The Foreign Service Journal, April 2018

52 APRIL 2018 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL DEFINING DIPLOMACY for YEARS Above inSILVERFOILonCover FSJ April 1939 The Lima Conference The Eighth International Conference of American States which met at Lima during December 1938 must be viewed against the background of world conditions in order to make a fair appraisal of its accomplishments. While fortunately the American Republics have been spared from the direct impact of tragic events in other parts of the world during recent years, those events inevitably have had a powerful influence upon the nations of this hemisphere. –George H. Butler, Department of State 1940 ~ 1949 FSJ March 1940 The Administration of the Neutrality Act Not only was the Department faced with the task of imme- diately preparing and promulgating varied and numerous regulations, but it also found itself flooded with a torrent of inquiries requesting immediate and definitive interpretations of the new law and regulations. Can airplanes purchased by a belligerent government be flown to Canada? Can goods be shipped on an American vessel to Bilbao for trans-shipment to France without transfer of title? CanWashington banks buy sight drafts on banks in belligerent nations presented by the embassies of those nations inWashington to cover their normal running expenses? –Charles Yost, assistant chief, Division of Controls FSJ January 1942 Army Air Corps Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses over New York City FSJ May 1942 Metamorphosis of the Foreign Service If anything were needed to hasten the metamorphosis of the Foreign Service into an organization adapted to the needs of war, our entry into the conflict provided the final impetus. …Whatever the conditions it may have to face, the Foreign Service by training and qualification is quickly able to meet the challenge. With the United States a full- fledged belligerent, the constructive diplomacy of peace has vanished, the everyday concerns of consular routine have yielded in importance to the new demands growing out of the emergency. Everywhere our officers are mastering hitherto unfamiliar subjects—priorities, allocation, foreign activities correlation, proclaimed lists. …The emphasis today is on matters in the economic sphere, a sphere that develops progressively as the struggle deepens. –Editor’s Column FSJ July 1942 America Through Axis Eye The attempts to belittle the United States generally fall into three categories: (1) disparagement of our morale, (2) emphasis of our “incompetence,” and (3) insistence on our desire to grow rich from the war. Most prominent is the first. –Henry S. Villard, Department of State FSJ May 1943 The Problem of Relief Abroad The question of providing a measure of relief and facilities for rehabilitation to suffering populations liberated from Axis control already is a real and pressing problem in North Africa and it may be anticipated that this problem will be multiplied a hundred-fold as the liberating armies of the United Nations deal final blows to the Axis on the Conti- nents of Europe and Asia and in the Islands of the Western Pacific. The problem confronting the world when the fight- ing ends area by area will be one of appalling magnitude. –Herbert H. Lehman, director of foreign relief and rehabilitation operations FSJ June 1945 The United Nations Conference on International Organization Opening a new chapter in man’s historic struggle to keep the peace, delegates from forty-six countries to the United Nations Conference on International Organization foregathered in plenary session on April 25, 1945, in San Francisco’s magnificent Opera House—itself a memorial to the dead of World War I. FSJ October 1945 The Berlin Conference While historians are able to cite parallels for practically anything, they will find it hard to point to a meeting in past history equal either in importance or in dramatic setting to that which President Truman had with Prime Ministers Churchill and Attlee and Marshal Stalin from July 16 to August 1 at Potsdam (officially designated as “The Berlin Conference”). The scene of the Conference was amid the shattered ruins of the capital of the defeated enemy. Three powerful allies met to decide the treatment to be accorded the enemy peoples and to discuss means of continuing in peace the collaboration which had been maintained so suc- cessfully during war. Every human being in the world had a stake in the success of the meeting. –George Allen, deputy director of the Office of Near Eastern and African Affairs