The Foreign Service Journal, December 2004

nearly 20 years working overseas or on foreign policy assignments: namely, the systematic re-introduc- tion of Seminar participants to American society. When I entered the 11th Seminar, I was only superficially aware of the social, economic and political upheaval underway at home. I inter- preted State background papers and newspaper accounts in the context of my experiences during the Depression, World War II, the post- war boom and the Cold War. How surprised I was with the United States I encountered on Seminar vis- its to the Northeast, the Midwest, the new South, Texas and the Pacific Coast! Our meetings with political, business, labor, community and uni- versity leaders in Boston, New York, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Atlanta and Dallas introduced me to a coun- try I didn’t recognize at first. Night rides with the police in Chicago, Los Angeles and New York gave me insights into racial and social ten- sions that had been subordinated in my consciousness to my duties as a Foreign Service officer. We met amid the riots at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, the civil rights revolution fueled by the assassination of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and the dissen- sion spawn by the Vietnam War. In our posts overseas, these were issues that were somewhat academic: our immediate concerns related to for- eign policy issues. As a result, I truly had no perspective on the historic crisis that was transforming the country I sought to represent. Every session of the Seminar gave us additional opportunities to under- stand not only the interrelation of domestic and international relations but also the impact of domestic inter- ests on the conduct of foreign policy. My colleagues from all the other agencies of government made me aware of their differing insights in assessing domestic and foreign policy issues and led me to rethink many departmental policies and positions that I had previously accepted as not susceptible to challenge. Around the Seminar table, military members raised questions with their superiors about the strategy and tactics being employed in Vietnam. All of us probed senior government officials, academics and community leaders 10 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 4 L E T T E R S 2000 N. 14th Street Suite 500 Arlington, VA 22201 Telephone (703) 797-3259 Fax (703) 524-7559 Tollfree (800) 424-9500