A council of combined security forces known as the Derg staged a coup d’état on September 12, 1974 against Ethiopian…
The Incidental Oriental Secretary and Other Tales of Foreign Service
Back to Diplomats and Diplomacy Dick Jackson captures the humor and sheer incongruity of working across cultures in an international…
“The World Was Tired of Haiti”: The 1994 U.S. Intervention
The United States found itself embroiled in several interventions in the 1990s that focused on upholding basic human rights standards…
Getting Kosovo Right: Working to Avoid Another Bosnia
Yugoslavia had long been a simmering caldron of ethnic and nationalist tensions. After the death of Yugoslav strongman Josip Broz…
Billion-Dollar “Plan Colombia” to End Decades of Civil War
Published January 2016 A guerrilla organization known as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People’s Army (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias…
Burundi: With Independence Came Genocide
Coordinated attacks in Burundi in recent years left hundreds dead and forced thousands to flee the country. The State Department advised…
The Last Emperor – The Fall of Haile Selassie
None could be more considered more central to the modern history of Africa’s longest independent nation, Ethiopia, than Emperor Haile Selassie. Regent…
Picking Up the Pieces After Black Hawk Down
The State Department dispatched Richard Bogosian to Somalia to repair political and diplomatic damage following an attempt to rescue crews…
Responding to the Threat of Mass Atrocities
Drawing on his experiences as U.S. Special Envoy for Sudan and South Sudan, Ambassador Princeton Lyman highlights the decision making trade-offs he…
The Irrepressible Prudence Bushnell
As a teenage daughter of a Foreign Service Officer who moved his family from country to country every so often,…