Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project
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Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project JOHN J. (JAY) TAYLOR Interviewed by: Charles Stuart Kennedy Initial Interview date: April 25, 2000 Copyright 2016 ADST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born in Arkansas; raised in Arkansas and Tennessee Vanderbilt University National Security Agency - Trainee U.S. Navy - Aviation Cadet 1953 U.S. Marine Corps Marriage Entered Foreign Service - 1957 Accra, Ghana - Political Officer 1957-1959 Nkrumah Soviets Environment State Department - Foreign Service Institute 1959 Chinese Language Training Taichung, Taiwan - Chinese Language Training/Political Officer 1960-1965 Quemoy and Matsu Politics Chiang Kai-shek Relations CIA Republic of China [ROC] China intelligence Sino-Soviet split State Department - INR - China and Thailand 1965-1967 1 Mao Soviet-Chinese relations Vietnam University of Michigan - China Studies 1967-1968 Student attitudes Kuching (Borneo), Indonesia - Consul 1968-1969 Environment Sarawak and Sabah Borneo Peace Corps Hong Kong - Political Officer 1970-1974 Sino-Soviet split Vietnam China policies Mao Nixon/Kissinger China talks U.S.-China relations Lin Biao U.S. Peking recognition Taiwan Canton visit U.S. Peking mission (USLO) National Security Council 1975-1977 Kissinger China (PRC) East Asia U.S. forces in South Korea Carter Center - Diplomat in Residence 1990-1992 Iraq/Kuwait President Carter Micronesian Status Negotiations Team 1992 Pretoria, South Africa - Political Counselor 1977-1980 Namibia Soweto Reforms Apartheid negotiations Rhodesia Biko 2 Boycotts Mandelas “African Renaissance” Peking, China - Political Counselor 1980-1982 Soviets Taiwan Relations Deng Arms sales (Taiwan) Negotiations Environment Contacts Health Harvard University - Cox Foundation Scholar 1982-1983 China and India “The Dragon and the Wild Goose” State Department - INR - East Asia and Pacific Affairs - Director 1983-1985 Operations Interagency relations “Indigenous plane” issue MIAs Philippines China Windhoek, Namibia - U.S. Observation Team - Head 1985 State Department - Intelligence Coordinator – Deputy Assistant Secretary 1986-1987 Agency coordination Covert operations Afghanistan Iran-Contra Iran hostages CIA Director Casey CIA STASI’s Washington operation Taiwan’s nuclear program “Imbedded” agents Intelligence capabilities Embassy-CIA relations Havana, Cuba - U.S. Interests Section - Chief 1987-1990 3 Contras Radio Marti Angola and Namibia Africa CIA Defections U.S. Cubans Castro Operations U.S. policy Gorbachev Political refugee program Abrams Contacts Human rights Politics Relations Soviet Union Economy Reporting Reform Radio “jamming” USIA Nuclear issue Environment Film industry Congressional delegations Foreign embassies Drug trafficking Guantanamo Raul Castro Carter Center 1990-1992 Author, “The Rise and Fall of Totalitarianism” Gulf War State Department - Task Force 2000 1992 INTERVIEW PART I 1931-1952 4 Q: Jay, let’s start with your family background. TAYLOR: My father, along with a twin brother, was born on a farm close by the Strawberry River in the then entirely rural state of Arkansas. Having produced Wallmart and Bill Clinton the territory has now advanced beyond its previous Ozark image, or maybe not. The year was 1891. His mother, Fannie McCarroll, was a fine young woman of Scott descent, much younger than her husband, John Wesley Taylor. Diligent members of her clan have traced Fannie’s ancestors back to pre-revolutionary times, which is better than the Taylors have done. Her great grandfather, Nathaniel McCarroll’s birth year was 1765; the place: the British colony of North Carolina. Nathaniel’s father was John McCarroll, who in turn was son of Nathaniel and Elizabeth McCarroll - Fannie’s great, great, great grandparents, also of North Carolina. The eldest Nathanial’s will shows that he left his “negroes, Nan and Jacob,” his “plantation, one third of money and livestock, and one half of the household furniture” to Elizabeth, all of which was to pass to son John on her death. Another son, Thomas, received “2,000 lbs.” of what is not clear. Thomas also got a wagon, a whiskey still, and one half of the personal estate “except for the negroes and household furniture.” A daughter, Mary, was left “my negroes, Bet and Lilly,” one half the household furniture, and 1/3 of the livestock. Despite the reference to a “plantation” and four slaves, the family probably owned a farm that was moderate for the times. John seems not to have done as well as his father. When he in turn passed on, he divided his land between his sons Thomas and John Nathaniel. Only one cow went to “my son John Holoby” and one horse to Ruth. Possibly John Holoby was a stepson. Daughter Genrot, received “all that has been claimed by her,” probably a modest request. The origin of this daughter’s name remains a mystery. Perhaps she was born after 1776 and received an appellation in honor of the French ally. Judging by the will it seems her father had no slaves. We would like to think he was an abolitionist, but probably not. He had also lost the whiskey still. This, before the Whiskey rebellion. The first McCarrolls probably “came over” from Scotland a generation or so before the original Nathaniel and Elizabeth, or perhaps they were the first generation. No McCarrolls that I know of have searched Scotland in search of the roots. Back in the old country, they were probably simple but perhaps literate folk. Anyway, they had the gumption to make the dangerous journey to a new land and a revolutionary life. In 1781, the young John Nate McCarroll, then 16, volunteered for service as a private in a horse company in the Revolutionary War. He was a military scout on the frontier in Indian country and took part in several skirmishes, “none of any note,” he modestly reported. Andrew Pickens was his commanding General. Some years after the war, John Nate and his young wife Martha (surname unknown) moved their family to Kentucky. After a few more years, they hitched up the wagon again and trekked to the Missouri territory. They settled on Cooper’s Creek in what came to be Lawrence County in northeast Arkansas. “Strawberry River Country” they called it, near but not quite in the 5 Ozarks. I imagine even today it looks like the lowlands of Scotland with the highlands sleeping in the distant fog. The McCarrolls owned one farm of 160 acres and another of 80 acres. The family residence was about three miles south of what came to be the locally famed “Old Taylor Mill” on the Strawberry River. In 1833, Nathaniel received a Revolutionary War pension. He reputedly was a “prominent member of the Strawberry River community.” In 1835 both John Nathaniel and Martha died. Their property was divided between two sons, James and Thomas, a married daughter Elizabeth Steadman, and a grandson John Rhea McCarroll Jr. “in right of his father.” John Rhea McCarroll Senior presumably had passed away before his father, leaving only one son. John Rhea McCarroll Jr. was the 5th “John” in these American McCarrolls and possibly the umpteenth “John” since the heathen Scots accepted Christianity. John and his wife Elizabeth Davis made up for his father’s absence of many progeny. They had 15 children! After 32 years of marriage, brave Elizabeth died. John remarried and his new wife produced four more babies. The man was a population bomb. At the beginning of the Civil War, while married to Elizabeth, John enlisted in the Confederate Army for a year’s service. Six months after returning home, he signed up again. This was about ten years after their marriage and the couple probably had five or six children by this time. How Elizabeth managed is uncertain - slaves probably made it possible. John served with the 38th Arkansas under General Sterling Price. One account reports that he took part in “the raid on Pilot Knob,” Missouri - a skirmish we should apparently know about - and then in 1865 he surrendered with his unit. But another probably more accurate version reports that Federal troops captured him in July 1963 and while on a forced march to a POW camp he escaped by swimming a river. According to this account, he did not return to his unit but went home to Elizabeth a la “Cold Mountain.” He is shown in the records as having deserted. After the war, he became a successful farmer and cattleman. He and Elizabeth lie together in the McCarroll Family Cemetery near Anniesville, Arkansas, a name I’ve always liked. John and Elizabeth’s 11th child, Fannie, was born in 1868. When she was 18, she married John Wesley Taylor, who was 27 years older. John Wesley was born at Jessup, Arkansas in 1851, son of Joseph and Martha Finley Taylor, who had migrated from the Clinch River area of East Tennessee. My wife Betsy’s home is in this area of Tennessee - a small settlement called Lone Mountain not too far from Cumberland Gap of Daniel Boone fame. With a two story home and cars, Betsy’s family was the upper class of Lone Mountain. But until she was seven or eight they had no electricity or indoor plumbing. After eighth grade she moved to Kansas City to live with an Aunt and Uncle in the well- to-do section of the city. According to family legend, when Joseph and his sister Martha were coming of age in the Clinch River Valley they became estranged from a new stepmother. Joseph trekked west and after a few years ended up working on John and Elizabeth McCarroll’s farm in Arkansas. He sent for his sister, who soon after arrival married a McCarroll son. Joseph 6 married a local girl and they had three children, John Wesley, Margaret Amanda, and one other, before the young mother died. The casualty rate for women in those days was probably higher than that of the average Confederate platoon leader.