What do you think?
Rate this book
Mr. Ambassador: Warrior for Peace
“Apartheid South Africa was on fire around me.”
So begins the memoir of Career Foreign Service Officer Edward J. Perkins, the first black United States ambassador to South Africa. In 1986, President Ronald Reagan gave him the unparalleled assignment: dismantle apartheid without violence.
As he fulfilled that assignment, Perkins was scourged by the American press, despised by the Afrikaner government, hissed at by white South African citizens, and initially boycotted by black South African revolutionaries, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu. His advice to President-elect George H. W. Bush helped modify American policy and hasten the release of Nelson Mandela and others from prison.
Perkins’s up-by-your-bootstraps life took him from a cotton farm in segregated Louisiana to the white elite Foreign Service, where he became the first black officer to ascend to the top position of director general.
This is the story of how one man turned the page of history.
So begins the memoir of Career Foreign Service Officer Edward J. Perkins, the first black United States ambassador to South Africa. In 1986, President Ronald Reagan gave him the unparalleled assignment: dismantle apartheid without violence.
As he fulfilled that assignment, Perkins was scourged by the American press, despised by the Afrikaner government, hissed at by white South African citizens, and initially boycotted by black South African revolutionaries, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu. His advice to President-elect George H. W. Bush helped modify American policy and hasten the release of Nelson Mandela and others from prison.
Perkins’s up-by-your-bootstraps life took him from a cotton farm in segregated Louisiana to the white elite Foreign Service, where he became the first black officer to ascend to the top position of director general.
This is the story of how one man turned the page of history.
576 pages, Hardcover
First published April 10, 2006
4 people are currently reading
52 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
September 11, 2016
For any person interested in international affairs and diplomacy, reading Ambassador Edward Perkins' biography is a must. It is insightful, honest, and really provides a fantastic view of what the early State Department was like under a variety of figures, including Henry Kissinger. There are so many lessons in here that are applicable to one's life and career--no matter which career someone is aspiring to.
Basically, prepare to be in awe at how much Ambassador Perkins has accomplished throughout his lifetime and all of the events he was able to witness, experience and ultimately transform. Ambassador Perkins begins his biography by detailing his early life growing up in a family of sharecroppers in the segregated South. From there, he moved to Oregon where he obtained a formal education before joining the U.S. Military. He was stationed in Korea before the Korean War and was later stationed in Japan right after World War II as a U.S. Marine. He writes of witnessing the country's transition and reconstruction after the war and witnessing General Douglas MacArthur's work helping Japan create a new Constitution.
Later on, Amb. Perkins received Masters and PhD degrees and served overseas with the U.S. Agency for International Development in Southeast Asia, including time spent working in Vietnam during the war. Later on he joined the State Department where he became an Ambassador in just 12 years, serving in Liberia and most notably South Africa where he was at the forefront of creating U.S. policies to dismantle South Africa's system of apartheid. I really appreciated the fact that for every country that Ambassador Perkins has lived and served in, he takes the time to really explain the histories and perspectives of the majority and minority ethnic groups within those countries (i.e. South Africa's Afrikaners, Australia's aboriginal population, Liberia's Americo-Liberians), what their goals are, their grievances, and anything that contributes to understanding these groups in order to best formulate U.S. policy toward those nations. After all, that's what diplomacy is.
Other accomplishments of the author that he writes about include serving as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, U.S. Ambassador to Australia, and Director General of the Foreign Service--a job in which he was directly responsible for creating sustainable programs such as the Rangel and Pickering Fellowships that increase the racial, religious, geographic, and socio-economic diversity of America's diplomats abroad.
Overall, this is a wonderfully written, and quite candid memoir that I would suggest to anyone interested in pursuing a career in diplomacy. Ambassador Perkins has an incredible amount of integrity and leadership that will inspire anyone reading his memoir.
Basically, prepare to be in awe at how much Ambassador Perkins has accomplished throughout his lifetime and all of the events he was able to witness, experience and ultimately transform. Ambassador Perkins begins his biography by detailing his early life growing up in a family of sharecroppers in the segregated South. From there, he moved to Oregon where he obtained a formal education before joining the U.S. Military. He was stationed in Korea before the Korean War and was later stationed in Japan right after World War II as a U.S. Marine. He writes of witnessing the country's transition and reconstruction after the war and witnessing General Douglas MacArthur's work helping Japan create a new Constitution.
Later on, Amb. Perkins received Masters and PhD degrees and served overseas with the U.S. Agency for International Development in Southeast Asia, including time spent working in Vietnam during the war. Later on he joined the State Department where he became an Ambassador in just 12 years, serving in Liberia and most notably South Africa where he was at the forefront of creating U.S. policies to dismantle South Africa's system of apartheid. I really appreciated the fact that for every country that Ambassador Perkins has lived and served in, he takes the time to really explain the histories and perspectives of the majority and minority ethnic groups within those countries (i.e. South Africa's Afrikaners, Australia's aboriginal population, Liberia's Americo-Liberians), what their goals are, their grievances, and anything that contributes to understanding these groups in order to best formulate U.S. policy toward those nations. After all, that's what diplomacy is.
Other accomplishments of the author that he writes about include serving as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, U.S. Ambassador to Australia, and Director General of the Foreign Service--a job in which he was directly responsible for creating sustainable programs such as the Rangel and Pickering Fellowships that increase the racial, religious, geographic, and socio-economic diversity of America's diplomats abroad.
Overall, this is a wonderfully written, and quite candid memoir that I would suggest to anyone interested in pursuing a career in diplomacy. Ambassador Perkins has an incredible amount of integrity and leadership that will inspire anyone reading his memoir.
May 1, 2021
An incredible book filled with remarkable insights and interesting stories.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews