“There is no place on this small planet for a billion of its potentially most able people to live in…
McCarthy’s Red Herring
With his infamous Wheeling, West Virginia speech on February 9, 1950, in which he declared he had a list of…
“You’re nothing but a two-bit dictator” – Dealing with the DR’s Rafael Trujillo
Known as “El Jefe,” or “The Chief,” Rafael Trujillo ruled as dictator of the Dominican Republic for more than 30…
The Show Trial of U-2 Pilot Francis Gary Powers
On May 1, 1960, an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union and its pilot, Francis…
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…
Ignoring Washington for the Sake of Argentina
While human rights in foreign policy has generally enjoyed broad bipartisan support for several years now, it was not always…
Being Black in a “Lily White” State Department
Terence Todman is one of the few people to attain the rank of career ambassador – the equivalent of a…
The USS Pueblo Incident — Assassins in Seoul, A Spy Ship Captured
January of 1968 saw two of the most serious incidents to occur on the Korean peninsula since the end of…
Desert Storm: “The War Never Really Ended” — Part II
Chas Freeman was U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia during Desert Storm and consulted frequently with General Norman Schwarzkopf and others…
Desert Storm “The War Never Really Ended” — Part I
It was the first major foreign policy crisis for the U.S. since the end of the Cold War. Iraq, which…