Following the Chinese Civil War and the establishment of the People’s Republic of China on the mainland, a “Bamboo Curtain,”…
Survivor of Two Concentration Camps, U.S. Ambassador to Three Countries
Robert Gerhard Neumann (1916–1999), seen at right with wife Marlen, served as U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, Morocco, and Saudi Arabia.…
Georgia and The Rose Revolution
Georgia declared independence from the Soviet Union in April 1991, and problems and instability arose almost immediately. The first President…
Admiral William Leahy, Ambassador to Vichy
When Admiral William Leahy retired as Chief of Naval Operations in August 1939, President Roosevelt personally awarded him the…
The U-2 Spy Plane Incident
On May 1, 1960, an America U-2 spy plane was shot down in Soviet airspace, causing great embarrassment to the…
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…
That’s What Friends Are For
One of the great advantages of being in the Foreign Service is the opportunity to live abroad, learn new languages,…
The 1991 Madrid Peace Conference
The Madrid Peace Conference, held from October 30 to November 1, 1991, marked the first time that Israeli leaders negotiated…
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…
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…