THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | APRIL-MAY 2025 89 cleavages that the Vietnam War caused at home. The author of Diplomats at War, Charles Trueheart, is the son of the DCM and godson of the ambassador, endowing the book with an immediacy and bittersweet resonance. Trueheart complements his knowledge of diplomatic life and the fateful events in 1963 Saigon with primary research, including Nolting’s archives and the author’s mother’s weekly letters home. Trueheart provides a captivating picture of the role of a Foreign Service family in a bygone era, when career diplomats had more autonomy to both shape and carry out policy and their families were deeply involved (Foreign Service wives used to be officially rated in the annual reviews of American diplomats). The author is very much a character in the book as a pre-adolescent, bicycling around Saigon as Buddhist monks set themselves afire and hiding under a table at a friend’s house as the battle to overthrow President Diệm raged around the presidential palace. Author Trueheart succeeds in avoiding the bias and partiality that one might expect toward his protagonist father, offering equally sensitive portraits of both men. He portrays clashing interpretations of what each player found essential in the diplomacy: loyalty (Nolting toward the erstwhile U.S. partner Diệm as well as a DCM to his boss) versus professionalism (DCM Trueheart, who came to view Diệm as a failing leader who was endangering U.S. interests). This book is particularly praiseworthy for its comprehensive use of and tribute to two important tools of diplomatic history—the State Department Historian’s Office and the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training (ADST), whose archive contains the oral histories of both Nolting and Trueheart, as well as other players. Trueheart’s research combines the best of academia and journalism (he wrote for The Washington Post for many years) as he tracks down participants and their descendants in that drama of some 60 years ago. In addition to capturing the personalities and quirks of such giants as President John F. Kennedy, Averell Harriman, Henry Cabot Lodge, and others, the author paints a fascinating portrait of the interagency process (notably the August 24 telegram from Washington that presaged Diệm’s overthrow). He describes diplomatic dilemmas that we continue to grapple with today: a diplomatic establishment that seeks to assert its authority over an increasingly dominant military, the relationship of State and the CIA, journalists who not only report but shape political and popular attitudes, and the embrace of “strong men” whose proclivities can end up undercutting the policies we pursue. The depiction of this chapter in history is as compelling and relevant as if it were spinning out in yet another crisis zone today. It is a terrific read on family and personal dynamics, an important addition to contemporary understanding of diplomacy during the Vietnam War, and an in-depth look at the practice of diplomacy (and the vicissitudes of a Foreign Service career). It is so evocative of an era, a place, and timeless conflict—both personal and public—that it would make a gripping movie. Laura Kennedy served as U.S. ambassador to Turkmenistan and the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva as a career Foreign Service officer. She is a member of the Secretary of State’s International Security Advisory Board. BOOKS Diplomacy: The Vietnam Crucible Diplomats at War: Friendship and Betrayal on the Brink of the Vietnam Conflict Charles Trueheart, University of Virginia Press, 2024, $24.95/paperback, e-book available, 368 pages. Reviewed by Laura Kennedy In the words of author Charles Trueheart, Diplomats at War is “a work of memory hiding inside a work of history.” This is a beautifully written book, rich with detail evocative of the Vietnam War era that illuminates the two central diplomatic actors—the U.S. ambassador to Vietnam, Frederick “Fritz” Nolting, and his deputy chief of mission (DCM), William Trueheart—as well as a sprawling cast of American and Vietnamese characters. The account is set in the fateful year of 1963, when U.S.-Vietnam policy lurched tragically toward all-out war. It culminates with the recall of Ambassador Nolting, who was seen as too sympathetic to the increasingly isolated and autocratic South Vietnam President Ngô Đình Diệm, and the subsequent coup against Diệm, which ended with his assassination and that of his powerful brother. An embittered Ambassador Nolting blamed his fall from grace on his deputy, a close friend from their days at the University of Virginia before they entered the post–World War II Foreign Service. The portrait of Ambassador Nolting and DCM Trueheart offers not only a fascinating look at a critical diplomatic relationship but also at the fracturing of a longtime personal relationship between the two and their families. This professional and personal conflict was later mirrored in the societal and political
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