The Foreign Service Journal, April 2008

A P R I L 2 0 0 8 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 43 he subject of Len Shurtleff’s article, “A Foreign Service Murder,” is my late father, Alfred Erdos, and the circum- stances of his terrible story. Mr. Shurtleff makes many valuable observations. However, his article contains certain errors and omissions regarding the facts of the case. Moreover, there are some particulars of the story that Mr. Shurtleff does not, indeed could not, know. Finally, there are rumors and speculation surrounding the episode, which, sadly, have not dissipated. For these reasons, I feel obliged to break the family’s silence on this matter and offer what information I have. My father was born in 1924 to Hungarian immigrants in New York City. It was a Catholic household, and Father felt his religion very deeply. After World War II broke out, he volunteered for the army as soon as he turned 18. The Army sent him to Europe. However, due to a bureaucratic error, his war papers were lost in Washington; army command did not “know” that he was there. He followed the army throughout the Ardennes campaign, wondering why his orders to go to the front never came. Father received an honorable discharge in 1946. He had acquired a taste for travel, and returned to Europe briefly before enrolling in college on the G.I. Bill. After graduating from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, he decided to serve his country once more, and applied to the Department of State. After passing the lengthy exams, he became a Foreign Service officer in 1952. He pursued grad- uate studies in diplomacy at The Johns Hopkins University before being assigned abroad. During this period, Father met a woman with whom he began a relationship. However, she was not an American. The State Department did not allow FSOs to marry non- citizens at that time. In addition, she was not Catholic. They stayed together for many years; but ultimately, their rela- tionship ended when he met my mother. My parents mar- ried in 1968; it was his first marriage, her second. I was born shortly after, the first child for both. Father was anxious about his career. In the diplomatic corps, he was not always the most popular person at post. His military years had given him an appreciation for order, discipline and, above all, adherence to the rules. He gained a reputation as a tough, sometimes intimidating supervisor, a by-the-book perfectionist who also demanded perfection from others. He was frankly resented by some FSOs who were more accustomed to the hail-fellow-well-met Foreign H EART OF D ARKNESS A LFRED E RDOS ’ SON BREAKS THE FAMILY SILENCE TO SHED LIGHT ON THE TRAGIC EVENTS OF A UG . 31, 1971, IN E QUATORIAL G UINEA . T B Y C HRIS E RDOS Chris Erdos is the son of the late Alfred Erdos. Editor’s Note: A feature article in our October 2007 issue, “A Foreign Service Murder,” by Len Shurtleff, reviewed the trag- ic events of Aug. 31, 1971, the day administrative officer Donald Leahy was killed in Santa Isabel, Equatorial Guinea. Chargé d’affaires Alfred Erdos was subsequently found guilty of voluntary manslaughter in a jury trial in Virginia and sentenced to the maximum 10-year term. His appeal was denied by the Fourth Circuit in Richmond. Erdos was released on parole in late 1976, after about three years in prison, and died of a heart attack in California in 1983.