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Waiting for Rain

March 2008

Journal of a Former Peace Corps Volunteer’s Return to Niger by Tom Kelly A Peace Corps Volunteer in Niger, now an associate professor at a law school, returned to the country and the rural village where he had lived in … Read more

Implementing AFRICOM

February 2008

by Robert Gribbin One of the Foreign Service’s most experienced Africa specialists assesses the Pentagon’s new Africa Command, what it is, what it will do, and how it will relate to American embassies and ambassadors on the continent. There will … Read more

Joining: Real hardship Post

August 2005

This, the second tranche of a feature on the background to entering a diplomatic career, presents the accounts of five more Foreign Service officers, active or retired. Each officer has an interesting and unique story. We at American Diplomacy believe that each … Read more

Joining the Foreign Service

May 2005

Generation after generation thousands of us have joined the Foreign Service for thousands of different reasons.Below six Foreign Service Officers of different generations, active duty and retired, describe why they wanted a career in the Foreign Service and how they … Read more

Review of Blix’s Disarming Iraq

July 2004

Review of Disarming Iraq by Hans Blix Review by Bob Chira Disarming Iraq. By Hans Blix. (Pantheon Books, New York 2004, Pp. 304, hardcover, $24.) Hans Blix, the former chief of the United Nation’s chemical and biological weapons inspection agency charged with verifying … Read more

The Bush Doctrine and U.S. Interventionism

June 2004

In this extended study of a currently developing facet of American diplomacy, the author presents his analysis of its meaning in the context of U.S. history. Prof. Dolan points up how in his opinion this change incorporates anti-multilateralist views, renewed … Read more

The Blessings of Globalization –“Done Right”

April 2004

The Blessings of Globalization–“Done Right” Review by Carl Fritz Globalization and Its Discontents. By Joseph E. Stiglitz. (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2001. Pp. xxii, 288. $15.95 paper.) Stiglitz believes globalization is good if done right; removal of free … Read more

The Real Axis of Evil

March 2004

Ambassador Mark Palmer is the author of the recently published Breaking the Real Axis of Evil: How to Oust the World’s Last Dictators by 2025 (2003) in which he tells the story of all the world’s remaining dictators, their vulnerabilities, and how … Read more

Surviving the Heart of Darkness: A Consul’s Tale

December 2003

Surviving the Heart of Darkness: A Consul’s Tale Review by Michael W. Cotter Captive in the Congo: A Consul’s Return to the Heart of Darkness. By Michael P. E. Hoyt. (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2000. Pp. xxiv, 275. $29.95 … Read more

Acting Alone? Fidel’s African Imperial Adventures

December 2003

Acting Alone? Fidel’s African Imperiadventures Review by Margaret Hemenway Conflicting Missions: Havana, Washington, and Africa, 1959-1976. By Piero Gleijeses. (Chapel Hill and London: The University of North Carolina Press, 2002. Pp. xix, 552. $34.95 cloth; $24.95 paper.) Piero Gleijeses’ Conflicting Missions attempts … Read more

The United States and Africa

August 2003

Is the United States once again “rediscovering” Africa? What has our approach been and what should it be now? The author, a former Assistant Secretary of State for African affairs, reviews the past and charts a course for the future. … Read more

Letter from Niger May 2003

June 2003

The Winds of War Blow By It would be overstating the case to say that the Iraq War turned out to be a non-event in Niger…but not by much. In the months leading up to the war, many of us … Read more