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The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project AMBASSADOR CHARLES H. TWINING Interviewed by: Charles Stuart Kennedy Initial interview date: May 26, 2004 Copyright 2006 A ST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born and raised in aryland University of Virginia, %ohns Hopkins U. (SAIS) Operation Crossroad Africa Entered the Foreign Service in 1,-. Tananarive, adagascar/ 0otation Officer 1,-.11,-- Environment French influence Population AID 0elations State Department/ FSI, Vietnam language training 1,-- Dalat, Vietnam/ AID, Area Development Officer 1,--11,-2 Environment Development programs Hostilities Post1Tet environment ontagnards Vietnamese officials 0isk taking philosophy 3eneral comments on Vietnam 4ar Armed Forces Staff College, Norfolk, Virginia 1,-211,-, Defense Department/ National ilitary Command Center 1,-, 6iaison, State7Defense oon landing State Department/ Operations Center 1,-,11,80 1 Vietnam 4ar Cambodia invasion Opposition to Vietnam 4ar in State State Department/ Ivory Coast, Upper Volta, Niger Desk Officer 1,8011,82 French interests 3overnments Economy Desk Officer responsibilities arriage Abidjan, Ivory Coast/ Political Officer 1,8211,8. Houphouet1Boigny Council of the Entente International Conferences French presence Economy Ethnic population 3overnment State Department/ FSI, Cambodian language study 1,8.11,85 Duty with East Asia Bureau Task Force Bangkok, Thailand/ Political Officer 1,8511,88 Personnel 0efugees 3overnment contacts PO47 IA issue Cambodia Non13overnment Organizations (N3O?s) US troop presence Congressional testimony Khmer 0ouge Cornell University/ Southeast Asian Studies 1,8811,82 State Department/ Deputy Director, Australia7New Aealand 1,8211,20 0elations Issues uldoon 3overnment Indonesia Espionage case State Department/ Personnel, East Asian Bureau 1,2011,22 China assignments 2 Vietnam assignments Cotonou, Benin/ ChargC d?Affaires 1,2211,23 Communists Economy 3overnment Contacts 0elations Immigrants 6ibyans Soviets Environment Population Peace Corps Douala, Cameroon/ Consul 3eneral 1,2311,25 Commerce 3overnment French presence Failed coup Environment Peace Corps Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso/ DC 1,2511,22 AID Committee for the Defense of the 0evolution 3overnment Environment President Sankara Peace Corps French 6ibyans State Department/ Office Director/ Vietnam, 6aos D Cambodia 1,2211,,1 PO47 IA 0efugees Vietnamese New Eork ission Vietnam relationship Association of Southeast Asian Nations National 6eague of Families Vietnam?s international relations Prince Sihanouk French International Conference on Cambodia Congressional interest 3 UN involvement Khmer 0ouge Peacekeeping operations The new Vietnam Indochina 0econciliation Center ASEAN Tiananmen SFuare Voice of America Ambassador to Cambodia 1,,111,,5 (Initially Special 0epresentative, then ChargC d?Affaires) 0evival of Cambodia Prince Sihanouk and family 3overnment Khmer 0ouge Vietnamese Foreign 0epresentation UN Peacekeeping ission eetings with ASEAN AID Embassy operations Environment Elections Students Political Parties 0elations UN Special 0epresentative Akashi Secessionist ovement Coup attempt Sin Song Cambodia Peoples Party Ambassador to Cameroon and EFuatorial 3uinea 1,,511,,2 Embassy operations Foreign representation 0elations Economy Commerce Non 3overnment Organizations (N3O?s) French influence US evacuees EFuatorial 3uinea government EFuatorial 3uinea Oil American Oil Companies . Honolulu, Hawaii/ Political Advisor for U.S. Pacific Command 1,,212001 China Command organization China7Taiwan India7Pakistan Spratly Islands Korea Function Vietnam Spy plane (EP13) controversy Change of Administrations %apanese sub incident U.S. ission to the UN, New Eork (three separate missions) 200112003 State Department/ East Asia, Pacific Bureau/ 6iaison 2002 Khmer 0ouge Tribunal in Cambodia 0etired 2002 U.S. ission to the UN, New Eork (Advisor) 200212003 Non1Aligned Summit in Kuala 6umpur Post 0etirement 200. Peacekeeping Operation in Burundi ChargC d?Affaires in 6ome, Togo (2005) International delegation to 6iberia INTERVIEW ": Today is the 26th of May 2004. This is an interview with Charles H. Twining. This is being done on behalf of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. I(m Charles Stewart Kennedy. Do you go by Charles or Charlie) T4ININ3: Charlie. ": Let(s start at the beginning. Could you tell me when and where you were born, and a little about your family) T4ININ3: Sure. I?m a farm boy from aryland. y dad, grandfather, and his father, had worked a farm that my great grandfather bought with money that he made in the California gold rush. It?s in northern aryland. I was born and raised on the farm and participated in activities like .1H and the like. I found early on an interest in things 5 foreign/ starting with a postcard a passenger on a Trans1Atlantic cruise sent me just after 4orld 4ar II. I was intrigued. ": When were you born) T4ININ3: I was born in 1,.0. ": The Twinings came from where, originally, do you ,now) T4ININ3: They came from England. I think it was, perhaps the ship after the ayflower. They wanted to see how the ayflower did. ": How about on your mother(s side) T4ININ3: y father?s family were basically dirt farmers, and my mother?s family were educators and farmers. They were a mixture, probably, with as much English blood as anything else. ": Did your father get a higher education) T4ININ3: y father went to the tenth grade. He was needed on the farm. Starting from the age of five, he had to do farm chores every morning before school. y mother was the educated one. ": Where did she go to school) T4ININ3: After high school, she went to the aryland Institute of Fine and Practical Art and studied fine arts. ": Was your mother from Maryland, too) T4ININ3: Ees sir, both sides of the family are from aryland, Baltimore County. ": Do you have brothers-sisters) T4ININ3: One brother, younger, who grew up and made a career of the military. ": What ,ind of farm were you raised on) T4ININ3: 6ocated in a little place called 3len Arm, aryland, it was a mixed, general farm. 4e had about -0 cows, 5,000 chickens. 4e sold eggs. 4e did a lot of vegetable growing, everything from corn and tomatoes to rutabagas. It was a very general kind of farm. Family farms, in the past, on the east coast, didn?t have to be large. Eou had large families to provide the labor. It worked until my generation. - ": I assume you were intimately involved with the cows, the chic,ens, and the rutabagas. How did farming suit you) T4ININ3: There were a couple of things I liked. I had heifers as my .1H project. I had normal chores. 4hen I came home from school, I would have to take care of the chickens, feed them and gather the eggs. Those things were okay, but my epiphany came when I was about 12 years old. y father gave me a hoe and I was to hoe the tomato field. This was a field of about five acres. The temperature was something between ,0 and 100 degrees. I said to myself, as I had been out in the field for about three hours, II?m not going to do this all my life.J It helped orient me a bit. Here I am, over 50 years later, now ready to settle back on the old farm. ": Is the farm still going to be five acres of tomatoes) T4ININ3: No, not Fuite. 4hen my father and two brothers passed away, the farm was subdivided. The brothers and my dad all had children, so then it was further subdivided. 4hat I have is a great big barn, and sheds, and property where the farmhouse was, and some acreage of land. But, the farm still looks the same, with the back of the farm converted into a state park. 0elatives and others are working the land. ": How about schooling) Let(s start with elementary school. What sort of school did you go to) T4ININ3: y father was in the first class of a four1room rural school, which 35 years later, I attended as well. It was four classrooms for six years. It was nice. Pupils were farm children, basically. ": In elementary school, were there any particular courses that you loved) T4ININ3: Ees, anything involving social studies, geography, and history. Those were the things I really enjoyed. ": How many students were there in this four.room schoolhouse) T4ININ3: Oh, there were maybe 120 students, with two grades often in one room. ": I had some of this too. It sounds li,e a situation where you wondered how ,ids could learn, but often ,ids are pic,ing up things, and are often a grade ahead of themselves. /ou(re getting educated twice over. T4ININ3: I agree. I think you benefited in many cases. ": What about reading) Were you reading as a ,id) 8 T4ININ3: Sure, always. That was coming from my mother and my mother?s family, who were educators basically. Books were a very important part of their lives. y mother?s sisters always made sure I had lots of books to read. ": Well, you were an easy ,id to get presents for. T4ININ3: That?s true. ": I was the same. Where did you go to high school) T4ININ3: That was the change in my life. I went to a small junior high. Then, suddenly, a new high school was built in the suburbs of Baltimore. I went from being a country boy to a city kid. All the country kids sort of hung out together. The barriers started to break down, and the city kids would ask about how chickens really mated, and so forth. It was good for my educational process. ": In high school, were there any particular courses you li,ed) T4ININ3: I was fascinated, once again, by history. I loved French and had a wonderful French teacher. I will never forget a particularly wonderful English teacher who disregarded the curriculum that the county wanted her to teach. She had saved books from .0 years earlier that had been discontinued. She had us work on those books because she felt they were better.