Elsewhere in this journal we offer accounts by American diplomats, active and retired, on how they became interested in a Foreign Service career.An important part of such careers is the initial assignment, especially the first post abroad. Very frequently officers at … Read more

stories from John Brown; Carleton Coon; Milt Iossi; Brenda B.Scjoonover; Richard Schoonover; and Daniel Strasser

The author bases this informative survey on a presentation he made in April to a university study group on Asia. As the reader will note, he finds the record mixed, with successes in dealing with China and Japan, and a … Read more

by Ronald Palmer

Review by William Dale
Vietnam and Beyond: A Diplomat’s Cold War Education. By Robert Hopkins Miller. (Lubbock, TX: Texas Tech University Press; ADST-DACOR Diplomats and Diplomacy Series and the Modern Southeast Asia Series, 2002, Pp. xix, 247. $36.50 cloth.

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

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

The author has specialized in the study of terrorist groups worldwide for the past twenty years. This essay, originally appearing on www.frontpagemagazine.com. in November 2003, remains relevant to a continuing problem in Iraq—the suicide bombings.— Ed. On October 27, 2003, … Read more

Amb. Schaffer presents below a balanced appreciation of one of the most distinguished senior American diplomats ever. This article, drawn from the author’s book of the same title published in 2003, takes a generally admiring approach, but also points up … Read more

by Ronald D. Palmer

Not all dangers faced by Foreign Service families abroad derive from the actions of humans, such as terrorist acts or wars. The author recounts the course of a natural disaster at one of her posts and the effect it had … Read more

Dr. Radu forcefully makes his point that there can be no half-way measures in understanding the nature of international terrorism. He discusses in particular three courses of action that should NOT be taken to meet the threat. A number of … Read more

The News and Observer, a daily newspaper in Raleigh, NC, recently in interview posed the question “who’s winning?” in the war on terror to two distinguished scholars of international affairs, both based at Duke University, Durham, NC. Their responses, as … Read more

The author, a retired U. S. Foreign Service officer, sets forth a thoughtful and thought-provoking analysis of the terrorism phenomenon, one that repays a careful reading. Without defending terrorist acts in moral terms, Nicolson raises questions about their efficacy and … Read more

Chaos theory, this editor has learned, is the qualitative study in mathematics and physics of unstable, non periodic behavior in deterministic nonlinear active systems. So there you have it. Chaos, then, is a state of uncertainty in a system that … Read more

The author has contributed a number of articles to this journal, above all on one aspect or another of life abroad in the Foreign Service. In the following commentary, he discusses the Suez Crisis of 1956 as seen from more … Read more

Review by Carl Fritz
Conflict and Confrontation in South East Asia, 1961-1965. By Matthew Jones. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. xxi, 325.)

by Bobbie Bergesen Once again the author brings her perspective to bear as a Foreign Service spouse, recounting this time her “break-in” experiences at her and her husband’s first post—Rangoon. For other of Ms. Bergesen’s illuminating commentaries on official life … Read more

by Ronald D. Palmer

by George P. Shultz The following is the text of a speech given on May 29, 2002, by former Secretary of State George P. Shultz on the occasion of the dedication ceremony for the George P. Shultz National Foreign Affairs … Read more