The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project
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The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project AMBASSADOR PHYLLIS E. OAKLEY Interviewed by: Charles Stuart Kennedy Initial Interview date: March 8, 2000 Copyright 2004 ADST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born in Nebraska; raised in Nebraska and Missouri Northwestern University; Fletcher Entered Foreign Service - 1957 Marriage Resignation Khartoum, Sudan - Wife of Foreign Service Officer 1958-1960 Environment Southern Sudan Coup d’etat Washington, DC/New York, NY - Wife of Foreign Service Officer 1960-1963 Harvard University - African studies Abidjan, Ivory Coast - Wife of Economic Officer 1963-1965 Environment Living English instructor Shreveport, Louisiana - Foreign Service Officer Husband in Vietnam 1965-1967 American history instructor Paris, France - Wife of Foreign Service Officer 1967-1969 New York, New York - USUN - Wife of Foreign Service Officer 1969-1971 YWCA Beirut, Lebanon - Wife of Foreign Service Officer 1971-1974 Living environment Palestinians Washington, DC - Wife of Foreign Service Officer 1974 1 Reinstatement as Foreign Service Officer 1974 State Department - UN Political Affairs 1974-1976 Arab-Israeli relations State Department - Under Secretary for Political Affairs - Staff Assistant 1976-1977 Arab-Israeli relations Kissinger State Department - ARA - Regional Affairs 1977-1979 Philip Habib Panama Canal Treaty Mexico Kinshasa, Zaire - USIS (Tandem Assignment) - Assistant Cultural Affairs Officer 1979-1982 Wife of Ambassador Oakley Mobutu Exchanges programs Relations AIDS U.S. presence State Department - NEA/PAB - Afghanistan and Bangladesh Affairs 1982-1985 Afghanistan Capitol Hill - Senator Mathias Staff 1985-1986 State Department - Congressional Relations [H] 1986 Middle East issues Congressional travel [CODELs] State Department - Deputy Spokesperson 1986-1989 Secretary of State Shultz Operations Press corps Agency coordination Issues Islamabad, Pakistan - Spouse of U.S. Ambassador 1989 AID program Islamabad, Pakistan - USAID Staff 1989-1991 Peshawar Projects 2 Afghanistan Helmand project Environment The Bhuttos Iran Relations Gulf War Fundamentalism Economy Population State Department - Intelligence and Research - Deputy Director 1991-1993 Operations Yugoslavia Organization State Department - Refugee Affairs - Deputy Director 1993 State Department - Population, Refugees and Migration 1993-1994 Addis Ababa Conference Rwanda Donors Ex-Yugoslavia Haiti UN State Department - Population, Refugees and Migration - Assistant Secretary 1994-1997 Non-governmental organizations Vietnam State Department - Intelligence and Research - Assistant Secretary 1997-1999 Confirmation problems Operations Security flap Secretary of State Albright Morale Relations with Secretary of State CIA Intelligence quality Atmosphere Personnel Retirement 1999 Bush administration Carlucci report 3 Secretary of State Colin Powell Teaching Reflections INTERVIEW Q: To start with, tell us about where and when you were born and something about your childhood. OAKLEY: I have always said that I am a product of the Middle West. My whole family is from Nebraska and both my parents were born in the same little town, West Point, in the eastern part of the state. I was born in Omaha in 1934 and we moved shortly afterwards to Lincoln. My father had just been hired by the Rawlings Sporting Goods Company, which makes basketball, football, and baseball equipment, as a salesman. When he was promoted and given a new territory, we moved to Columbus, Ohio where we lived from 1939 to 1943. My mother was a math and chemistry major at the University of Nebraska and became a high school teacher of both subjects. When she married she, of course, had to quit, which was the norm in those days. During WWII, she was recalled when all the male math and chemistry teachers were drafted. Before joining Rawlings, my father had been a high school coach and American history teacher. He also graduated from the University of Nebraska, where he had been a star athlete. My father’s family had migrated to Nebraska right after the Civil War from Pennsylvania; they were Pennsylvania Dutch. My mother’s family was German from Prussia, and had immigrated after Bismarck expanded conscription in 1870. Many of that family stayed in Wisconsin; others went further west to Nebraska. My maiden name is Elliott, which came from Scotch-Irish ancestors who came through the port of Philadelphia in the early 1800s, as many leaving Ulster did. That first Elliott forefather married into a Pennsylvania Dutch family, which had immigrated probably in the mid- 18th Century and had fought in the Revolutionary War. The fact that this surname has two Ls and two Ts indicated that the family had come from the Scottish lowlands, and probably then on to Northern Ireland, and not from England. I had one brother, who was four years older. He was very much like my mother’s family and interested in machines, so he went to Purdue and became an engineer. My father’s family had always been interested in politics and in public affairs. My grandfather Elliott was for a while the county attorney of Cumming County, where West Point, the little town both my parents were from, is located; he came West after the Civil War to teach school. He had graduated I think from a small Pennsylvania college or maybe the University Of Pennsylvania and had studied law with an older relative to become an attorney. One year, he ran for Congress as a Republican, but lost, probably in a William Jennings Bryan landslide. This small town, West Point, has always reminded me very 4 much of River City of “Music Man” fame. It had two or three thousand inhabitants principally from three ethnic groups: the Scandinavians, the Germans and the Bohemians. The town was split in two by religion: the Protestants (Scandinavians and the northern Germans) and the Catholics (southern Germans and the Bohemians). My family was all Protestant. There are wonderful stories about the little town of West Point. My grandfather did not have a great many educated friends. He and the Catholic priest were probably the two most educated men in town and in the evening they liked to sit on the front porch to discuss affairs of the world. The fact that a Protestant and Catholic seemed to have such good rapport raised some concern in the town! They were told not to continue! In the late 1990s, Bob and I were invited to Katherine Graham’s 80th birthday party. We had been friends for many years in Washington. Warren Buffett, who was a major investor in Graham’s Washington Post, was also at the party. He had helped the Grahams with financial and business advice, as Katherine Graham noted in her autobiography. I was anxious to meet Buffett again because his mother and mine had grown up across the street from each other in West Point. His sister had been in college at the same time I was, so our two families have had some connections over the years. During the party, Buffett and I conversed about our old houses and families. He told me that his grandfather was the publisher and editor of the West Point Democrat - I told him that my grandfather had been the editor and publisher of the West Point Republican. We all roared with laughter and wondered about flapping wings overhead! Back to the main narrative - by the end of 1942, all athletic equipment manufactured in the United States was commandeered for the armed forces and that made salesmen surplus. Athletic teams of whatever sort had to make do with what they had My father was moved into the home office of Rawlings, St. Louis, Missouri, and we moved there in the summer of 1943. During the war, it was difficult to find houses but my parents found one in a small suburb called Brentwood, which was where I grew up Q: Tell us a little about your home life. OAKLEY: My parents were always very active in community affairs. My father knew something about education and did not feel that the schools in Brentwood were very good. So he ran for the school board, served many years, and eventually was elected president. He handed me my high school diploma! He was also very active in the Congregational church; he sang in the choir, and was on the Board of Elders. He also belonged to a variety of boards around St. Louis. My mother was the president of the PTA, as well as president of the women’s church organization. So I grew up in a family that was very involved in its community. My grandmother Elliott, wife of the editor of the West Point Republican, had become a widow in middle age with children to get through college. Through her Republican connections, she was appointed Postmistress of West Point, which helped her to finance the college educations of her four sons, though not her two daughters. She was very 5 active in Nebraska’s Republican Party and I think at one time she had done some work for Harold Stassen. So my brother and I grew up in an atmosphere which was very positive about involvement in politics at the local and national levels. I was always fascinated by history and public affairs; at the movies, where we all went a lot, I loved Time Marches On and other newsreels. Our close neighbors pointed out to me one day that the United States had a diplomatic service; I said that I didn’t know anything about it. The neighbor contacted her brother-in-law who was a Congressman from southern Missouri and asked his office to have some material on the State Department sent to me. This was about 1946 or 1947 when I was about twelve. I can remember lying on my shag bedroom rug, reading through the sample Foreign Service test that had arrived. I also read about what the life of a diplomat might be. I was impressed by how tough and comprehensive the exam seemed to be and I could not imagine I could never pass it.