At the height of the Cold War, with the death toll mounting in Vietnam and the split between the USSR…
Frances Willis, The First Career Female Ambassador
Frances Willis was the first female to rise to the rank of Ambassador as a career Foreign Service Officer. After…
A First-Class Spy Flap: CIA Agents Compromised in Ghana
Relations between the United States and Ghana were strained in the early 1980s. Its leader, the enigmatic former Flight Lieutenant…
Somalia — From Great Hope to Failed State
While today the mention of Somalia may conjure up images of a destitute nation run by warlords, such was not…
Sound and the Fury — The 1954 Geneva Conference on Vietnam and Korea
In April 1954, amidst growing tensions regarding the situation in the Korean Peninsula and Indochina, the international community convened a…
Like Father, Like Son — Tyranny in Syria, A Massacre in Hama
As the civil war in Syria drags on with no end in sight, the humanitarian toll of the conflict becomes…
“Never get into an elevator with a Polish blonde” — More Honeypots
During the Cold War and beyond, Western diplomats had to constantly keep their wits about them when serving in the…
The Art of China Watching During the Great Leap Forward
From 1958 to 1961, following the anti-rightest crackdown of the Hundred Flowers Campaign, Mao Zedong and the Communist Party launched…
The Long Arm of History — Kurt Waldheim Banned for his Nazi Past
On June 8th, 1986, Kurt Waldheim was elected President of Austria. The former Secretary General of the United Nations and…
The Berlin Crisis of 1961
In the early years of the Cold War, Berlin repeatedly became the focal point of tension between the U.S. and…