The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project AMBASSADOR WILLIAM B. MILAM Interviewed by: Charles Stuart Kennedy Initial interview date: January 29, 2004 Copyright 2019 ADST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born in Bisbee, Arizona, July 24, 1936 BA in History, Stanford University 1956-1959 MA in Economics, University of Michigan 1969-1970 Entered the Foreign Service 1962 Martinique, France—Consular Officer 1962-1964 Charles de Gaulle’s Visit Hurricane of 1963 The Murder of Composer Marc Blitzstein Monrovia, Liberia—Economic Officer 1965-1967 Attempting to Compile Trade Statistics Adventure to Timbuktu Washington, DC—Desk Officer 1967-1969 African North West Country Directorate Working on Mali and the Military Coup Studied at the University of Michigan Washington, DC—Desk Officer 1970-1973 The Office of Monetary Affairs Studying Floating Rates London, United Kingdom—Economic Officer 1973-1975 Inflation under the Labor Party The Yom Kippur War Washington, DC—Economic Officer 1975-1977 Fuels and Energy Office The 1970s Energy Crisis The Carter Administration 1 Washington, DC—Deputy Director/Director 1977-1983 Office of Monetary Affairs The Paris Club Problems between Governments and Banks Working with Brazil and the Paris Club Yaoundé, Cameroon—Deputy Chief of Mission 1983-1985 The Oil Fields of Cameroon Army Mutiny and Fighting Around Yaoundé Washington, DC—Deputy Assistant Secretary 1985-1990 International Finance and Development Fighting the Department of Defense on Microchip Manufacturing Dhaka, Bangladesh—Ambassador 1990-1993 History of Political Instability The Government in Dhaka and Awami League The Start of the Gulf War Operation Sea Angel Educating Women (Family Planning) Islam in Bangladesh Washington, DC—Special Negotiator for the Environment 1993-1995 Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) CSD Preparatory Meeting in Cartagena, Colombia Dealing with Desertification Final Meeting in Paris, France Monrovia, Liberia—Chief of Mission 1995-1998 Trouble in Liberia The Eruption of the First Liberian Civil War Protecting Non-American Refugees The Ceasefire Islamabad, Pakistan—Ambassador 1998-2001 Nuclear Proliferation of Pakistan Growing Concerns of the Taliban Conflict between India and Pakistan The Use of Information Technology in Diplomacy President Clinton’s Visit Retirement July, 2001 Post retirement activities 2 Washington, DC—Senior Policy Scholar 2003-2018 Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars INTERVIEW Q: Today is 29 January 2004. This is an interview with Ambassador William B. Milam. It is being done on behalf of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. I am Charles Stuart Kennedy. You go by Bill don’t you? MILAM: I do indeed. Q: What does the name Milam mean? MILAM: Well I don’t know if it means anything. It is an English name. My brother who is the family historian believes that the Milams came from a village in England near Norfolk which is spelled Mileham. Q: Ok, well Bill, let’s start sort of at the beginning. Can you tell me when and where you were born and we will talk a little about your family. MILAM: I was born on July 24, 1936, in Bisbee, Arizona. Q: My, that is real mining country there. MILAM: Bisbee, as I understand it, used to have one of the biggest copper mines in the world. My dad was not a copper miner. My Mom and Dad were always there temporarily, even though they stayed 6 years or so. They were there pretty much since early in the depression because my dad had lost his job in Santa Barbara, California, and was out of work for a year. But when he was re-employed by the Western Union Company, he was sent to Bisbee. My Dad had moved around a lot before they were married, and didn’t mind moving to new places, whereas my mom was a southern Californian from a young age and didn’t like moving, but they had no choice. I was not their first child; a girl was born dead in 1934, and my Mother never really got over that the rest of her life. Q: Let’s talk about the family. Can you talk a bit about on your father’s side, what do you know about them and your grandfather, grandparents and father MILAM: Well my Father’s family came from Indiana. I still have relatives there, cousins, second cousins and so forth. My dad was actually born in Illinois, raised in Illinois, but his father had come from Indiana. My Dad spent almost every summer in Indiana, so was close to the Indiana family. He and his father didn’t get along very well. So when he was about 16 or 17, he left home for good and went first to Oklahoma to learn how to be a telegrapher. Then he went from there to California where he worked in the 20’s and up 3 until the time the depression came along. He met my mother in the late 1920s, and they were married in January 1930. So he was basically a Midwesterner transplanted to California. He did not go back to the Midwest until I was a teenager; thus I never knew his father. Q: On your mother’s side, where did your mother come from and what was her background? MILAM: My mother was born in Truckee, California, and grew up in Santa Barbara. Her father and mother had moved to California probably at the end the end of the 19th century. They came from Arkansas, but there was almost no connection left to Arkansas. I don’t think my mother had ever been there. Q: What was your mother’s maiden name? MILAM: Pierce. Q: Do you know anything about her parents? MILAM: Well I knew her father, he was still alive when I was young. He lived until he was seventy died in 1949 or 1950. I remember him as a very good grandfather, kind generous, loving to his grandchildren, of which he had 6. A fantastic story teller; he kept us entertained for hours with his stories of his youth and of his wanderings after he left Arkansas and before he found the promised land -- California. We loved him a lot. He was tall -- I must have inherited my stature from my mother’s side because both my maternal grandfather and his son, my mother’s brother, were quite tall. But that is about all I know about him. Q: And your mother, what kind of education did she have? MILAM: Oh she was a quiet shy person, but accomplished enough to finish high school and be told she could go to college if she wanted to. If she did, however, the family wouldn’t have enough money to send her brother to college. So she said she would let her brother go, and went to work and then met my dad. Q: What type of work did she do? MILAM: I don’t really know. She worked at the Western Union in Santa Barbara which is where my dad met her, so… Q: Do you recall Bisbee at all? MILAM: No. They left when I was about a year old. Q: Where did they go then? 4 MILAM: We went back to southern California which is where my mom always wanted to be. They went first to Ventura, which is between Los Angeles and Santa Barbara. My dad worked for the Western Union, an obviously mobile profession and I think we spent 4 years there before moving to Santa Ana which is south of Los Angeles in Orange County. We were there when I went to kindergarten. We were there when the war started in December 1941, and my dad tried to volunteer for the military. Now I had by then two brothers and another on the way. The army recruiter would not take his application but told him that if he wanted to contribute to the war effort, he should go to work for the railroads. They were going to be critical in the need to ship soldiers and equipment back and forth. As he had a skill which the railroads could use, telegraphy, he quit the Western Union, and went to work for the Southern Pacific Railroad. The first thing the SP did was transfer him to eastern Nevada. Q: Oh my God. MILAM: That is what his family said too. Q: I don’t think there is anything in eastern Nevada. MILAM: There are a lot of little small towns, and the SP runs through them. He went to Wells, Nevada. My pregnant mother and we 3 children moved to Santa Barbara, back to live with her father in Santa Barbara. I started the first grade in Santa Barbara. Q: Do you recall Santa Barbara at all? MILAM: Just barely. I was in kindergarten there. I have memories of my first day in kindergarten, of playing around with different friends, but that is about it. Q: Did you go to Knott’s Berry Farm? MILAM: I have a vague memory of going there It must have been when my father was still with us. But that is about all I remember. Q: That strikes me looking at the map, Las Vegas, Carson City, Reno are all on the western side. MILAM: Wells is on the Eastern side. It was a small town. I finished the first grade there. It was not the only place in Nevada we lived because my dad kept getting transferred. So we lived for a year in Reno -- the West side of the state. Then we lived for a couple of years in Carlin which is also in the East, though a little further west than Wells but still on the eastern side.