balkan War
The break-up of Yugoslavia caused some of the most heinous human rights violations and ethnic mass killings seen in the…
Through the Open Gate: The Communist Takeover of Nanking
On October 1, 1949, Mao Zedong declared the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, starting an era of Communist…
Jordan’s Black September, 1970
In 1972, a group of Palestinian terrorists shocked the world by kidnapping eleven Israeli athletes during the Summer Olympics in…
A Personnel Tragedy
Charles William Thomas was a bright mid-career Foreign Service officer who was selected out because his efficiency report was mixed…
Douglas MacArthur, America’s Emperor of Japan
He was a general’s general, tough, unrelenting, a man who embraced the role history thrust on him. He was also…
Wives Gone Wild
Every Foreign Service Officer can have a difficult job of navigating cultural differences, memorizing customs and sticking to protocol while…
Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe
Robert Mugabe is one of the more controversial figures in Africa. He rose to prominence in the 1960s as the…