William Faulkner, among the most decorated writers in American literature with the 1949 Nobel Prize for Literature, the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award among his honors, was invited to Japan in 1955 under the auspices of the Exchange of Persons Branch of the United States Information Service (now consolidated into the… Read More "Sound, Fury, Brilliance & Booze: Faulkner in Post-War Japan"
Harriet Elam-Thomas: A Career Well Served
Harriet Elam-Thomas grew up in Boston, the youngest of five children. She graduated from Simmons College and later earned a Master’s Degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts. Beginning a four-decade career in the Foreign Service, Elam-Thomas served her first tour in Senegal, worked in public diplomacy in Mali and Cote…
Protecting Greenland: The American Consulate at Godthab, 1940-42
During World War II, Nazi Germany invaded and occupied continental Denmark, leaving the Kingdom’s other two territories, the Faroe Islands and Greenland, exposed to a possible German invasion. The United Kingdom quickly occupied the Faroe Islands and, along with Canada, made plans to occupy parts of Greenland, which would drag the otherwise neutral island into… Read More "Protecting Greenland: The American Consulate at Godthab, 1940-42"
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. The creation of the Nordic-Baltic Eight (NB8), a regional cooperation consisting of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, and Sweden, helped the Baltics transition away from Cold War-style self-identification toward a more regionally-focused identity.…
Rebuilding Iraq after the Second Gulf War: Lewis Lucke
In January 2003, the U. S. Government established the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance (ORHA) to act as a caretaker administration and begin to rebuild Iraq. Coalition forces from the U.S., UK, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq two months later, launching Operation Iraqi Freedom. The initial phase, with major combat operations, lasted from March… Read More "Rebuilding Iraq after the Second Gulf War: Lewis Lucke"
You Know a Coup is Coming but No One will Listen: Sudan 1964
Sudan’s long history has been riddled with internal conflict. The United Kingdom and Egypt controlled Sudan for the first half of the twentieth century, then agreed to cede it self-government in 1953. In December 1955, the premier of Sudan declared unilateral independence. The newly independent Republic swiftly fell into a pattern of civil wars, coups… Read More "You Know a Coup is Coming but No One will Listen: Sudan 1964"
Foreign Service Newly-Weds in 1960s Yemen
Since the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, Yemen was been a hot spot for unrest in the Middle East. The 1960s saw instability and hostile relations between the socialist South Yemen and the authoritarian Yemen Arab Republic (YAR), also known as North Yemen. The YAR was in the midst of a bloody civil war that… Read More "Foreign Service Newly-Weds in 1960s Yemen"
Intelligence, Research, God and Country: a Tour in INR
Teresita Schaffer enjoyed an illustrious 30-year career in the Foreign Service, developing a reputation as a leading expert on South Asia and international economics. She served in embassies in Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh and as U.S. Ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives from 1992-1995. After a first tour in Israel, Ms. Schaffer returned to… Read More "Intelligence, Research, God and Country: a Tour in INR"
To be Young, Rich and Ambassador to Paris in the ’50s
C. Douglas Dillon was a politician and diplomat who served as U.S. Ambassador to France in the critical post World War II period, 1953-1957, and later as Under Secretary of State and Treasury Secretary. Son of a wealthy investment banker, Dillon graduated from Groton and Harvard, served in the U.S. Navy during World War II,… Read More "To be Young, Rich and Ambassador to Paris in the ’50s"
The Rough Road to Moscow for Malcolm Toon
Malcolm Toon was a fluent Russian speaker and one of the State Department’s top experts on the Soviet Union during the Cold War. He was ambassador to Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Israel, and the Soviet Union. Toon was characterized in The New York Times in 1978 as “one of the most influential of the postwar ambassadors in… Read More "The Rough Road to Moscow for Malcolm Toon "