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Daily Archives: June 30, 2017

Raymond Davis Writes About How He Landed in Prison and Ignited a Diplomatic Crisis in Pakistan (Excerpt)

June 30, 2017 By in Contractors, Controversies, State Department, U.S. Missions Tags: , , , ,

Posted: 4:59 am ET

 

For three months in the early part of 2011, Raymond Davis was the biggest news out of Pakistan (see links below). This week, he released a book of his account from landing in Pakistani prison to igniting a diplomatic crisis.

Raymond Davis is a former United States Army soldier and military contractor who became the center of an international maelstrom after his involvement in a shooting in Lahore, Pakistan on January 27, 2011. Born and raised in Big Stone Gap, Virginia, Davis spent 10 years in the army, the last six of which he spent as a member of the Special Forces. After being discharged from the army in 2003 because of an injury, Davis worked as a private contractor providing operational security in Afghanistan and Pakistan. (via Amazon)

Leon E. Panetta, Chairman of The Panetta Institute for Public Policy writes: “Reading Ray’s account brought back a lot of memories about the difficult challenges he faced. The book is a tribute to those public servants like Ray who quietly do their job, put their lives on the line, and will do whatever is necessary to protect and defend their country. He is a silent patriot.” (via Amazon)

Excerpt below via Kindle Preview:

Clips:

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Secretaries of State: Present at the Creation, Present at the Destruction

June 30, 2017 By in Diplomatic History, Leadership and Management, Media, Political Appointees, Rex Tillerson, Secretary of State, Spectacular, State Department, Top Ranks, Trends Tags: , , ,

Posted: 4:18 am ET
Updated: July 2, 10:59 pm PT

 

LOOK WHAT WE FOUND  — via Amazon:

Dean Acheson joined the U.S. Department of State in 1941 as an assistant secretary for economic affairs. Shortly after the end of World War II, he attempted to resign, but was persuaded to come back as under secretary of state; Harry Truman eventually rewarded Acheson’s loyalty by picking him to run the State Department during his second term (1949 to 1953).

“The period covered in this book was one of great obscurity to those who lived through it,” Acheson wrote at the beginning of his memoirs, first published in 1969. “The period was marked by the disappearance of world powers and empires … and from this wreckage emerged a multiplicity of states, most of them new, all of them largely underdeveloped politically and economically. Overshadowing all loomed two dangers to all–the Soviet Union’s new-found power and expansive imperialism, and the development of nuclear weapons.” Present at the Creation is a densely detailed account of Acheson’s diplomatic career, delineated in intricately eloquent prose. Going over the origins of the cold war–the drawing of lines among the superpowers in Europe, the conflict in Korea–Acheson discusses how he and his colleagues came to realize “that the whole world structure and order that we had inherited from the nineteenth century was gone,” and that the old methods of foreign policy would no longer apply. Among the accolades Acheson garnered for his candid self-assessment was the 1970 Pulitzer Prize for history.

The passing decades confirm Dean Acheson’s place as the clearest thinking, most effective Secretary of State of the twentieth century. As a writer he has no equal since Thomas Jefferson first occupied the office in the eighteenth century.–Gaddis Smith, Yale University

 

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Trump Nominates Former TX Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison to be Ambassador to NATO

June 30, 2017 By in Nominations, Officially In, Political Appointees, Rex Tillerson, Senators, Trump Tags: , ,

Posted: 3:55 am ET

 

 

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