The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project BROOKS WRAMPELMEIER Interviewed by: Charles Stuart Kennedy Initial interview date: March 22, 2000 Copyright 2004 A ST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born and raised in Ohio Princeton Uni ersity; American Uni ersity of Beirut, Lebanon Entered Foreign Ser ice - 1956 State Department - FSI - Staff Aide 1956-195, U.S. Army, Fort .no/; Holabird, 0aryland 195, State Department - I1A - E/ecuti e Secretariat 1952-1959 Beirut, Lebanon - FSI - Arabic Language Training 1959-1960 1i il war 0arriage Language school En ironment Amman, 5ordan - Political Officer 1960-1964 En ironment 5ordan labor mo ement .ing Hussein 5ews 5erusalem Palestinians Nasserism Ambassador 0acomber 5eddah, Saudi Arabia - Political Officer 1964-1966 8emen ci il war Nasser En ironment Tra el Riyadh capital 1 Royal family 1ontacts State Department - INR - Egypt Analyst 1966-1962 196, Arab-Israeli war U.S. policy State Department - NEA - Arabian Peninsula Affairs 1962-19,4 0ilitary programs Persian :ulf claims Berber issues Persian :ulf states British withdrawal 8emen ci il war Oil embargo Saudi Arabia issues .hartoum assassination Lusaka, ;ambia - Political Officer/D10 19,4-19,6 .aunda Economy Political organizations Rhodesia 1ongressional isits .issinger isit En ironment 5ohns Hopkins School of Ad anced International Studies [SAIS? - 0ideast Studies 19,6-19,, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates - D10 19,,-1920 Federation Iran Oil Abu Dhabi Fund Security U.S. military presence .uwait - D10 1920-1922 IraA-Iran war Political changes Oil policies Stock market bust Bisas Intermarriage Bubiyan/Carbah islands 2 State Department - NEA - Arabian Peninsula Affairs - Deputy Director/Office Director 1922-1924 Operation Staunch Iran-IraA war U.S. military presence IraA relations :ulf islands Emirates 8emen State Department - FSI - Professional Studies - Dean 1924-1926 0idle el course 1ourse of study National Car 1ollege 1926-192, Strategic 1oncepts De elopment 1enter [S1D1? Iran-1ontra Affair Persian :ulf Dhahran, Saudi Arabia - 1onsul :eneral 192,-1929 En ironment U.S. base Aramco U.S. na y Intermarriage Shias U.S. businessmen Saudi military Retirement 1929 USUN - New 8ork 1991 D;ionismE issue State F Declassification 1992 INTERVIEW ": Today is March 22, 2000. This is an interview with Brooks Wrampelmeier being done on behalf of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and I am Charles Stuart Kennedy. Brooks, can we start at the beginning. When and where were you born) CRA0PEL0EIER: I was born in 1incinnati, Ohio on September 2,, 1934. ": Can you tell me a little about your family) 3 CRA0PEL0EIER: 0y fatherIs family was of partly :erman descent. His grandfather had come o er in 1242 and settled in 1incinnati. His motherJs family was of Irish and New England stock. 0y motherJs family was primarily of New England, New 8ork 1ity, and .entucky origins. They had come to 1incinnati in the mid-19th century. ": Hence the Brooks. CRA0PEL0EIER: 8es, my motherIs maiden name is Brooks. In fact, her :randfather Brooks had come to 1incinnati from .entucky. 0y father was a third-generation painting contractor. He owned a business founded by his grandfather back in the early 1250s. 0y motherIs father was a na al officer, a 1902 graduate of the U.S. Na al Academy, who then left the Na y to marry his childhood sweetheart in 190,. They settled in the little suburb of 1incinnati called Cyoming where they were born. 0y parents li ed a few years in 1incinnati and when I was three they also mo ed to Cyoming. That is where I grew up and went through the Cyoming public school system. I should mention that Cyoming in the decade between 1945-55 produced fi e senior Foreign Ser ice Officers - Ste e Low, Tom Boyatt, .empton 5enkins, :unther Rosinus of USIS, and myself. Other graduates of Cyoming High School during this time included a future president of Princeton Uni ersity, a ice admiral in the Na y and a well known journalist, Bill :reider. ": Now that you are here I think we have interviewed all the people in the Foreign Service that you mentioned. Why Wyoming) CRA0PEL0EIER: Cell, Cyoming is a little town I would compare to 1he y 1hase, 0aryland. It is basically middle to upper middle class - a town full of people who worked as middle managers at places like Proctor and :amble or had their own business like my father. It had no industry and ery little commerce. Basically it is a bedroom suburb that has a ery good public school system. It still apparently has Auite a good school system. There may be other people in the Foreign Ser ice who came from Cyoming. ": What was your father-s educational background) CRA0PEL0EIER: 0y father went through the 1incinnati public schools and graduated from 1ornell Uni ersity in 1929. He was not the first in his family to ha e a college degree - his uncle had graduated from the Uni ersity of 1incinnati - but most of my fatherIs family had been painters and decorators, not college graduates. ": How about your mother) CRA0PEL0EIER: 0y mother went to a pri ate girlsJ school in 1incinnati and then graduated from Cells 1ollege, a small school for women in Aurora, New 8ork. ": Do you have any brothers or sisters) CRA0PEL0EIER: I ha e a brother and a sister who also went through the Cyoming 4 public school system. 0y sister Holly graduated in 1959 from what was then the 1onnecticut 1ollege for Comen in New London. She immediately married Floyd Chite, a U.S. 1oast :uard officer and maritime lawyer. They are now both retired and li e in Bodega Bay, 1alifornia. 0y brother is a graduate of the 1ollege of Cooster, in Cooster, Ohio. He is about 14 years younger than I and li es with his family outside of 1incinnati. I ha e three children. 0y eldest, Susan, was born in Beirut in 1959. She graduated from Pomona 1ollege in 1921, spending her junior year abroad at St. Andrews Uni ersity, Scotland. She then went to 1hrist 1hurch, O/ford for two years to study Arabic at the Oriental Institute there. She is married and has a little girl born in 1996. She and her husband work for a U.S. :o ernment agency. Both of my sons were born in Amman, 5ordan. The elder, Peter, born in 1963, li es in the 1hicago area where he has worked as a financial analyst for Hewitt Associates. He was an Army officer for a while after he graduated from Pomona 1ollege in 1925 and participated in Desert Storm with the 101st Airborne. The younger son, 1hristopher, born in 1964, majored in Arabic at Princeton on an Army ROT1 scholarship. He ser ed about three and a half years in :ermany as an air defense officer. Chen he left the army he went to the Uni ersity of Te/as, acAuired a law degree and is now a family law associate with a law firm in Amarillo, Te/as. He is married and has a teenage stepson and a little girl born in 199,. ": Back to your youth, were there discussions at the dinner table about what was going on, such as World War II, etc.) CRA0PEL0EIER: Cell, I followed it with interest. I donIt remember a great deal of discussion of public affairs at the dinner table. As my wife has commented, my family were fast eaters. But, I certainly remember being ery interested in the war. Chen I was in 4th grade somebody ga e me a little Rand 0cNally atlas and I would carry that book e erywhere and look through it when I didnIt ha e anything else to do. I became acAuainted fairly early on with what the world looked like. I donIt recall public affairs being particularly discussed although my father did take an acti e role in the ci ic life of our little community. He ser ed on the city council for 33 years, the last 13 of which he was mayor. He did not ha e any larger political interests than that. ": In elementary school in Wyoming, do you recall any of your teachers or favorite sub.ects) CRA0PEL0EIER: Oh, in high school I always liked history and English. 0ath and science were not my forte, IIm afraid. In the elementary school I canIt pick out anybody that I thought of ery highly, although they were good teachers. In the high school we had some ery good teachers. One was a former Na y officer named Ferol Betz, whom I think is still ali e in Cashington State. He was our teacher for American history and go ernment and also our debate and public speaking coach. He certainly was a ery dynamic person and probably contributed to some e/tent to those of us like Boyatt and myself who entered public ser ice. He didnIt ha e any particular interest in the Foreign Ser ice but simply helped to open our minds to what was going on in the world. Another important teacher was the late 0ary Lou 1ulp, who taught English and Spanish and 5 ser ed as our school guidance counselor. ": How about e/tracurricular activities in high school) CRA0PEL0EIER: 0y chief e/tracurricular acti ity was the debate club. Ce had a pretty good program and always did Auite well in state interschool competitions, often placing first or second. I should mention that in those days the Cyoming high school was not ery large. 0y graduating class had fewer than 50 students but by the time my brother came along 14 years later the classes had grown to 150. Still, we were Auite competiti e with a relati ely small number of students.