After conquering Kabul in April 1996, the Taliban established the ultra-conservative Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, enforcing a radical interpretation of…
“Military overreach cannot be offset by diplomatic incapacity”
2014 marks the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I, the devastating “war to end all wars.” While…
The Embassy Moscow Fire of 1977
Diplomats working in the USSR had to contend with a wide range of difficulties – poor bilateral relations, KGB surveillance,…
End of an Era: The August Coup and the Final Days of the Soviet Union
In August 1991, Soviet hardliners attempted to overthrow the progressive Mikhail Gorbachev, Secretary General of the Communist Party, in a…
The Search for Peace in Southern Africa – Oil, Angola, and the Proxy Wars
During the Cold War, the United States and the USSR engaged in a zero-sum game throughout the globe; while mutually…
The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
The Gulf of Tonkin attack on August 2, 1964 and another many believed to take place on August 4 led…
The Vietnamese Boat People
After the United States withdrew from South Vietnam in 1975, communist North Vietnam quickly took over and established the Socialist Republic…
Broken Bones, Broken Dreams, Broken Homeland: The First Intifada, 1987
On December 9, 1987, the deaths of four Palestinian refugees plunged the nation of Israel into four years of strikes,…
Kashmir and the 1965 Indo-Pakistani War
In the summer of 1965, India and Pakistan returned to the battlefields of Kashmir in a renewed attempt to establish…
An Iraq War Dissent
In 2001 Ann Wright served as the first political officer in the newly reopened U.S. Embassy in Kabul. Two years…