On May 15, 1948, the UK withdrew from Palestine. (It had been given a mandate over the territories after it defeated the Ottomans…
Back in the USSR — Life as a Student in Moscow in the 1960s
Grim. Tedious. Unrelentingly cold and dreary. Add in KGB surveillance and the fear that they truly were out to get…
Apocalypse Not – The Evacuation from Can Tho, Vietnam — April 1975
The shaky peace that had held in Vietnam since the signing of the Paris Peace Accords in 1973 began to…
“The U.S. values amateurism over professionalism in diplomacy”
Chas W. Freeman, Jr. is one of those rare diplomats with brilliant language abilities who also was involved in an…
“Two Men, One Grave” — The Execution of Pakistan’s Ali Bhutto
Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, founder of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), served as president of Pakistan in the 1970s. By 1977, opposition…
Clare Booth Luce: Ambassador, Congresswoman, Playwright
Born in New York City in 1903, Clare Boothe Luce led a diverse career as a playwright, journalist, editor, and…
An American in Solzhenitsyn’s “Gulag Archipelago”
He was a victim of cruel fate, a young American living in the USSR forced to endure unimaginable torture and…
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…
Nixon Goes to China
“There is no place on this small planet for a billion of its potentially most able people to live in…
McCarthy’s Red Herring
With his infamous Wheeling, West Virginia speech on February 9, 1950, in which he declared he had a list of…