The worldwide increase in demand for recreational drugs in the 1960s and 1970s prompted drug barons in Colombia to ramp…
Sue McCourt Cobb: Ambassador and Summiteer of Mt. Everest
Climbing Mount Everest has long been the epitome of physical and mental endurance. Since Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became…
John Foster Dulles – Master Craftsman, Man of Paradox
President Dwight Eisenhower appointed John Foster Dulles as Secretary of State in January 1953, a job he held until almost…
The Coup Against Iran’s Mohammad Mossadegh
Mohammad Mossadegh became Prime Minister of Iran in 1951 and was hugely popular for taking a stand against the Anglo-Iranian Oil…
A Flood of Cuban Migrants — The Mariel Boatlift, April-October 1980
One of the most contentious events in mass migration started on April 1, 1980 when several Cubans took control of…
Brazil’s Long Detour on the Road to Democracy
Brazil’s path to democracy was far from perfect and often tortuous. In 1961, a “possibly half insane” Janio Quadros was…
Argentina’s Dirty War and the Transition to Democracy
It was one of the darkest periods in Latin American history. From 1976-1983, a brutal military junta ruled Argentina in…
The Dramatic Hostage Crisis and Daring Rescue at the Japanese Embassy in Peru
It sounds like something out of a novel: a group of rebels, helped by an American, seize an embassy in…
“Don’t Cry For Me, Argentina” — The Tumultuous Times of Juan and Evita Peron
July 26, 1952: The people of Argentina are glued to their radios and fall silent as an official broadcast comes…
Four Days in September — The Kidnapping of the U.S. Ambassador to Brazil
It sounds like something out of Hollywood. Indeed, it was made into a Brazilian movie in 1997 with Alan Arkin…