Missions of Peace | Moments of War
Nearly a quarter million Americans have served the United States as Peace Corps Volunteers, eighty of whom went on to become US ambassadors.
In its first generation alone the agency produced fifty future ambassadors, participants in some of the most dramatic global events of the last seven decades.
They stood up our embassy in Kabul after 9/11 and tracked down looted antiquities in Baghdad’s chaotic streets after the invasion of Iraq. Three endured 444 days of isolation, interrogation, and mock execution as hostages in Iran; several joined the US military’s CORDS program in Vietnam, dodging bullets during that war’s heaviest fighting.
One integrated her Maryland high school after Brown vs the Board of Ed, served with the first Peace Corps group in the Philippines, and represented the fledgling agency at JFK’s funeral.
Their profiles establish a narrative arc captured in the oral histories with the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. They cover the world, from hurricane cleanup in Central America and economic development on the Korean peninsula to negotiations with warlords in the Balkans and strongmen across Africa.
The sketches illuminate the deeply human side, like finding comfort in African village beliefs to grieve the loss of a newborn, or coping with the trauma of surviving a four-hour hijacking that ends in a crash on the Indian Ocean.
The research highlights links between Peace Corps service and diplomatic efforts, showing how the Volunteer experience shaped both individual careers and today’s Department of State. In so doing, it answers one of Kennedy’s key intentions behind establishing a Peace Corps in the first place: to strengthen the pool of candidates for the foreign affairs community. He spelled this out during a speech at San Francisco’s Cow Palace on November 2, 1960:
The key arm of our Foreign Service abroad are the ambassadors and members of our missions. Too many have been chosen—who are ill equipped and ill briefed.… Men who lack compassion for the needy here in the United States were sent abroad to represent us in countries which were marked by disease and poverty and illiteracy and ignorance, and they did not identify us with those causes and the fight against them.… How can they compete with Communist emissaries long trained and dedicated and committed to the cause of extending communism in those countries?
I therefore propose that our inadequate efforts in this area be supplemented by a peace corps of talented young men and women, willing and able to serve their country in this fashion for 3 years as an alternative or as a supplement to peacetime selective service.…
Was the initiative successful? If so, does it remain relevant? Should we spend half a billion dollars on community development abroad when so many communities at home struggle with poverty, drug addiction, and aging infrastructure? Do we still need a Peace Corps? The answers—all yes—can be found in the service of these Volunteers-turned-ambassadors.
I’ll be sharing some of their stories over the weeks to come.
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Ben East 