Long before he was President Reagan’s Secretary of Defense, Frank Carlucci was a young State Department political officer in Kinshasa,…
A Diplomat Recalls Escape From a Kidnapping in Uruguay
Kidnappings, particularly those of high-ranking political officials, were not uncommon in 1970s Uruguay given the prominence of an urban guerilla…
Edward Elson: Entrepreneurial Ambassador to Denmark
The fall of the Soviet Union upset long-established power dynamics, leaving East and Central Europe, in particular, in uncharted waters.…
Wait ‘til the Winter: Iran, Iraq and the Kurdish Rebellion
Iraqi Kurds are scheduled to hold a referendum on independence in September, 2017. The Kurdistan region of about five million…
North Yemen: Ambassador to a Divided Land
Yemen has experienced violence and poverty in recent decades, but for centuries was a pivotal crossroads for trade and travel.…
Harold Saunders: The Original “Peace Processor”
Born in Philadelphia, Harold “Hal” Saunders graduated from Princeton and Yale before serving in the U.S. Air Force. After working…
Mission Unspeakable: When North Koreans Tried to Kill the President of South Korea
On October 9, 1983, while South Korean President Chun Doo-Hwan was on a visit to Rangoon, Burma to lay a…
The Technology of Terror – South America in the 70s and 80s
Terrorism the world over poses a threat to the lives of Foreign Service Officers. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s terrorist…
Seeking a Peace Settlement with Shimon Peres, Hawk and Dove
The passing of Israeli statesman Shimon Peres on September 28, 2016 was deeply felt by U.S. diplomats who had worked…
The Sudden Rise of Muammar Qaddafi and a Hostile Libya
On September 1st, 1969, a group of young Libyan military officers overthrew the Libyan royal family and established the Libyan…