Safirka: An American EnvoyKent State University Press, 2000 - 241 pages Peter S. Bridges's service as an American ambassador to Somalia capped his three decades as a career officer in the American Foreign Service. Safirka, a frank description of his experiences in Somalia and elsewhere, offers pointed assessments of American foreign policy and policymakers. Bridges recounts his service in Panama during a time of turmoil over the Canal; in Moscow during the Cuban missile crisis; in Prague for bleak years after the Soviet invasion; in Rome when Italian terrorists first began to target Americans; and in key positions in three Washington agencies. In Somalia Bridges managed the largest American aid program in sub-Sahara Africa. He dealt with a postcolonial regime, hobbled both by traditional clan rivalries and by a leader who cared far less about Somalia's people and progress than about maintaining his control over that poverty-stricken, strategic - which soon erupted in civil war. |
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An American Envoy Peter Bridges. My question had come from simple curiosity , and I had not expected his question in return . I thought for a minute . " Yes , " I said , " I'd be interested . " " Good , " said Oakley . " Let me just tell ...
... question arose of renewing the principal American aid program in Poland , credit guarantees for Polish purchase of American grain , which amounted to a third of a billion dollars annually . I was told that the question had to go to the ...
... question of aid to Somalia . ( I did not ini- tially believe this report , but Siad Barre subsequently admitted to me that it was true - the fault of incompetent subordinates , he said . ) In any case , the Paris meeting had been ...
Contents
Scholar Soldier Someday Diplomat | 7 |
From Foggy Bottom to the Isthmus | 13 |
The Moscow Hand | 26 |
Copyright | |
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