US Diplomats and Their Spouses during the Cold War: Americans Looking down on Australia and New Zealand

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This study examines 324 oral history transcripts and explains the recruitment, training, and deployment of US diplomats. Amid growing feminist hostility to Foreign Service treatment of spouses, some couples resented postings to distant Australasia but most enjoyed a welcoming English-speaking environment. While New Zealand assignments involved complex negotiations with Pacific islanders, diplomats in Australia were powerless to control the geopolitics of the Indian Ocean, including the fortification of Diego Garcia and peace negotiations threatening US Navy access to the port of Fremantle. When the Australian Labor Party won power in 1972 the vulnerability of vital military and intelligence facilities alarmed the US more than opposition to nuclear ship visits that removed New Zealand from the ANZUS alliance in the 1980s. Notable exceptions to a principal focus on diplomats below the highest ranks are Marshall and Lisa Green. After meeting John Stewart Service in post-1945 New Zealand they remained for years his loyal defenders against the assaults of McCarthyism. Lisa's interview implicitly but decisively refutes allegations that, as US ambassador to Australia, Marshall plotted the dismissal of the Whitlam government in 1975. Despite persistent rumors of a CIA coup, declassified cables reveal resident US diplomats' hostility to the governor general's unprecedented action.

Reviews

Anthony J. Barker is to be congratulated for his innovative approach based on 324 interviews conducted by the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training of foreign service officers and their spouses who served in the antipodes to explore trans-Pacific relations.... US Diplomats and Their Spouses During the Cold War: Americans Looking Down on Australia and New Zealand will be consulted by historians and political scientists for years to come.

This is an exceptional piece of work detailing the impact of American diplomats and their spouses on the trilateral relationship between the United States, Australia, and New Zealand.

Author Bio

Anthony J. Barker is senior honorary research fellow at the University of Western Australia.